Good morning, Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you once again for taking the time to listen to us, for once again giving us this opportunity to assist the committee in its work. Today, of course, we’ve been invited to participate in a discussion on the road map for Canada's linguistic duality.
As an introduction, I ask you to recall that at our last appearance we expressed our dismay a little bit about the lack of acknowledgement by the federal government of the English-speaking minority in the Speech from the Throne. In that regard, you may or may not be aware, the QCGN has recently submitted an official complaint to the Commissioner of Official Languages about the omission, because of the impact that kind of thing happening in the throne speech could have on the official language minority community in Quebec.
What do we mean by that? Well, we bring this up to demonstrate that despite 40 years of the Official Languages Act and despite the recognition of our minority community's national standing by the Commissioner of Official Languages in his 2007-2008 report, we still believe that a deep-rooted misunderstanding remains regarding the English-speaking community of Quebec as an official languages minority community.
Key stakeholders see omissions in federal strategic communications, such as the throne speech, as evidence that there is, at best, continuing political and policy confusion around how the English-speaking community of Quebec must be supported, and at worst, a deliberate move to dismantle the traditions of the official languages policy.
Not only do policy-makers have a hard time imagining that English-speaking Quebeckers are members of an official language minority community, but many English Quebeckers also have a hard time considering themselves part of a minority. But we are, and many English-speaking communities and institutions are on the endangered list.
The original policy document entitled The Next Act: New Momentum for Canada’s Linguistic Duality and the funding priorities that ensued under the action plan and the current road-map initiatives have been a significant step forward in terms of the government's attempt to inject new momentum into the promotion of a linguistic duality in Canada. The most significant initiative to date in Quebec has been the effort to improve access to health and social services in English, and there’s been great success in that domain. In contrast, however, most departments have not been able to successfully take on the design of national policy and programs that are flexible enough to work in Quebec as well as across Canada. That has meant fewer initiatives for the English-speaking community.
From a policy-maker's perspective, the reality of the English-speaking community of Quebec presents a particular challenge. We know that. In fact, it questions the core of collective thinking about Canadian official language minority communities. The tradition that informs the beliefs and the structure of a response to official languages is based on the francophone experience, and the foundation of that experience is a minority language that has been fiercely protected and proudly fostered for four centuries in Canada. But for English Quebec, the protection of the language is not a concern. For the English-speaking minority of Quebec, the fundamental aim is to preserve our institutions and the communities they serve.
We seek integration. We demand that our children have the language skills necessary to participate fully in Quebec society, and we understand that limited and rational asymmetry in program delivery, but not design, is necessary for Quebec to flourish. For the English-speaking official language minority, the mandates, overall policy considerations, and program design of various federal departments continue to make interventions in Quebec problematic. For the most part, services that have a direct impact on our community fall within provincial jurisdiction. Furthermore, restrictions on federal spending powers, highlighted in the Speech from the Throne and now the subject of Bill C-507, and the devolution of federal responsibilities provide significant challenges to those charged with designing and implementing the road map in Quebec. Unlike the federal government, our provincial government does have the responsibility to promote the vitality of our community. Therefore, little, if any, leverage can be obtained without some innovative thinking.
Under the previous action plan and the current road map, many initiatives were not available to the English-speaking community of Quebec. Among the gaps were programs in the areas, for example, of literacy, early childhood development, and immigration.
There are certainly varied reasons for this situation. The community also acknowledges that in some cases our capacity to successfully support implementation was lacking, but our community structures and support networks are still evolving to adapt to the specific challenges and realities of being an English-speaking minority community in Quebec.
The structural challenges in government programming, such as the road map, can be mitigated by innovative thinking and dedicated effort. For example, immigration is the subject of a Canada-Quebec accord to which the current road map is subordinate.
Quebec's immigration policy does not address the demographic pressures faced by the English-speaking community. Renewal is of importance to English-speaking communities across the province and of critical concern to the communities on the island of Montreal. Ground-breaking strategies are being developed to access road-map funding for research to inform the design of future initiatives, such as a study on the ability of English-speaking communities to help attract and retain immigrants in rural Quebec.
We believe that closer collaboration with Citizenship and Immigration Canada, with the community, and with the government of Quebec is beginning to pay off. In small steps, we're beginning to demonstrate that capitalizing on the community's role as an asset could help with immigrant retention in the regions, and retention means thriving communities and perhaps even growing communities.
