Official Languages Committee on Feb. 9th, 2022

[Raymond Théberge]

In my opinion, it is clear that the current situation indicates a systemic problem within Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada. With the recruitment of foreign students in particular, there is certainly a problem when applications from certain countries, especially those in Africa, are systematically refused.

I can draw on my experience as a former rector who recruited from those countries. Very often, we waited a long time to obtain study permits.

If we are serious about selecting French-speaking candidates, we must certainly look at French-speaking countries.

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

Exactly.

From your experience in your previous job, do you think our communities would get positive results by targeting all French-speaking countries in general, or even certain regions or countries in particular?

[Raymond Théberge]

As I said earlier, it is important to recruit where the francophones are. To do that, we should perhaps broaden the traditional pool. Actually, very often, foreign students apply for permanent residency. If so, they then help to increase our workforce.

So we have identified the problem. Now we have to find solutions.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Thank you, Mr. Commissioner.

Thank you, Ms. Ashton.

The floor now goes to Mr. Godin for five minutes.

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to go back to my question from earlier. I moved quickly, because, as you know, in committee, we do not have a lot of time.

So, let me go back to your statement. The federal government has concluded agreements with all provinces except Ontario. However, as you see it, these federal-provincial-territorial agreements do not provide for a proper proportion of child-care spaces for francophone communities in minority settings.

You mentioned earlier that you had met with the Minister of Official Languages. Did you discuss this situation with her?

[Raymond Théberge]

I don't think so, but perhaps my recollection is inaccurate. At our meeting itself, I don't think we addressed that.

In any event, it is clear that, in the future, we will need to have language provisions in the FPT agreements to ensure that the communities—

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Mr. Commissioner, I'm sorry to interrupt you, but my time is very short. You answered my question: you met with the Minister, but, as far as you recall, you did not address the situation.

Mr. Commissioner, let me remind you that you told my colleague Ms. Kayabaga that the next Official Languages Act must meet the needs not only of today, but especially of tomorrow. So let me remind you of some chronology.

In June 2021, Bill C‑32 was introduced. Parliament was dissolved in July. In August and September, we were in an election campaign. In October, the Cabinet was formed and decided to give itself 100 days to table a new version of the bill. Then along came the holiday season, and we understand that. It is now February 2022.

I asked you earlier whether we should move quickly to pass this new bill. You just said that when you met with the Minister, you did not deal with the child care agreements. You told me earlier that we need to pass the bill quickly.

Could you give me your definition of “quickly”?

[Raymond Théberge]

In the process of getting legislation through Parliament, when we say “quickly”, we have to understand that it can take 18 to 24 months for a bill to receive royal assent, unless it receives the support of all parliamentarians.

When I talk about the need to move quickly, I mean that it is important for the government to introduce a bill quickly. Once the bill is tabled, the legislative process can begin.

It is difficult for me to say what a quick legislative process is, because it depends a lot on the committee work.

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Mr. Théberge, I have a great deal of respect for you. My goal is not to catch you out or trip you up. However, I feel that this is a very important bill and that, once it is passed, you will either be a victim of it or you will be better equipped because of it.

So, I feel we need to take the time to do things right and make good amendments so that you can see some results. You said yourself that there are no results at the moment.

Bill C‑32 was introduced, but you said that it had no teeth. So we have to give ourselves the means and the time to do things right.

Let me ask you again: do we have to pass this bill quickly?

[Raymond Théberge]

I think we must take the time we need and make sure that the bill will meet the needs not only of today, but also of tomorrow.

As to how quickly we need to act, of course, I will leave that to the Minister and the government to judge. I think some have said that they are willing to wait, but I don't know what that means in terms of time. Until the bill is tabled, we're still waiting and the clock hasn't started ticking yet.

So “quickly” does not necessarily mean the same thing to me as it does to you.

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

No, it does not.

When you do things quickly, you forget details and you take shortcuts. Several examples probably come to mind. That was the point I was making when I was talking about the need to pass a bill quickly.

As I said at the outset, this bill is historic. It lays the groundwork for protecting, let's be honest, French in particular for the next 50 years. Canada is a bilingual country, until we are told that it isn't, so we must give ourselves the tools we need.

I will go—

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Thank you, Mr. Godin.

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Théberge.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Ms. Lattanzio, the floor is yours for five minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Going back to you, Mr. Théberge, obviously you know that I'm an anglophone from Quebec, and I wanted to perhaps ask you about the complaints you have received. I understand there are about 1,000 per year. You mentioned 50,000 before, and I imagine that's over the lifespan of more than 10 years. If we were to average it out, it's more or less about 1,000. Give me an idea of the nature and the quantities of complaints you have received over the course of the last three or four years, specifically from Quebec. What would they be?

[Raymond Théberge]

That would basically be with respect to receiving services in the language of your choice. More often than not that would be French.

We have had a number of language of work complaints, but the vast majority have to do with receiving services from federal institutions in the language of their choice.

There's an array of institutions that are, for lack of a better word, guilty of those behaviours, and it hasn't changed much over time. For example, this year we had a significant number of complaints from Quebec, but from across the country as well, with respect to the Air Canada CEO giving a unilingual speech.

It is often with respect to communications in the language of one's choice.

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

Okay.

Before us we have different groups that come to speak to us, and I'm sure you're very much familiar with QCGN. They have presented to us their queries, their worries. One of the comments that come back again and again is their saying that the modernization of the official languages is doing really two things. It is creating new language rights for only one language to the detriment of the other in Quebec, and it is saying that the proposed bill is not doing much to fix the problems of part VII of the act.

I just wanted to have your opinion on those two issues.

[Raymond Théberge]

With respect to the first issue you raised, you're referencing legislative asymmetry, which seems to be part of Bill C-32. The goal of Bill C-32 is to achieve substantive equality, and I think those two concepts are quite different. Substantive equality is well defined by the Supreme Court in terms of how we can achieve substantive equality between linguistic communities. It doesn't mean we have to do the same thing for each community. Legislative asymmetry means that you bake into the legislation rights for one group and not for the other.

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

Exactly. That seems to be the worry.

[Raymond Théberge]

I really understand the worry of the English-speaking communities of Quebec. To reference a previous speaker, if we're going to take more time to make sure we table a piece of legislation, I think the government has to revisit and rethink this whole question of asymmetry. In one way, how can we ensure that both linguistic communities are well represented and well defended in this new bill?

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

What about with regard to the issue of not fixing the issues with part VII of the act?

Or have we missed the boat on that with regard to the projected law?

[Raymond Théberge]

One of the problems is that the law as it was written did not counter the Gascon decision. However, we had a Federal Court decision in January that basically countered the lower court decision.

For part VII, we probably need a regulation to talk about the obligations of various institutions, like, for example, Immigration, StatsCan and Canadian Heritage. Those institutions have a role to play in the development of official languages in minority communities. We should specify these obligations within a regulation to deal with, for example, the concept of positive measures and to define a number of these things. Right now the broad principles are there, but when it comes to the application, we have to look on the regulatory side.

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

We need to be able to divvy up regulations.

[Raymond Théberge]

Yes. I think to support part VII, we need a regulatory framework.

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

On what—