Official Languages Committee on April 11th, 2024

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

That's rather worrisome.

Mr. Cormier, can you tell us how this announcement affected you and give us recommendations with respect to the foreign students you would like to accept?

[Gabriel Cormier]

I fully agree with my colleague that we will be penalized because Quebec already had a system in place. In my budget for next year, I expect to lose 130 foreign students, which represents $2 million per year over a four-year period. That's a significant amount for Université de Moncton. It creates an enormous amount of uncertainty over the decision-making process. Will there be as many permits next year?

The fact that Quebec already had a system in place is worrisome for us. As I mentioned, 35% of our students come from abroad, and they contribute to New Brunswick. The ceiling is having a major impact.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Thank you, Mr. Cormier.

Mr. Généreux and Mr. Dalton have the floor now for the next three minutes.

[Bernard Généreux, Conservative, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Mr. Normand, I'd like my proposal for a summit on francophone education in Canada to be recorded. I have proposed it before.

I am reiterating my proposal to organize a Canada-wide meeting with all stakeholders as quickly as possible, to deal with this matter for once and for all.

[Marc Dalton, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC]

I'd like to thank the witnesses.

Mr. Normand, can you expand upon the importance of foreign students in terms of funding for programs at post-secondary educational institutions?

[Martin Normand]

My Université de Moncton colleague mentioned the loss of revenue that may result from the ceiling this year. Our institutions have a smaller pool of clients. Some programs are also very expensive. For an institution to be able to offer some of these programs, larger cohorts are needed.

While it's true that international students provide additional revenue, they also, as students enrolled in our programs, help make it possible to offer these programs in the first place. Without them, our institutions might not be able to offer a full range of programs.

Not only that, but in addition to the programs and courses they attend in our institutions, these students have a direct impact on their community. While studying, they may have part-time jobs in the community. After graduating, many remain, as Mr. Cormier mentioned earlier. They therefore contribute to the francophone communities ecosystem.

[Marc Dalton, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC]

What's the overall percentage of foreign students?

[Martin Normand]

For the 22 institutions in our network, there are approximately 12,000 foreign students, accounting for 30% of the total.

[Marc Dalton, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC]

Have the numbers for foreign students and all students remained stable? If not, how have they been changing?

[Martin Normand]

I won't try to hide the fact that the number of foreign students has increased rather rapidly over the past few years. As institutions within the Canadian francophonie have not been receiving foreign students for all that long, they've been making up for lost time for about 10 years now.

Only seven or eight years ago, some institutions had virtually no foreign students. They have therefore been attracting more foreign students to catch up to the number being received by institutions of the English-speaking majority.

[Marc Dalton, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC]

Thank you.

I believe I have only five or six seconds of speaking time remaining.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Yes, approximately.

Thank you, Mr. Dalton.

I'm strict with speaking time because it enables members to comment more often.

Mr. Serré, you have three minutes.

[Marc Serré, Liberal, Nickel Belt, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much, Mr. Normand and Mr. Cormier.

I have several questions.

Mr. Normand, could you send the committee details about your third recommendation, on structure? As Mr. Samson mentioned, there is in fact something about elementary and secondary education, but there's no coordination.

My first question, regarding the responsibilities of the provinces, is for Mr. Cormier.

I was born in Ontario. Without federal intervention, the Université de l'Ontario français would not exist. As for the University of Sudbury, the federal government contributed $1.9 million towards the creation of a university by and for francophones. It provided 100% of the funds, with nothing received from the province.

Can you explain the role of New Brunswick in terms of contributions?

The last I heard, a francophone from New Brunswick is still a citizen of the province. What is the province's responsibility and role with respect to education in French?

[Gabriel Cormier]

Our funding model is very simple. If funding was at a certain level last year, it would be increased by a specified percentage this year.

As we mentioned in connection with special programs, where a provincial contribution is to be provided for a special project linked to official languages in education, the province considers this to have already been included in our core funding. We therefore don't receive any additional funds for special official languages projects.

[Marc Serré, Liberal, Nickel Belt, ON]

What do you think the federal government should do to ensure that provinces like New Brunswick shoulder their responsibilities?

[Gabriel Cormier]

I believe that when there is a special project, there should be an additional contribution from the province.

Recognition of the Université de Moncton's general mission is also required. Providing a wide range of programs in French for everyone costs more.

French-language education is extremely important.

[Marc Serré, Liberal, Nickel Belt, ON]

Mr. Normand, I have 30 seconds of speaking time left.

What should the federal government do to ensure that the provinces shoulder their responsibilities to their francophone citizens?

[Martin Normand]

I think Mr. Cormier put it very well.

However, I would add that the federal government also has responsibilities, which it is not necessarily addressing at this time. It needs to acknowledge its new obligations under the Official Languages Act.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Thank you very much, dear witnesses.

As the chair, I'm going to exercise my privilege to ask a question that is somewhat related to Mr. Généreux's and Mr. Samson's questions.

The action plan for official languages mentions the federal government's memorandum of understanding with the Council of Ministers of Education. This MOU has provisions on transparency and accountability. Have these provisions been implemented? Is it a useful implement?

In other words, I'm asking you whether the transparency and accountability provisions in the MOU are worth the trouble. Are they being applied? If they need to be improved, how to go about it? Are they effective?