Finally, I have a word on evaluation. Ever since the launch of the overarching priority-setting initiatives, such as the action plan and the road map, we have come to recognize that there is a systemic flaw in the policy and program design, which cannot be fixed by regular evaluation processes. Therefore, unless the evaluation process includes what we call a gap analysis, nothing will change. Only an evidence-based approach will ultimately allow departments to fill in the gaps.
Issues cannot be fixed at the evaluation stage--which often comes at the end--and therefore policy and interventions for the English-speaking community of Quebec must be considered from the outset.
The English-speaking community of Quebec cannot continue to rely only on a half-century of research and capacity building, as provided to Canada's francophone minority. Evidence-based policy by definition relies on evidence. To ensure our vitality, the English-speaking minority needs more resources directed towards research.
To conclude, although we feel largely absent from the road map, we of course still believe it possible that English-speaking Quebec can be given equal national consideration and equitable resources in developing its successor, the planning of which we understand is already under way.
Thank you for listening to some of our concerns, and we look forward to trying to answer some of your questions.
:
Mr. Chair, ladies and gentlemen, members of the committee, I would first like to thank you for having invited us to appear this morning as part of your study on the Roadmap for Canada's Linguistic Duality. We are coming to the roadmap's halfway point and we absolutely need to take this time to look back on what has been done and especially the approach that was taken, in order to make the adjustments needed between now and 2013. In preparing our presentation, and in order to make thoughtful comments and assist you in your study, we consulted with the 40 member organizations of the Leaders Forum, which is working on implementing the community strategic plan. That plan arose from the 2007 Francophone and Acadian Community Summit.
The government launched its Roadmap for Canada's Linguistic Duality in June 2008, however, it did not set the new course as we had been hoping for in terms of strengthening the social, economic and cultural vitality of our communities. Nevertheless, the roadmap was a significant initiative. Investments totalling $1.1 billion were announced, representing an increase of $400 million over the Official Languages Action Plan. The roadmap helped sustain most of the initiatives started under the action plan. A greater number of departments and development sectors were targeted by the roadmap. Culture and youth were identified as priority sectors. Investments made in education, health and justice were increased. If the strength of the roadmap was to emphasize services to the public, its weakness came from leaving behind the groups that create and deliver those services. There was no increase in the support given to communities and organizations that create and instil a sense of community living in French.
In a context where the government, in the Speech from the Throne, has spelled out its commitment to further work with local organizations, one of the priorities should be to strengthen the capacity of local organizations to carry out their community missions and offer services to the public, if the roadmap is to become an out-and-out success. That is a priority for both us and the government.
That isn't the only success factor. I would now like to address the main issue that we would like to talk to you about today, i.e. the governance of the roadmap. The greatest challenges are ones of clarity and transparency. To date, it is especially difficult to know what has been invested where, when and by whom. There is still no public document containing a breakdown of roadmap investments by department, year and initiative. Our primary and almost sole source of information is the Official Languages Secretariat website, which presents only the announcements that have already been made. Furthermore, the recurrent funding of the various departments in terms of official languages is not announced and not part of the available data. The situation is not made any easier by the fact that few departments specifically mention the roadmap or official languages in their financial planning. More often than not, you have to try and read between the lines. Added to that is the fact that funding is announced once a year, which makes it particularly difficult to do any short, medium or long-term planning. There is also a lack of clarity with regard to expected results, performance indicators and the linkages among departments or between departments and communities.
We have tried to find out more about how the roadmap is presented in departmental reports on plans and priorities. The only department we currently have information on is Canadian Heritage. The department presents various measures related to the implementation of the roadmap, the renewal of federal and provincial agreements, cooperation agreements with the communities and ongoing initiatives to improve the grants and contributions approval and allocation procedures. Those activities have their own performance measurement frameworks, which include results and indicators. Among other things, the department measures the satisfaction of OLMCs with program access and services provided by the community organizations, as well as the confidence of OLMC members with regard to the promotion of our community.
How did they define those indicators? How will they consult with the communities on the achievement of those results?
