Mr. Speaker, in a recent ruling, the Chief Commissioner of the Alberta Human Rights Commission denied a verbal harassment complaint filed by a francophone Albertan, Gilles Caron, against the City of Edmonton, his former employer.
After being fired for using offensive language with a colleague, Mr. Caron also filed a verbal harassment complaint and the commissioner denied the complaint last June. In the commissioner's opinion, terms like “Frenchie” or “maple syrup” were not significant or offensive enough for a tribunal hearing.
It is unacceptable to be the target of repeated discriminatory remarks in the workplace, regardless of what provokes those remarks. Mr. Caron pointed out that the commissioner's comments in his decision show what little attention is given to discriminatory remarks toward francophones.
The Bloc Québécois sincerely hopes that the government does not endorse this decision.