Official Languages committee  We have given some thought to that. We appreciate your asking us for our opinion and we will provide it to you in detail.

Official Languages committee  Yes, that's an important observation. This is a challenge for us. For our high school graduates to be fully capable of participating in the Quebec economy, we must reach a level, a quality in training. We have high-school graduates from a francophone board or an English board a

Official Languages committee  Or don't, without conditions.

Official Languages committee  We're 13% of the population.

Official Languages committee  That's a very important idea, and I absolutely agree that we need to work on it. I think that with a little creativity the transfers you're talking about are possible. It's quite correct that the direct granting of federal money to a school board would end up with a problem, bu

Official Languages committee  I'd like to take an example from that question, because you were there for this. We met briefly with the Premier of Quebec. He came into the room and said, “I want to talk about three things: education, health and employment”. We said, “Oh, we want to talk about three things: ed

Official Languages committee  Here are some possible examples. The matter that's currently before the courts in British Columbia could be resolved by legislation. The powers of the commissioner are defined vaguely, and we could give you some specific details in regard to those matters. The list probably is m

Official Languages committee  There's nothing to stop the federal government from setting conditions before it transfers funds. Right now, Madam Joly is trying to negotiate a set of ententes that have principles in them, but why couldn't there be a requirement in the law or a mains libre that she doesn't gi

Official Languages committee  Exactly. It's not there now, and I speak for my brethren in other provinces. As you all probably know, we're not blaming the government of Quebec for being particularly bad about this.

Official Languages committee  Everybody does it, I think. The other example is even messier. We heard this just yesterday. There are 18,000 immigration files that are being discontinued in Quebec, for 50,000 people. There's a class, in that file, of people who are in Quebec and who are acting as caregivers

Official Languages committee  In terms of drafting the act, we're willing to participate. We have lawyers. We can define precisely what we want and, if you wish, we can submit a brief on it. We are in the process of drafting a document on our position in general. We have the wording for general principles, b

Official Languages committee  Well there is a demographic pattern, and language fits into it. Our community is not in numerical decline. There are places where it's in numerical decline, but overall in the province it is not.

Official Languages committee  I'd like to argue that we need an active, interventionist, energetic, supportive attitude from the federal government, always understanding that when there's a dialogue between federal and provincial authorities, there are going to be complications. I'm going to give you two ex

Official Languages committee  Well yes, it seems to me that there's a numbers question on the Island of Montreal and off the Island of Montreal. The policy that the Government of Quebec applies to language questions is applied generally across the province. And it's true that on the Island of Montreal or in

Official Languages committee  We met with the Prime Minister just prior to the morning of the announcement of the new action plan, so it was in March of last year. This is talking a bit out of school, but we made a request to the Prime Minister's Office this morning, prior to coming here, for a meeting in t