Moreover, will they be assessing the impact, the work done by communities, or the impact of government funding? I do want to underscore that there have been improvements in terms of linkages. For example, if you look at the Horizontal Results-based Management and Accountability Framework, which was developed last year for the Roadmap, you will find that the governance structure now includes a dialogue component with the official language minority communities. We are proud to have contributed to that governance structure and are looking forward to the first day of dialogue with the communities. The event will be held in May and attended by representatives of 15 departments and 40 francophone organizations.
It needs to be said, however, that such a day of dialogue was held at least once a year under the Official Languages Action Plan, with senior executives of federal institutions in attendance. This day of dialogue, which was called for by the FCFA, is the first opportunity to hold discussions between the institutions targeted by the Roadmap and the communities.
Consultations also vary considerably from one sector to another, from one department to another. That is something that has been mentioned on a number of occasions by Commissioner Fraser and his predecessor, Dyane Adam. Part VII of the Official Languages Act and its obligation to ensure that positive measures are taken suggest that communities participate in all stages of the development, implementation and evaluation of the policies and programs that are of concern to them.
We, like the government, want the investments made under the Roadmap to produce significant results for Canadians who want to live and grow in French. We believe that the challenges we have pointed out with regard to governance can be overcome through better coordination. As we have indicated in our document entitled La mise en oeuvre de la Loi sur les langues officielles: une nouvelle approche - une nouvelle vision [the implementation of the Official Languages Act: a new approach, a new vision], the success of a comprehensive approach depends on the coordination of a central institution that has an authority over the entire federal machinery of government.
Such coordination would ensure that the federal institutions under the Roadmap take their responsibilities into account in their budget planning, report on plans and priorities and performance reports. That would lead to a better overall profile of all Roadmap investments, guarantee better linkages with provincial and territorial governments as well as with communities, and call on targeted institutions to consult with organizations and report on the coordinated efforts.
Essentially, there needs to be an active, horizontal governance structure to directly engage the key departments and agencies, and ensure strong and transparent leadership. I have often said that we wanted to be part of the solution. That is still the case. That is why, after having reviewed the implementation of the Roadmap to date, we would like to make concrete recommendations for the next steps.
First, in order to facilitate planning both for the communities and the departments, we recommend there be a template indicating how investments are being made under the Roadmap. We will come back to that. Furthermore, we know that your committee made a recommendation last fall calling on the Department of Canadian Heritage to make further use of multi-year agreements. We thank you for that and believe that the recommendation could extend to all institutions targeted by the Roadmap.
As for cooperation mechanisms with the communities, I said earlier that the Roadmap and the community strategic plan share a number of common elements. It would make sense to increase the linkages between the two. That is why we gave a detailed presentation of the community strategic plan to the members of the Interdepartmental Policy Committee in November, and that is the reason why we will be discussing implementation of the plan with the 15 departments attending the day of dialogue in May.
I hope that there will be more opportunities for discussion among the institutions targeted by the Roadmap, other departments and the communities in the future.
:
I apologize. I am probably speaking too quickly for the interpreter. In fact, I was told about that at the beginning.
In the future, I hope there will be more opportunities for dialogue between the institutions contained in the Roadmap, the other departments and the communities. More specifically, in accordance with what is prescribed by section VII, we are asking that the government quickly implement, in cooperation with the communities, a transparent consultation structure founded on performance targets and indicators, that the government consult with communities in the development of evaluation mechanisms, including collecting information and validating this information by the communities; that the government work with communities to assess whether the changes have actually taken place on the ground regarding the ability of Canadians to live and work within the dynamic communities in the official language of their choice; and, lastly, to make public the way the budget was broken down, so that we can see where investments under the Roadmap were made, by year and by department.
Five years ago, on the request of the government, the FCFA coordinated the development of the communities' perspective on what accomplishments had been made halfway through the Official Plan on Official Languages. Now that the Roadmap is near its halfway point, I cannot insist enough on the importance of receiving the perspective of communities as a tool to benchmark, evaluate and, ultimately, achieve results. We are also aware that this perspective at the halfway point will sow the seeds of a government initiative which will come after the Roadmap.
We have ideas to share and, especially, we have a plan which is based on a common and motivating vision which we developed three years ago: a vision of life in French, in a dynamic community involving many organizations which offer a whole range of services and activities. This vision will require strong leadership on the part of both government and communities.
