Mr. Speaker, after years of failing to comply with the Official Languages Act, national defence, the CBC tells us, has given up and will do only the bare minimum to establish bilingualism. Away with the regulations. Our military leaders will no longer speak French. National defence is giving itself until 2012 to fine tune its new bare minimum plan—over forty years after passage of the Official Languages Act. Bilingual former senior officers are criticizing these changes.
How does the minister explain such an affront to our francophone military personnel?