Official Languages committee  I must admit, I often find it hard to predict what will happen up until 2017. In any case, this has to do with certain points in the annual report. Living in a minority situation is always challenging, and respect for both official languages in a context where two mainly unilingual societies exist side by side requires ongoing efforts.

Official Languages committee  That's for parliamentarians to decide. It would involve a restructuring of the organization. It would mean having tribunal-like authorities. My own sense is that I am not the person to preside over a quasi-judicial tribunal. I have never asked for that power, and I'm trying to use all the powers that are now available to me under the act.

Official Languages committee  I'm glad to hear that you will be commemorating the arrival of the Irish in your region. That's exactly the kind of thing we want to see. There are two elements to consider here. The first is what I would call content. You mentioned important elements, such as the arrival of the Irish, the colonization of western Canada by francophones, the role that francophones and anglophones have played together and the history of linguistic accommodation in Canada.

Official Languages committee  It's funded internally with our existing resources. We have a staff of lawyers who are excellent, who have developed a high degree of expertise in language law and a certain amount of hard-won experience intervening before the courts. It is an honour and a pleasure to work with staff of such high quality and enormous commitment.

Official Languages committee  Yes. If you look at it within the categories that I described, that funding fits into the protection basket, if you like, rather than the promotion basket. It is part of the share of the funding that is dedicated to protection. One of the elements I would underline is that because we quite often intervene in cases where the Government of Canada has intervened on the other side, our lawyers are not justice department lawyers.

Official Languages committee  No. In this case it is CBC and they have, at the Federal Court level, hired external counsel to represent them. Borden Ladner Gervais was the firm they hired to represent them.

Official Languages committee  With respect to Air Canada, I had a meeting with president Rovinescu, the CEO of Air Canada. It was a constructive meeting. I was worried that a negative relationship between our two organizations had developed, and I wanted to clear the air. I found it a very cordial and useful meeting.

Official Languages committee  My office has a budget of $20.8 million to carry out its mandate during the 2015-16 fiscal year. This amount includes $13.556 million in salaries. Our workforce consists of 160 full-time equivalents. In 2015-16, I will continue to encourage key decision makers to make linguistic duality an integral part of Canada's 150th anniversary celebrations in 2017.

Official Languages committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair, and honourable committee members. Good afternoon. It's a pleasure to appear before you today to present the main estimates for the Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages. In addition to Madam Saikaley and Madam Donaghy, I am accompanied at this hearing by Mario Séguin, interim assistant commissioner in the corporate management branch, and Colette Lagacé, director of finance.

Official Languages committee  I mentioned in the report that eliminating support for employers to participate in job fairs had a harmful effect on the recruitment of immigrants and employees to work for employers in anglophone communities. For one thing, the francophone significant benefit program was terminated.

Official Languages committee  I based my recommendations on a statistical study conducted and published by Citizenship and Immigration Canada. It is a statistical profile of anglophone immigrants in Quebec. The numbers in that section of the report are from that statistical profile. Personally, the number I found for bilingualism among Quebec francophones is actually 38%.

Official Languages committee  Yes.

Official Languages committee  Since there is no annual census, we have to use the numbers from the 2011 census. It is clear that we live in a country with some asymmetry in terms of immigration from a linguistic and a resource perspective. Thanks to the Cullen-Couture agreement, which was negotiated with Quebec 35 years ago and has become the Canada-Quebec agreement relating to immigration and temporary admission of aliens, Quebec controls its immigration.

Official Languages committee  The numbers I've seen really concern me too. Programs that encouraged francophone immigration were terminated and replaced by express entry. Given that express entry was implemented in January, it's too early to draw any final conclusions, but the numbers you mentioned are very troubling.

Official Languages committee  My answer is twofold. I recently read two studies on the economic advantages for Canada and New Brunswick in terms of bilingual nature, in terms of increased trade with francophone countries, and for New Brunswick in terms of the degree to which its ability to offer services in both languages has resulted in major economic advances measured not in millions but in billions.