Official Languages Committee on Feb. 26th, 2024

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

Thank you, Ms. Pelletier.

As you said, that initiative was interrupted by the pandemic. Is the real issue a lack of funding or a lack of leadership and drive? I would call that a speed meeting event for entrepreneurs so they can do business elsewhere.

Shouldn't that be reactivated? Couldn't the Edmundston Region Chamber of Commerce take the lead on that?

[Cathy Pelletier]

It absolutely could.

I referred to funding. As far as I know, because I was also on the committee, there are still some funds. So the main reason isn't necessarily a lack of funds. As you mentioned, it's also a question of leadership.

That said, to be a leader, you need to have support. One person alone can't take care of everything. Yes, the Edmundston Region Chamber of Commerce could do that, if it had the support of its colleagues in the region.

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

Thank you, Ms. Pelletier. In fact, it's probably a question of willingness on the part of the business community to mobilize and put in place the necessary means.

I'm now going to head for western Canada.

Mr. Fortin, your story is impressive. You were born in Quebec—we're very proud of that—you left and travelled across Canada. You return on occasion and your children speak to their grandparents in French. Continue to encourage this relationship.

You have imported to western Canada a product from New Brunswick that is a fine Canadian trademark, or rather eastern Canadian trademark, and one that is dear to us. You successfully developed this business.

What obstacles have you encountered? What would you ask us to put in place to help young people who want to follow exactly the same path as you—that is go to the east coast, the west coast, the centre and the North of the country so that the francophonie serves economic development and is a positive element for our official language minority communities?

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Please respond in 15 seconds, Mr. Fortin.

[Roch Fortin]

We need to work together, not in isolation. I hear about New Brunswick and all the other regions, but we need to bring all of the people together so they can talk to each other. Right now, we're talking about exporting products that we've created here in Quebec. This shows the importance of working together.

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

Thank you, Mr. Fortin. I'd like to ask you more questions, but my colleague can continue.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Thank you, Mr. Fortin.

Mr. Iacono, you have the floor for six minutes.

[Angelo Iacono, Liberal, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I thank the witnesses for being here today.

Ms. Pelletier, I want to come back to the questions my colleague opposite raised.

You said that it was possible to revive the initiative you were talking about, but that you would need support. You mentioned the two levels of government—presumably they'll help—but would other organizations be willing to help you move forward?

[Cathy Pelletier]

Yes, absolutely. These are mainly municipalities, some in Quebec, of course, but also others in the state of Maine, where we already have good collaboration. There's also the Réseau de développement économique et d'employabilité du Nouveau-Brunswick, whose representative testified before you earlier today. These people are also very important in this process. Then, the RCMs of Quebec, those of our region, of course, have also been important partners.

So, yes, it's not just the two levels of government. There are also the municipalities in the regions concerned and the organizations that are primarily involved in economic development, such as Opportunities New Brunswick and the Conseil économique du Nouveau-Brunswick.

[Angelo Iacono, Liberal, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

All right.

You also said that some funding would be welcome. Can you tell us if there's a strong will for the French language to continue to exist and grow? Is the will weak or only apparent? Do people express themselves and act in a way that suggests such a will?

[Cathy Pelletier]

Yes, absolutely. There's certainly a will, and it's not just apparent. It's important. We're not just saying we want the French language to persist in business.

[Angelo Iacono, Liberal, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Thank you.

Mr. Fortin, British Columbia is the only province in Canada with no French-language services legislation. Yet it has just launched its French-language services policy.

Can you tell us about this new policy? Are you satisfied with it?

[Roch Fortin]

We work very hard, but I must point out that we work a lot on the English side, because that's where we do business.

I don't know much about the new law. However, I have received support for my children's education in a French-speaking environment, and that has been very beneficial.

I'm sorry if this isn't the answer you were looking for, but I'm not familiar with the new law.

[Angelo Iacono, Liberal, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Thank you.

Do you feel that the provincial government offers enough support to French-speaking entrepreneurs, like you, who start businesses?

[Roch Fortin]

I have to say that it was very difficult to explain to the provincial government that we were an agrotourism business. Our raw material didn't come from the province of New Brunswick; we had a hard time explaining to officials that, yes, maple syrup comes from eastern Canada, but that we had used it to create 20 other products, including granola, mustard, barbecue sauce, in short, all things that are very popular.

[Angelo Iacono, Liberal, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Fortin.

Mr. Vaillancourt, what has been the impact of federal language policy on official language minority communities?

[Prof. François Vaillancourt]

I think we need to distinguish between two types of policy. On the one hand, the recognition of the right to minority-language education, found in the Constitution Act of 1982, has created a foundation that may not be as secure as it could be, but still ensures important fundamental rights. What's more, it is the main source of provincial spending on minority language policy.