Thank you very much.
:
Thank you for confirming that I can indeed ask the questions I wish of the witnesses, and that I can use my time as I see fit. However, I will ask the same question, and I will wait for an answer because I understand that you will have to discuss this matter with the minister and the government. That being said, if it was possible to receive an answer before that dialogue takes place, that would be greatly appreciated.
Further, in May, we will hear from—but we are still waiting for confirmation—Minister , and possibly Minister to speak to the Roadmap. I share your opinion: since we are at the halfway point, it is important to point out any weaknesses the Roadmap might have.
My second question is for you, and for Mr. Donnelly, as well as to the officials with you. If you have any questions which you would like the , and the , to answer, please send them to us. I have no objection to sharing them with all the members of the committee, because the country could benefit from a greater degree of transparency as far as the Roadmap is concerned. We also tried to have more transparency regarding the action plan. So this is an invitation. I will use the content of your presentations from this morning to prepare for the two meetings we will have in May with the ministers.
[English]
In particular, I'm intrigued by your view, Mr. Donnelly, of the systemic flaw that can't be fixed at the end when you have an evaluation. There was a fairly detailed evaluation midway on the action plan. I hope there was a final evaluation on the action plan before the feuille de route was put in place. Was there not an occasion to influence the feuille de route in terms of the systemic flaw, or was the systemic flaw a continuation of the action plan?
It could be. So I'm just trying to determine if the systemic flaw that you perceived was already present and why we are not attacking it. If we haven't been, then indeed the mid-range, or mi-parcours, would be useful afin de corriger le tir, pardon.
:
The road map and its successor were the fruit of many consultations. At least, the action plan took enormous consultation in the beginning of 2000-2001.
We acknowledge in the English-speaking community that we were not quite ready for all of the initiatives being considered by the seven or eight departments at the time. The only place we were really ready was in health. There was a crying need for access to health services and a lot of work was done around health. The other sectors are quite lacking in structure, so the action plan had a huge impact in health but the other sectors were not great.
It's not about who and what. We weren't quite ready...our capacity. That's why we say in this speech “our evolving capacity”. Since 2000, the capacity of the community has grown and we've learned from good practices in health how better to work with the province in certain sectors.
In evaluation, Treasury Board policy evaluates the design and the delivery of a program at mid-term or at the end, where you make adjustments to the actual program. We were absent in many. Unless you do some special kind of analysis to say the English-speaking community was not there then, and then ask are they ready now, or is there a quid pro quo because we can't do that there.... Our point is that with all of the work that has been done, both with the action plan and the many millions of dollars, we will never be able to have a benefit in many sectors because it's already set. Many of the programs that were taken on by the road map were programs that had already been initiated with the action plan. So you can see that we're just moving along with older thinking--
:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I would like to give a warm welcome to our witnesses, whom we have met with a number of times already.
I am somewhat taken aback by what I am hearing regarding consultation. I personally am certainly available. We have had a number of consultations with you in the FCFA.
[English]
We meet regularly in my office, so to not be acknowledged for the time that's put into it is a bit surprising.
I'm particularly surprised by QCGN this morning. The apologies that you made to me this morning for missing your consultation meeting with me last week I truly felt were sincere. Yet you didn't mention that this morning when Monsieur Godin asked if there were consultations. There have been consultations. In fact, I have to say the department meets regularly, at least once a year anyway, with the organizations. I wanted to meet, and QCGN actually turned me down and said they would only meet with the minister. And last week the minister and I waited for half an hour for a consultation that no one showed up to. So I'm a little surprised, when we talk about consultations, that those consultations aren't acknowledged.
Furthermore, when we talk about our commitment to official languages, this is a feuille de route with $1.1 billion. That is sans précédent , it's an historic amount of money, and that is a firm commitment to both the English-speaking minority community in Quebec and of course the French-speaking minority communities across the rest of the country.
In any event, I do have some questions.
[Translation]
To begin with, I want to provide some information to the FCFA, since I understand that it is hard for them to find information on the Web sites. The Web site of the Official Languages Secretariat has everything that you are looking for on the other Web sites. Perhaps there could be a link for the Health Canada Web site, for example. That said, everything is on the Secretariat Web site. They are required to provide that information. I wanted to share that in order to help you.
