Procedure and House Affairs committee  Thank you for the question. The Translation Bureau is not responsible for the technological aspects related to interpretation. That question would be best directed to the House administration, to those responsible for multimedia.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  No.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  The sound quality, with the Internet connection and the sound varying from participant to participant, means that interpreters have to increase the volume, have to listen harder and have to concentrate harder. There's an increased risk of acoustic shock, or, as I said, when they

Procedure and House Affairs committee  There have been, yes, but we will have to come back to the committee with the exact number.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Thank you for your question. We work closely with our interpretation teams. After every test, after every assignment, interpreters provide a report. We also work closely with the union. We meet with union representatives twice a week, and we discuss the various challenges and is

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I would say that the most important thing is that people wear a headset. We've done a lot of tests over the last few years, and even more over the last few weeks, and the quality of sound is much better when people wear their headset. This is of prime importance, though—

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Yes.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I will send the question to Matthew Ball, the chief interpreter.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Thank you for your question. All the interpreters who work for the Translation Bureau and Parliament are accredited by the Bureau. They are accredited in their mother tongue and in what we call their B language. That means they can all interpret from one language to the other. T

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I don't think so because we have strong capacity in both official languages. Some interpreters are quite comfortable working in either language, while others are less so, be they Translation Bureau employees or freelancers. No one is forced to work in a language they aren't comfo

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Thank you for raising that point. I have to say that the conditions are difficult for the interpreters. Some interpreters have reported incidents, saying that after assignments they have headaches, earaches and fatigue. There were no incidents related to acoustic shock or injury

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Sound quality is the cornerstone for interpretation. When participants are remote, the sound is really dependent on the Internet connection of the participant, on whether they're using a headset and on some of the technical requirements I mentioned in my opening remarks. It's ver

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Will the quality suffer? No, it won't because of what we ask of interpreters: if they cannot hear, they cannot interpret, so we've provided them with that at our end to protect their health and safety as well. When you hear “inaudible” or you hear that the interpreters are stoppi

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I was able to get your question.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Yes, when we have the interpreters interpreting remote participants, we need to increase the team's strength. Normally, on average—it varies depending on the type of assignment—an interpreter in a normal setting will do it for about six hours. With remote interpretation, it's muc