Then, I'd like you to provide us with some numbers. Between 2002 and 2024, nothing happened. How have provincial contributions to post-secondary institutions fluctuated between 2002 and 2024, in places like Moncton, for example?

Have investments kept up with the cost of living? Have the provinces contributed more? These are, after all, their post-secondary institutions. It's all very well to talk about what the federal government does, but it's also important to discuss the provinces. How have they met their responsibilities to their educational institutions?

We'd like to know what these numbers are, because they would be helpful when the time comes for us to make our recommendations.

Mr. Cormier and Mr. Normand, you won't have time to answer these questions today, but I would appreciate it if you could send us your answers in writing.

Mr. Godin, you have the floor.

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

Mr. Chair, I'd like to add something to what you requested. Would it be possible for Mr. Normand to provide us with information about the changing numbers of foreign students in each educational institution, since 2002?

What I'd like to know is whether the increased number of students is directly related to funding. I think it is, but I would like information about it, if possible.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Okay.

On that note, we are going to briefly suspend the meeting to welcome the next group of witnesses.

I'd like to thank the witnesses for all the information they provided. There were lots of useful questions and it was very interesting. We expect to receive the additional information we asked them to provide in writing.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

I call the meeting back to order.

We are now beginning the second hour of this very interesting meeting on the heated issue of funding for francophone post-secondary institutions.

We'll begin with Dr. Jacques Frémont, president and vice-chancellor of the University of Ottawa.

Welcome. I think this is the first time you've appeared before the Standing Committee on Official Languages.

After that, we'll hear from Mr. Emmanuel Aito, dean of the University of Regina's Cité universitaire francophone.

Mr. Aito, while this may be the first time you've appeared in person, we've previously met.

Lastly, we will hear from Mr. Patrick Arseneault, executive director of Collège nordique francophone, who is attending the meeting virtually. He's probably a distant cousin of mine.

For those of you who are not regulars, you each have five minutes for an opening address. If you keep it shorter than that, it would allow everyone to ask more questions over the next hour.

Dr. Frémont, you have the floor for five minutes.

[Dr. Jacques Frémont, President and Vice-Chancellor, University of Ottawa]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for inviting me today to give you my thoughts about the important study you have undertaken on funding for francophone post-secondary institutions.

I' d like to begin with two facts.

The first is that post-secondary institutions serving official language minority communities are in difficult if not dire straits. The second is that our institutions have for far too long been squeezed by the federal and provincial governments tossing the ball back and forth.

We are asking the federal government to fully assume its role as the defender of official languages and official language minority communities.

I' d like to say a few words about the University of Ottawa. We are the largest French and English bilingual University in Canada and the world, or at least we believe this to be the case. This year, we welcomed more than 49,000 students to our campus. Of these, 15,000 were enrolled in French-language programs. That's a significant number. We take pride in offering the largest number of university programs in French outside Quebec. Not only that, but over 80% of francophone university students in Ontario attend the University of Ottawa. That is indicative of our influence in the province of Ontario.

We offer university programs in French in every field in order to provide support to discrete and isolated francophone communities, whether in medicine, health, law or social work, not to mention engineering, natural sciences and, more recently, pharmaceutical sciences. It's extremely wide-ranging.

Even so, we are in a difficult financial position because of the chronic underfunding of our francophone mission. Last year, as you may be aware, the Ontario government established an expert panel to examine the financial viability of post-secondary institutions. In a brief to the expert panel, we clearly demonstrated that for every francophone student enrolled at the University of Ottawa, we receive approximately $3,000 less than other francophone or bilingual post-secondary institutions in the province. We further reported a shortfall of over $50 million a year for our francophone mission.

In its report, the expert panel mentioned our chronic underfunding, as well as underfunding for the whole network of Ontario francophone institutions. The Ontario government acted on all but one of the expert panel's recommendations, the one on funding for Ontario's francophone and bilingual institutions.

The province's strategy seems to be very straightforward: don't provide enough funding to meet the needs of the francophone post-secondary system and ask the federal government to make up the difference. Once again, we are being squeezed by the federal government and the Ontario government. That was four months ago.

What is the federal government's current role?

Allow me to try and answer that question. For over 25 years, despite the ranting of politicians who say that the federal government shouldn't intervene in provincial areas of jurisdiction, the federal government has been funding the post-secondary sector directly. For example, Health Canada provides millions of dollars to our university to help us train health professionals to ensure that there will be qualified workers in francophone communities across Canada. The Department of Justice does the same to ensure training for bilingual lawyers so that francophones have access to legal services in their language.

These direct interventions are of course made on grounds that the federal government has jurisdiction in matters like justice and health. We would also argue that the federal government has the same level of jurisdiction to protect Canada's linguistic minorities. Likewise, Parliament recognized this fact when it modernized the Official Languages Act last year. The importance of the education continuum is now enshrined in that act. It means that parliamentarians have acknowledged that the federal government needs to fully assume its role in support of official language minority communities. As is the case for health and justice, there is nothing to prevent the federal government from providing direct financial support to post-secondary institutions.

The matching provincial funds required by the federal government are, as we know, not always in evidence. That's the problem everyone is aware of, Mr. Chair, but no one wants to mention it.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Indeed.

[Dr. Jacques Frémont]

Sometimes the province requires us to pay its share ourselves. The new federal initiatives are useful, laudable and important, but the financial stability of our institutions is equally important, even though chronic underfunding remains the norm.