On the immigration issue, I am very pleased to hear that comment, since it was the government that suggested that our committee examine immigration. Things are changing a lot in that area, and there are consequences for both minority communities. I can tell you that we have doubled the amount of money available since the time of the action plan. So I am eager to see the results of our immigration study. I believe that this will help us remain engaged with our minority communities.
I would like to know how your two groups—you are umbrella groups, in a way—exchange information. How do you organize consultations and exchanges? Do the FCFA and QCGN hold meetings together?
:
On the second question, of whether we talk, of course we talk on a regular basis, especially when hot issues arise. One that comes to mind is the cancelling of the court challenges program and the implementation of the LRSP. There was huge consultation on what the communities were going to do about that and many other issues.
To come back to your first point, about a missed meeting, I'll also echo what she says. I don't think that's what Mr. Godin meant about consultation. That's not the understanding I have of his question.
Do we consult with politicians? Of course we do, all the time. We set up meetings. But when we come to Ottawa to meet representatives from Immigration Canada, we come with reality hats on, knowing that they will talk to us all we want, but when you look at the reality of the jurisdictions, what can we expect from them? They're very careful about what they say.
We continue to meet with people. We asked to meet the minister, because we still think the issue in the throne speech was important. We would have talked of other things as well, but they declined and asked us to meet with you, which we accepted. Due to a medical emergency last week we unfortunately had to cancel our visit to Ottawa. I was simply not available.
In speaking to you earlier this morning you told me that with your agenda it takes from three to six months to get another appointment. We hope to have another appointment in months three, four, or five, as we requested in our letter earlier this week. So we have talked, but the formal consultations will be on May 18 and 20.
:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I think that we, for our part, understood what you meant by "consultation": it is not individual meetings with members of Parliament. If you really want to reach your objectives and have your needs addressed, you need to be able to discuss issues. Those discussions cannot be held one on one; rather, everyone needs to get together to look at the situation and see what needs to be changed.
Before talking about the Roadmap directly, I just want to make a short comment. The chairman has raised the issue with some of you about a letter from Statistics Canada that was sent out. Before the committee meeting started, he indicated that this was a terrible thing. I would like to read you a few excerpts. I think that it is important for me to mention this when we are talking about respect for our official languages and the government's efforts to have the communities respected.
I will just read these excerpts and then move on to something else. I apologize to the interpreters, since I know that it will be very difficult for them.
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As you can appreciate, not many people can understand that. It is a bit difficult for the interpreters to try to render it—I apologize to those who are listening to the interpretation; don't worry, we did not understand any more than you did.
Let us now talk about the Roadmap. You raised some interesting points earlier about interdepartmental relations. It is also interesting to look at certain documents that were prepared for us for comparison purposes. One item is called the Primary Health Care Transition Fund. It comes with a nice note that says: "This component of the Action Plan terminated in 2006-2007. We unfortunately do not have any specific figures to determine whether this funding was reallocated to other components under Health Canada's responsibility".
It is so broad and complicated—moreover, the information is not provided—that I can understand that it becomes very difficult to know what the various sources of funding and resources are within the different departments. That is something that we have already talked about in the committee. If I remember correctly, the Minister of Heritage said that this was an important issue. One has to wonder just how important it is, since it is difficult, if not impossible, to find.
So if you could give us more explanations about this... After all, it is not just Canadian Heritage that has responsibility for official languages and what the government calls the Roadmap; all the departments are supposed to play a role. Do you feel it is reasonable for the information to be so vague and for it to be so difficult to see the connection between the various departments and the Roadmap? You can—
Welcome to all four of you. Once again, it's a pleasure to meet with you.
The Roadmap is important. I see that under the former Treasury Board Secretariat action plan, the amount granted was $72.64 million over five years, whereas under the Roadmap, it was reduced to $17.52 million over five years. That definitely makes a considerable difference.
You said earlier that there is a lack of consultation and dialogue between the various departments. You also stated that the Roadmap is not complete because there has been no consultation concerning targets. So there are really substantial gaps. Will you be studying this? Have you scheduled meetings with ministers or deputy ministers? That is important.
