Evidence of meeting #42 for Official Languages in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was languages.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
He will live in Canada. Yes, he will, and he'll report to our head office in Montreal, along with 2,500 other employees. He'll be based there.
Conservative
Joël Godin Conservative Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC
I have more questions about your CEO, Mr. Rousseau. Why did he not step down until the committee and other stakeholders who are concerned about Canada's francophonie applied pressure? You didn't make the decision; Mr. Rousseau chose to retire. Why didn't it come from Air Canada's leadership?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yvan Baker
Mr. Sorensen, I would ask for a very brief response. The time has well elapsed now.
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
You're referring to the video after the tragic accident, I assume. Is that correct?
Conservative
Joël Godin Conservative Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC
No, I'm not talking about the video.
Excuse me, Mr. Chair. May I finish my remarks? Mr. Sorensen didn't understand the question.
Conservative
Joël Godin Conservative Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC
Mr. Sorensen, here's my question: Given the pressure that was brought to bear, why did the board of directors not respond to these situations by dismissing Mr. Rousseau rather than waiting for him to step down on his own?
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
We were in the midst of the pandemic and in a pretty problematic situation at that point. Mr. Rousseau was a good CEO in terms of steering the company out of that crisis. He committed—and we, in good faith, believed him—to improving his French.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yvan Baker
Thank you, Mr. Godin.
Mr. Villeneuve, you have the floor for six minutes.
Liberal
Louis Villeneuve Liberal Brome—Missisquoi, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Sorensen, the committee's mandate is to ensure that both official languages are respected in the context of the modernized Official Languages Act. An additional layer is added to this mandate: achieving substantive equality between the two official languages, particularly by protecting and promoting French. I just wanted to remind you of that from the outset.
Thank you for being with us. Thank you for delivering your opening remarks in both official languages.
We remember the controversy that arose following the release of a video—which had been pre-recorded as well—of condolences offered essentially in English by the president and CEO of Air Canada.
Air Canada already had a policy stipulating that its public communications must be in both official languages. That was already in place. How do you explain, then, that such a situation could have occurred at the highest level of the company? Has the board assessed why the existing mechanisms failed?
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
Given the urgency and given the sensitivity of the situation, Mr. Rousseau decided to record it in English with French subtitles. That was received very negatively. Obviously, we are very sorry for that decision on behalf of Mr. Rousseau, for which he has apologized, but it was the decision he made.
Liberal
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yvan Baker
We'll suspend for a minute while we get the technical glitch sorted out.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yvan Baker
I call the meeting back to order.
Mr. Villeneuve, I had stopped the clock. The floor is yours.
Liberal
Louis Villeneuve Liberal Brome—Missisquoi, QC
Okay.
Mr. Sorensen, I would like you to repeat the last part of your answer, please.
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
Given the urgency, Mr. Rousseau chose to make his statement on the video in English with French subtitles. That was an error in judgment, but he did it, I believe, in good faith. He wanted to come across as authentically as possible, given the sensitivity of the situation and the personal nature of the message.
Liberal
Louis Villeneuve Liberal Brome—Missisquoi, QC
Thank you.
That was six months ago. Can you tell me what has changed in concrete terms? What mechanism have you put in place at the executive level of the board of directors to ensure that, even in an emergency situation, this type of thing won't ever happen again?
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
We have an emergency procedure, a standard operating procedure, that calls for, obviously, communication in both official languages, which, apart from the video recorded by Mr. Rousseau, also worked as it should have. That included the special response team sent to the accident site in New York. They spoke to relatives, spoke to families and spoke to the people involved. They were able to do that in both official languages.
I believe the emergency procedure we have in place worked, apart from the video, which shouldn't have been unilingual in English with French subtitles.
Liberal
Louis Villeneuve Liberal Brome—Missisquoi, QC
Okay. Thank you.
Who's responsible for ensuring that Air Canada complies with the protocol?
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
Basically, it's management. I believe that within management, it's the CEO, but obviously there's a head of communications who should oversee that it is followed.
Liberal
Louis Villeneuve Liberal Brome—Missisquoi, QC
Okay. Thank you.
Excuse me, Mr. Chair, but there's a delay. It looks like the volume is going down in French at the end of the answers.
Mr. Sorensen, you have already announced that the next president and CEO of Air Canada should or could speak both of the country's official languages. What importance did the board attach to the ability to communicate in French—a real ability to do so—in choosing the next president and CEO?
How will that competency be assessed and maintained once the leader is in place?
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
We assigned great importance to that. When we did this succession process and search, both internally and externally, that was one of the criteria we applied, alongside of a lot of other criteria. In terms of the external candidates, these were criteria such as, obviously, CEO experience and the ability to lead a major global corporation, create followership and positively impact culture, and so on and so forth. However, the ability to communicate in both official languages was given great importance.
As I said before, we have found our next CEO in Mr. van der Werff, who is able to communicate in both official languages.