First of all, Madam Speaker, I was planning to point out to the minister the delay in informing us of the time he was to deliver his speech, but I accept his apologies.
I am pleased to speak once again on this issue of burning importance to Quebec, that is the closure of the Collège militaire de Saint-Jean and the decision to use only one college, Kingston's Royal Military College, for the future training of officers. The closure of the Collège militaire de Saint-Jean has never been justified, either for cost cutting reasons, or because of the need to reduce the size of the military. Nor has the government demonstrated that the military college in Kingston is capable of taking up the slack.
I have no doubt that the minister is being sincere and is making efforts in this area, but despite the speech that he just delivered this morning, I think that we have to be realistic. The Official Languages Act was around long before this Liberal government took office. RMC, the Collège militaire de Saint-Jean and Royal Roads Military College should have been bilingual and operating in both languages for a number of years by now. Based on the information we have and according to the criticisms of official languages pointed out by the minister, we know for a fact that the results of the legislation leave much to be desired.
This morning, the minister of defence gave us an overview of a proposal to convert the Royal Military College in Kingston into a fully bilingual institution. As I have just indicated, we have some doubts as to whether this is at all possible, despite good intentions and the efforts that will be made. We are given the broad outline of the proposal, while at the same time, we are told that DND officials are in the process of drafting a plan. Are we to understand that the minister was merely throwing up a smokescreen this morning? There is absolutely nothing tangible in this plan.
The minister talks about the consequences of a plan which we have not seen and of which we know nothing. We know nothing about its aims, its concepts or its mechanisms. Francophones expect more than vague concepts. The only details which the
minister released to us concerning his concept of a bilingual officer corps is the date on which this concept was agreed to. He informs us that this concept is presently being reviewed by a special joint task force. Another task force.
Plans call for refining this concept and resolving the issues raised by the Commissioner of Official Languages. The minister defers to the department's Official Languages Program. We all know the kind of results this program had at the military college in Kingston. Worse yet, all officers promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel are not expected to be bilingual until 1998. The minister has already made this fact clear to the House in response to questions put to him. I wonder what a normally bilingual lieutenant colonel is. What does "normally bilingual" mean? How can we accept it? It is too little too late.
Furthermore, the minister tell us nothing about what he intends to do to promote French culture within the military college in Kingston. The environment counts for a great deal in training an officer cadet trying to master a second language. Learning a new language takes more than an academic program. It also takes the right environment and immersion. I am well placed to speak on it since I have trouble learning a new language. Even though we are in a situation of partial immersion here, I intend to take total immersion.
From the recommendations produced by the official languages committee in the department of defence and in the Canadian Armed Forces, it appears that the committee recommended immersion as an important factor in training officer cadets. It recommended that all officer cadets at the Royal Military College and the Royal Roads Military College spend at least a year at the Saint-Jean campus, while those at the military college in Saint-Jean should spend at least a year at one of the other two colleges; this would help everyone develop their language ability and provide exposure to the other culture.
This brief excerpt shows how training bilingual officer cadets is not something that can be achieved with a hastily conceived academic program such as the one the hon. minister has presented.
It would certainly be more promising to emphasize immersion and exposure to another culture.
Some positions explain why my colleagues in the Bloc Quebecois and I are opposed to closing the military college in Saint-Jean and have been opposed to it from the beginning.
We all know that more francophones than anglophones in the Canadian Armed Forces are bilingual and most bilingual anglophones in the forces went to the military college in Saint-Jean.
There is a big shortage of bilingual military people whose mother tongue is English, but a surplus of bilingual military people whose mother tongue is French.
An internal report of the Canadian Armed Forces on bilingualism in the military reported a serious deficiency in this regard. This report said that 2,861 more francophones than required were bilingual, while there was a shortage of 1,424 bilingual anglophones.
Of course, this sample includes more than the officer corps, but it shows how much it has been left to francophones to promote bilingualism in the Canadian forces.
Remember the climate surrounding the announcement that the military college in Saint-Jean would be closed. The defence minister said that the military college in Saint-Jean would be closed to save money. It is also for economic reasons that he has decided to put francophones in an English speaking environment for their military training.
In his statement, the minister talks about an environment that encourages francophones to study in Kingston. Unfortunately, I think that is hypocritical, because many past and present officer cadets question the statement which the minister made this morning.
The minister made optimistic predictions about the level of bilingualism in the officer corps. I will give him some more realistic projections: yes, there will still be bilingual officer cadets, but more and more of them will be from a French background. That is reality.
There is nothing specific in this plan, nothing about how to get there, nothing about extra costs, nothing to satisfy us. There is nothing that could justify closing the military college in Saint-Jean or offset the loss and the major setback for francophones in the Canadian Forces as a result of this politically motivated closure.