You can answer me a bit later, but I would like to add something. You are welcome to meet with us any day, anytime, as often as you want. These meetings between us are formal, but they are not government meetings. You need to meet with government officials who can really do something within their department. Even if you met with Ms. Glover, myself or my colleague Jean-Claude D'Amours, that won't change anything. You need to meet with ministers, deputy ministers and senior officials who will respond immediately and be able to give you answers.
:
Yes, there has been progress. For instance, in the health care sector.
I could talk about all the good things. However, since we don't have a lot of time, we would like to talk about how we can work together to improve things. As we said, we want to be part of the solution. I did not come here to complain.
I would like to point out another problem. The Roadmap focuses a lot on strengthening government infrastructure in the interest of providing service. But people did not realize, or they did not consider the fact, that we are the ones who provide these services, since we are on the front lines. Yet our current infrastructure, that is, the organizations that actually provide the services, has not been strengthened.
Under the Roadmap, projects have been undertaken and money invested. However, when the Roadmap ends and we move on to something else, we will still need to provide those services. But we will not be able to continue providing these services unless our funding is increased. For me, this is very important. Investment in infrastructure has been increased, in the Centre of Excellence and elsewhere. We should not forget to make other investments, as well.
Can I tell you about all the progress which has been made? As I said, there has been lots of progress and consultation in the areas of culture and health. We consulted with the members of our organizations, and they told us that funding had been given to Franco Médias 2010 and to the legal sector. There have been consultations and there have been projects. So there has been progress.
I don't want to omit to say that there has been progress, and that investment has had a significant impact, even though it wasn't as much as we had hoped for. The government had established priorities even before the Roadmap came out. Our Roadmap was the Strategic Community Plan, which we have just finished. In some areas, we followed the lead of the Roadmap. In others, we felt that it was better not to take into account the Roadmap's priorities.
Has there been progress elsewhere? Absolutely. I don't want to lie to you. On the contrary there has been a lot of progress.
:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Maybe we could ask Ms. Glover to appear as a witness before the committee at its next meeting.
You're not here to shower praise on anyone, but rather to let us know what is not working with this Roadmap. That's what we want to hear about. It's up to the government to take note of what is being said. We have very little time.
We have a table here that indicates that there were cuts at the Treasury Board Secretariat. Available funds went from $72 million down to $17 million. For the public service, the monies available went from $72 million down to $17 million. This must certainly affect someone somewhere. Under the heading “Investing in Innovation”, we can see that the funding has gone down from $15.7 million to nothing at all. The funds available for the Centre of Excellence have gone up, from $13 million to $17 million. On the other hand, under the heading “Rebuilding Capacity (Public Service Commission)”, we know that the funding has gone down from $43 million to nothing at all. As for consultations, we're talking about consultations with the departments, with the appropriate minister. There is not a single person who represents everybody in government.
I'm sorry, but with all due respect, I think that it's not up to the parliamentary secretary to try and solve on her own the problems your communities are facing, be they English or French-speaking communities. Community members have the right to meet with the minister to tell him or her what is wrong. That's what we call consultation. Moreover, the minister is responsible for contacting you and consulting you. You shouldn't have to beg to have a meeting with him and simply be told that he will be able to see you in six months which is clearly a sign of a lack of respect. I'm convinced that some people in Canada meet ministers far more often than that. They don't have to wait six months. Under the heading “Reducing waiting lists for language training”, funds went from $13 million to zero.
What do you think of all this?
I don't want to spend too much time on the issue but, like most of my colleagues, I really enjoyed the meetings I had with some of you. Consultation is very useful, but we're not talking about consultation here. I think that all those around this table will agree with me when I say that public consultation is much broader than what we're dealing with.
I'm surprised to hear you talk so much about governance, because it is one of the five goals of the Roadmap.
Today, we talked a lot about this governance issue.
In the Roadmap, $33 million are set aside for governance. I would like to mention a few of the numbers I found in this paper. Some $2.5 million is to be spent to set up an ongoing consultation process, which doesn't seem to have been done. Then, $13.5 million has been set aside for the Horizontal Accountability and Coordination Framework, though nothing seems to have been done there either. Finally, $17 million has been earmarked for a Centre of Excellence to promote accountability. I wonder where all of that money has gone?
