Official Languages Committee on Sept. 22nd, 2022

[Alex Silas]

For many of them, English is their second language, but they appear to be more at ease communicating in their mother tongue, their indigenous language. It's important to recognize the value of this to the federal public service. Recognition is also needed for the fact that it is part of our commitment as a country and a government to reconciliation with indigenous peoples.

[Patricia Lattanzio, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Do you have any studies about this whole issue of indigenous languages, data, studies, or statistics that you could provide to the committee?

[Alex Silas]

Various statistics have indeed been established by the joint committee. I can tell you that at least 450 workers were identified as having to communicate in an indigenous language. It's absolutely essential in these communities to be able to provide services in the local population's language, which is more comfortable communicating in their indigenous language.

[Patricia Lattanzio, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

I understand, based on what the chair said, that you are from the most beautiful province in Canada. I'm from the province of Quebec.

Do you have statistics or data about the use of French or English in the federal public service?

[Alex Silas]

Do you want statistics for New Brunswick or the whole country?

[Patricia Lattanzio, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Statistics for New Brunswick and Canada.

[Alex Silas]

Quebec is also a very beautiful province, it would seem.

[Patricia Lattanzio, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Yes, the most beautiful.

[Alex Silas]

We can get you the statistics, but I know that New Brunswick is a proudly bilingual province. Most of the people in New Brunswick frequently communicate in both languages, sometimes at the same time.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Thank you, Ms. Lattanzio. That's all the time you have.

Mr. Beaulieu will be asking the next questions.

Mr. Beaulieu, you have two and a half minutes.

[Mario Beaulieu, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

As for the Public Service Alliance, about 40% of francophone workers are not comfortable working in French. So it's difficult when the common language in a working environment is the one used by everyone to communicate. Generally speaking, I think English is used, as we heard in the testimony. So it's clear that people are not necessarily at ease speaking French.

If the government were to do something in the regions where there are lots of francophones to ensure that French was used as the main language of work, do you think that might have a beneficial impact?

[Alex Silas]

Thank you for your question.

It is in fact true that the main language of work in the federal public service is English. Everything is initially written in English and then translated. It's not done in French. Concrete measures are required to ensure that the information provided in French to the workers is more than a mere translation. The level of bilingualism among managers and senior officials leaves a lot to be desired. When agencies and departments are reorganized, francophone employees may find themselves being supervised by unilingual anglophone managers. That means that these workers lose the ability to communicate in the language of their choice.

[Mario Beaulieu, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Do you think that senior officials and managers should be required to be proficient in French and bilingual, as was proposed by the Commissioner of Official languages? Do you feel this would be a worthwhile proposal for bill Bill C-13?

[Alex Silas]

I would say so. It's best to deal with things head on and to set a good example, and one of the best ways of doing that would be for senior management to be trained to be able to communicate effectively with workers in both official languages.

[Mario Beaulieu, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

As for…

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

You have 15 seconds left, Mr. Beaulieu.

[Mario Beaulieu, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

In that case, I'll let you have the last word, Mr. Silas.

[Alex Silas]

Access to training needs to be enhanced. Managers must be able to communicate with workers in both official languages.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Thank you, Mr. Silas.

We have now got to the final round of questions.

Ms. Ashton, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Normand, in February, you said:

By referring to part VII of the Official Languages Act… we think that [the federal government] could use its spending authority to ensure that postsecondary educational institutions… have the funding they need fulfil the various missions that are helping the federal government achieve its own objectives...

You believe that this would give the government the latitude to intervene directly in financing the mission of higher education institutions. Is that right?

[Martin Normand]

Yes, we definitely think that the federal government could do that. It is already doing it in the field of research, moreover, through the granting agencies. Money is given directly to researchers in our institutions to conduct important research projects that produce convincing data that can be used by the communities, the researchers and governments.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB]

In negotiations with the provinces, both parties must accept the language clauses to ensure that they are in the agreement. If negotiations become deadlocked, the francophone communities should not be the ones to pay the price.

Do you think the federal government should intervene directly to support service offerings, in education for example, by funding the French-language educational mission in postsecondary educational institutions?

This ties in somewhat with what I asked you previously, but I want to emphasize the fact that the federal government needs to act directly to protect and promote French-language education.

[Martin Normand]

Yes, absolutely. That's why we say that for things like the current envelope for postsecondary education, which could become permanent, the right mechanism needs to be found to allow provinces to sit at the table, without preventing the federal government from directly supporting our institutions so that they could fulfil their important mission of fostering the growth and development of francophone institutions in Canada, a commitment made by the federal government itself.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Thank you, Mr. Normand and Ms. Ashton.

On behalf of the committee, I'd like to thank the representatives of the Association des collèges et universités de la francophonie canadienne and the Public Service Alliance of Canada for having taken the time to come and testify today.

If you believe that there is other important information that would be useful to us, please don't hesitate to send it in writing. It would be given the same level of consideration as your testimony here today. If so, please send this additional information to our clerk, who will then distribute it to all members of the committee.

Thank you very much.

We will now suspend the meeting to prepare for the second hour with the next group of witnesses.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

We are now reconvening the meeting.

Unfortunately, the second hour of the meeting will be shorter than expected because of some technical problems we have been experiencing.

We will now welcome Ms. Marie-Nicole Dubois, the Vice-President of the Fédération des francophones de la Colombie-Britannique, who will be joining us by videoconference.

Ms. Dubois, You're going to have five minutes for your presentation. After that, committee members will in turn be able to ask you questions to which you can reply.

You now have the floor.