Mr. Speaker, my colleague gave me the answer in his question. I would also like to thank him for being an ally at the official languages committee and helping to launch the first ever study on French within Quebec, as well as French outside Quebec.
I agree that we need to focus as much as possible on the idea of “by” and “for” francophones. In partnership with the Association des enseignantes et enseignants franco-ontariens, the University of Sudbury has announced that it intends to become a francophone university. I think we should give this initiative all our support. The French programs at Laurentian University need to be maintained, but we also need to move more towards models “by” and “for” francophones. Earlier I was looking at my list and the percentage of funding that went to universities. For Newfoundland, Prince Edward Island, Saskatchewan and British Columbia, the funding is zero dollars.
Alberta has Campus Saint-Jean, and we need to try to preserve it and ensure its development. We need to move towards models “by” and “for” francophones as much as possible.
With diminishing support for post-secondary education in French, where will the professors come from if there are no more francophone universities and no more French programs? This is crucial. The Francophone and Acadian communities cannot afford to lose these French programs. Personally, I think there should be a lot more than there are now.