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.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yvan Baker
Thank you, Mr. Villeneuve.
Before giving the floor to Mr. Beaulieu, I would like to raise two administrative points.
First, when there are interpretation problems, I give members a little more time. I did it for Mr. Godin, and I did it for Mr. Villeneuve as well.
Second, I'd like to talk about the problem you had with interpretation, Mr. Villeneuve. The clerk said that it might be happening when the witness's microphone and the member's microphone are on at the same time. It would be good to keep the microphones off as much as possible.
Mr. Beaulieu, you have the floor for six minutes.
Bloc
Mario Beaulieu Bloc La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC
Thank you.
Mr. Sorensen, I'd like to talk about everything that happened with your previous president and CEO and all the controversy. First, there is the fact that he said he'd never had to speak French in Montreal since he'd been there, and that it was a very good thing.
Don't you feel that sends a signal? Isn't there an underlying mentality that is resistant to French?
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
Mr. Rousseau was not our previous chair, but our previous CEO. He was hired during the pandemic, at a time when there was severe financial pressure on Air Canada and severe pressure on our liquidity. Weighing up all of the different criteria in choosing a CEO, we found that Mr. Rousseau was the best choice at that given time because we needed somebody who could steer us out of a very precarious situation and recover the company financially. That was the main reason for the choice of Mr. Rousseau, and he has delivered on that.
Obviously, after the incident at the Montreal chamber of commerce, we were all very disappointed, as I previously said. We got a commitment from Mr. Rousseau that he would improve his French by undertaking intensive French training, which he did and which was followed up on, but unfortunately it didn't lead to the desired result.
We also strengthened board oversight and established an official languages branch, which now has 28 employees. We made management awareness training mandatory, and we—
Bloc
Mario Beaulieu Bloc La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC
I don't have much time.
How do you explain that? He committed to learning French. He took many hours of French classes, according to you. However, when he appeared here, he wasn't even able to read a few sentences in French, like you did.
Subsequently, the accident in which the two pilots died happened. He decided to send a message in English only with two small words in French. Don't you think this sends out an image of intolerance or lack of respect for French on the part of Air Canada? [Technical difficulty—Editor] repeatedly.
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
Yes, and that was obviously a big disappointment. It was also a big disappointment to Mr. Rousseau himself, for which he profoundly apologized.
It's not that he didn't undertake the lessons. I think the number of lessons he took was more than 300, in addition to 250 hours of preparing for those lessons, but it simply did not lead to the result desired. The only explanation I can give is that Mr. Rousseau simply wasn't capable of learning French. For some it's easier than for others.
Bloc
Mario Beaulieu Bloc La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC
We won't belabour the point. The goal is not to reprimand an individual; rather, this is about the company, the corporate culture.
You said earlier that you had 1,500 bilingual employees. Is that an improvement?
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
No, we have much more than that. I said that 50% of all customer-facing employees are bilingual and 65% have the capacity to become bilingual, so it's much more. If I take the entire employee population of Air Canada, my estimate is that around 40% are bilingual, so it's much more than that.
Bloc
Mario Beaulieu Bloc La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC
In that case, why did you announce this summer that there would be fewer bilingual flight attendants and less French on international flights?
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
That was a temporary thing over the summer, because we were simply not able to hire bilingual employees quickly enough. It has a lot to do with, as you know, our bilingual commitment to routes to, from and within Quebec. For instance, there are designated bilingual routes where we have a contingent of bilingual services on all flights. The company had expanded so much in Montreal that the need for bilingual employees was so big it temporarily couldn't be met, so we had to scale it down on some flights.
Bloc
Mario Beaulieu Bloc La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC
Has the situation been corrected? Have efforts been made to increase the number of employees who speak French? According to what the union president said, in some situations, there were safety risks. When people can't understand the flight attendant's instructions, there can be repercussions.
Liberal
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
That, I would question. I don't think there were any...or there were no safety issues around that. We are hiring all the bilingual employees that we can get hold of. We've hired more than 5,000 since 2022.
To my knowledge, the situation has corrected in the meantime. It was a thing in the height of summer, which had to do with certain operational restrictions and also in terms of what aircraft we had delivery of and which ones were delayed.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Yvan Baker
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu.
We will now begin the second round of questions. I give the floor to Mr. Gourde for five minutes.
Conservative
Jacques Gourde Conservative Lévis—Lotbinière, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
It's good to see you, Mr. Sorensen, and to be able to speak with you. I'm happy to meet the chair of the board of directors of Air Canada. You admitted earlier that you were present, that you were chair when Michael Rousseau was hired. When you had to assess the applications, there must have been other potential candidates for the position of president and CEO of Air Canada.
Was bilingualism one of the hiring criteria at the time?
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
It was one of the criteria, alongside many other criteria. As I said before, it was at the height of the pandemic, and there was severe financial pressure on the airline. We operated, in a month—I remember—less than 10% of the normal flights. There was also a risk to our viability in terms of liquidity and so on.
Conservative
Jacques Gourde Conservative Lévis—Lotbinière, QC
Thank you, Mr. Sorensen. I have other questions.
Were there a number of other candidates? There may have been a number of criteria, but were there other potential candidates?
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
We obviously considered other candidates, but we found that given the situation, Mr. Rousseau was the best choice for Air Canada.
Conservative
Jacques Gourde Conservative Lévis—Lotbinière, QC
I would like to come back to Air Canada's culture. You talked about identity, but in terms of culture, Air Canada would have to be able to prove it.
Let's talk about bilingualism training. There's an internal program at Air Canada that enables your employees who are not bilingual or who have trouble speaking French to learn French.
First of all, how many employees does Air Canada have in total?
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
We have around 39,000 employees in total.
Conservative
Jacques Gourde Conservative Lévis—Lotbinière, QC
Air Canada has 39,000 employees. Thank you very much.
Is it possible to know how many hours per year the French education program entails?
Chair of the Board of Directors, Air Canada
That figure I wouldn't have, but I can refer the question to Mr. Rheault, who's in the room. He would have that figure.
David Rheault Vice President, Government and Community Relations, Air Canada
Depending on the type of course, we're talking about 25,000 to 30,000 hours of classes per year.
Conservative
Jacques Gourde Conservative Lévis—Lotbinière, QC
A total of 25,000 to 30,000 hours a year and a total of 39,000 employees equates to about 45 minutes of courses per year per employee. That may not be how the calculation is done, but that's the reality. You can elaborate on that.
Vice President, Government and Community Relations, Air Canada
In fact, the courses are given based on employee needs. About 700 employees take courses every year. We focus mainly on public-facing employees. Approximately 15,000 employees are in contact with the public, and approximately 50% of them already have bilingual qualifications.
The courses are given to other employees who have qualifications, who need to practice or who have to requalify every year. For example, some employees are somewhat proficient in French, but since they're in parts of the country where they don't have the opportunity to practice it often, they take courses to ensure that they maintain their level.
It's hard to find opportunities to practice when you're in western Canada.
