Official Languages committee  I don't want to sound pessimistic, but I think it will always be necessary to do support and clarification work with the various departments. I speak from experience because I haven't always been immersed in official languages. I did other things in my life. When you're at Healt

Official Languages committee  It hasn't stopped us from doing things that the provinces did not always like. The creation of the tripartite committee I mentioned was a hard sell, as they say. We had to convince the provinces, which were very reluctant, to sit down with us—from the Department of Canadian Her

Official Languages committee  Yes.

Official Languages committee  I would like to add one point, namely the court challenges program, which will be reinstated. For a number of years, it has survived in the form of the language rights support program, which has been used by many school boards to advance the interpretation of rights, including th

Official Languages committee  I want to clarify that the line-ups to which you are referring is mainly for the learning of French as a second language, where the question of rights does not exist. In terms of access to the French-language education system, we’ve worked hard on it, particularly in a dialogue

Official Languages committee  No. The issue for rights holders is that some school boards want parents who are not considered to be rights holders by the province to be able to enrol their children in school. This is the case in British Columbia and elsewhere, including the Yukon.

Official Languages committee  The added value of our plan is to ensure that several departments have to step up with specific objectives. The exercise we are undertaking today will help shed some light on priority initiatives, including in health, economic development and education. I would like to add to my

Official Languages committee  If you had specific questions, I could tell you where we're making progress and where we're doing less. That said, I think our investments are yielding results overall.

Official Languages committee  I'd like to add an important point. At Canadian Heritage, there is a team that reports to Mr. Gauthier. Those people have feelers in several departments that work with them. Members of the roadmap and other departments have coordinators working with them.

Official Languages committee  Yes.

Official Languages committee  The best way to answer your question is to refer you to what my colleague, Mr. Gauthier, explained about the committee of assistant deputy ministers on official languages. It is important to note that this committee coordinates the roadmap, but it does more than that. Many of th

Official Languages committee  I will still exercise my right of reservation, since I am here as a public servant. I am here to talk about facts, not to give my opinions.

Official Languages committee  We will make it public. We have permission.

Official Languages committee  With all due respect, sir, our opinion matters little. Our efforts and actions to get the best results possible matter a lot. That is our duty. How are we managing the files? What advice are we giving to the minister? What are we doing? First of all, as you know, we have consta

Official Languages committee  I will say two things about that. First, some provinces are more transparent than others.