On the other hand, federal policy creates opportunities for French-speaking minorities outside Quebec—they are often more bilingual than French-speaking Quebeckers—to work for the federal government in Ottawa. We see this quite often. So these opportunities further the maintenance of the French language, and that's interesting, in my view.

We were talking about Spanish and French. What about our international trade policy of opening up to different countries? Surely, being open to Africa is positive, but let's be honest, English is the language of international trade. So that's much less important.

I would say to you that maintaining human capital through basic education rights is the interesting question that is never really asked. You'd have to look at the interaction between post-secondary training in French and the use of human and linguistic capital in the labour market. This question, I think, has perhaps not been studied. Yet the federal government could do so; it has a certain role in post-secondary education through research funds, or via your committee.

[Angelo Iacono, Liberal, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Vaillancourt.

Mr. Chair, I think my time is up.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

You have less than 10 seconds left. Thank you very much, Mr. Iacono.

The second vice-chair of the committee will ask the next questions.

Mr. Beaulieu, for the Bloc Québécois, the floor is yours. You have six minutes.

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

Thank you.

My question is for Mr. Vaillancourt.

We have had as a witness the Provincial Employment Roundtable, or PERT, whose studies revealed that anglophones in Quebec are more exposed to unemployment and that there are more of them below the poverty line. Anglophones are poorer overall than francophones.

To arrive at these conclusions, they used the variable “person's first official language spoken”, which includes around a third of immigrants to Quebec; first nations people were also predominantly included as anglophones. They also used the median, which, let's say, removes some of the economic disparities and therefore favours anglophones more in this type of comparison.

What do you think of the situation and of this kind of methodology?

[Prof. François Vaillancourt]

Defining who is an anglophone or francophone is always a bit tricky when it comes to determining what services we can offer. However, historically, let's be honest, it's the mother tongue that's used. If you look at the comparisons over time of English speakers, French speakers and mother-tongue speakers in Quebec, what happened was that there was significant immigration between 1970 and 1980. This happened following two external shocks, the October Crisis and the election of the Parti Québécois in 1970 and 1976 respectively.

This prompted a significant number of wealthy English speakers to leave Quebec. People a little older than me benefited greatly from the drop in house prices in the town of Mount Royal at that time. It also helped in the francization of the town a little.

Since then, we've observed that the average working income of anglophones is still higher than that of francophones, if we take mother tongue into account in both cases. However, when we do a slightly more sophisticated statistical analysis, where we say that the gap comes from the fact that anglophones are perhaps better educated, have more experience, and so on, then we note a significant difference. In 1970, a unilingual English-speaking man earned about 10% more than a bilingual French-speaking man. For women, the gap was smaller, at around 5% more for the unilingual anglophone. From 1980 to 1985, the opposite was true.

Francophones have therefore benefited from various measures, and I'm not talking about language laws, but rather the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec and francophone investments. A whole range of measures have significantly strengthened the French-speaking economy in Quebec, and English speakers, relatively speaking, have lost out.

Now, to get back to your more specific question, we usually use the mean. As you say, the median tends to overlook the fact that, by definition, there are people to the right or left of the median, dragging the average up or down. The trouble, I think, is that there might be some quibbling about this. Let's face it, academics sometimes like to split hairs, and split them some more. However, I think that the first official language spoken, as you mentioned in your question, is not as good an indicator of group membership as are the mother tongue and the language spoken at home. Those would be the two best indicators, in my opinion.

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

I read in a study that when education levels are equal, incomes are roughly equivalent. However, according to recent data I've read, in Quebec, francophones still have roughly 10% fewer university graduates than anglophones. Funding, federal research funding, for example, still goes disproportionately to English-speaking universities.

In your opinion, what explains the fact that there are still 10% fewer francophone graduates?

[Prof. François Vaillancourt]

There was the Quiet Revolution, in 1960. This revolution was necessary because we were lagging behind. Let's give Duplessis his due: He had started to put in place a catch-up plan for high schools, not university, but high schools. Traditionally, we've had lower-paying jobs, lower-rung jobs. It's going to take 50 or 60 years for generations to change direction. The Université du Québec network was created in 1969, if I remember correctly. CEGEPs appeared in 1967. I was in CEGEP, in 1967, and that was the first year these institutions existed.

So, 50 to 60 years have passed since the Quiet Revolution. We are in the process of converging. However, our anglophones, during this time, have always had a comparative advantage stemming from their more favourable socio-economic situation. There are both social factors that explain the convergence of francophones with anglophones, and historical, individual factors that still hold them back.

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

In your opinion, if there were funding roughly proportional to the demographic weight of francophone university institutions, would that help us?

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Please respond in less than 10 seconds, Mr. Vaillancourt.