Thank you, Madam Chair.
I am the president of the Association francophone pour le savoir, or Acfas, and a professor of education funding and policy at the Université du Québec à Rimouski. I am accompanied by the Acfas executive director, Sophie Montreuil.
For over 100 years, Acfas has made an exceptional contribution to scientific life in French. Acfas has six regional offices spread across Canada. We work every day to promote our country's prosperity and influence.
As shown in the report we published in June 2021 called portraits and challenges of research in French in a minority context in Canada, research in French is in clear decline in the Canadian scientific community. That decline continues to this day. In a country based on the biculturalism of our two official languages, it is unacceptable that federal authorities are not paying very close attention to that decline, as it is largely based on unfair conditions for francophone researchers when it comes to access to research funding provided by the Government of Canada.
The report released on October 17 on the consultations conducted last summer certainly doesn't reassure us about the seriousness with which the creation of the new capstone organization will embrace the issue of science in French. Out of a total of 10,034 words, only 180 are devoted to scientific research in French, or 1.8% of all the findings made by the three granting councils. However, those 180 words do a good job of summarizing the challenges and harms facing the French-language research community in Canada.
The time has now come to put in place measures that will correct injustices and result in substantive equality, even if the merger of the three councils takes place in a context of astonishing and disconcerting speed. For Acfas, this speed cannot in any way be cited at a later date as an excuse to make up for the lack of measures to support scientific research in French, as the Government of Canada cannot claim that it does not know how to remedy the situation of the decline or that it is not responsible for it following the adoption of the new Official Languages Act. The bodies that will lead to the creation of the capstone organization have everything they need to usher in a new era of public research funding, which will make it possible to achieve substantive equality between the francophone and anglophone scientific communities.
Allow me to quote a news release issued by Canadian Heritage on October 22, 10 days after the publication of the report entitled “What We Heard”: “... the Government of Canada is committed to improving conditions for the production and dissemination of scientific research in French in Canada.”
The news release announced the creation of an external advisory panel on the creation and dissemination of scientific information in French. You can see where I'm going with this: It's imperative that there be strong alignment between the bodies that will create the capstone organization and the members of the advisory panel. However, the agendas don't coincide, as the advisory panel is just beginning its work. Here again, Acfas is in a position of extreme vigilance. There is no way the government will consider failing to acknowledge the need to include strong measures to support research in French in the creation of the capstone organization because the agendas don't coincide. That would be absolutely unacceptable.
In fact, the situation is much simpler than it seems, and that is the crux of our remarks today. The new Official Languages Act, which came into force last June, puts forward a fresh and informed look at bilingualism in our country, recognizing for the first time that French “is in a minority situation in Canada and North America due to the predominant use of English”. The new act also requires, in part VII, all federal departments and agencies to put measures in place to “support the creation and dissemination of information in French that contributes to the advancement of scientific knowledge in any discipline”. Therefore, the context for creating the capstone organization is clear: It cannot be done without these measures.
There is some positive stuff. The consultations that need to be held, when it comes to positive measures, have already been held. For the past two years, the Government of Canada itself has done work to document the challenges of research in French and the needs of the community conducting that research. I repeat, it has everything it needs to fulfill its obligations under the new act.
Thank you for your attention.