You mentioned that you had trouble getting the numbers, results, and finding out where the money has gone. I suppose that's going to be part of the questions you'll ask us, as Mr. Bélanger has asked. I personally think that it's extremely important that we find out where that money has gone. You said that you visited the Web site and that you only found publicity. You found no data that would explain how that money has been spent. But governance is one of the priorities of the Roadmap.
say that they are quite willing to review the Horizontal Management and Accountability Framework. On the other hand, they refuse to meet with you. You've told us that you asked to meet with the minister after the Speech from the Throne. What can you add to this?
:
For committee work, we're here and we're happy to be here. I think what is important is the notion of outreach.
For the English-speaking community, we are in Montreal. The issue is on our access and our potential to come to Ottawa regularly.
[Translation]
This is all to do with fact that we are in Montreal. When we have to travel, it is expensive. And when we plan to travel, we have to make sure that it is done in the most efficient and productive way possible.
[English]
So it is more helpful if departments and ministers invite us in for consultation. It's the notion of outreach, and not just once a year. Things happen throughout the year. You have to have an outreach strategy. For English-speaking communities of Quebec, if you think there is maybe a problem, then maybe the impact of the Official Languages Act is not working as well in Quebec as somewhere else.
For the moment, in terms of our evolution, you would think there would be a bigger initiative around outreach. I can tell you there is no perceived significant outreach strategy to the English-speaking community of Quebec--like how we are different, how we can speak to you. I'll give you an example of the dialogue days. In Quebec we're not structured as well because of history, because of structure money. We don't have certain structures, so for us to go to that day it's a little more complicated to bring people in. We have to figure it out. To bring 33 people to that dialogue day the other day, my structure is not capable of doing the same thing. I can't just bring 32 of my members in, because for it to be really good for the department and beneficial for all of us, I have to figure out, if there are 40 people to come, who should be there. Where are my strong sectors? Where are my weak sectors?
I must have spent a week talking to people, bringing them in, making them understand what official languages are--I called it my Love Boat connection. That is very time-consuming. When we talk about asymmetry or we talk about a different perception in Quebec, we have to consider that. For us, the outreach strategy for Quebec has to be considered differently.
First, I would like to point out that it was Stéphane Dion, when the Liberal Party formed the government, who established the first action plan. This was an initiative aimed at promoting linguistic duality. The first plan contained objectives.
As concerns the second plan, or Dion II or the current Roadmap, whatever you want to call it—as you can see, I am not being partisan—some additions have been made in financial terms, but in other aspects, the plan has taken a beating. The organizations here with us today have been less affected by the question of public funding. That being said, I would still like to point out, as my colleagues did earlier, that consequently the government machinery is not as well equipped to serve the public in the language of its choice. This is all a question of the funds granted to Treasury Board and the Canada School of Public Service that are declining drastically.
Last week we heard from the Commissioner of Official Languages, and I was shocked to learn that he was obliged to dip into his budget envelope to promote official languages to senior government officials. It's absolutely shameful that Canada should still be at that point. If Canadian government officials do not realize that they are obliged to accept the fact that their employees work in French because it is the minority language in their environment, imagine what kind of impression that makes on communities, that don't even have the support of senior officials because they don't understand that the federal government must provide services in the language of the minority. This is a major shortcoming in the Roadmap and it's absurd, at the very least, not to say shameful. It's very important that people understand that.
As concerns consultations, I remember back in the fall of 1987 when the Secretary of State at the time, Lucien Bouchard, met for the first time with all organizations who received funding from Secretary of State—now Canadian Heritage—to hear their opinion. That was a first. Jean-Bernard Lafontaine, whom some of you know, was his political attaché. I participated in this meeting on behalf of the Fédération de la jeunesse canadienne-française. It was the first open consultation with all partners around one table. That's what we're talking about. We're not talking about the little chats you have with Richard Nadeau before our meetings, we're not talking about the time you met with me in my office to discuss your issues, although that was an excellent meeting; we are talking about high-level discussions.
To come back to my primary concern, if I understand correctly, interdepartmental dialogue is substandard, whether or not it is Canadian Heritage that always meets with the French-language minority or English Quebeckers. That is only 1 department out of the 60 federal government departments and agencies. All departments should participate in the initiative launched by Lucien Bouchard—who was a Progressive Conservative at the time—with all the communities, but we don't see this happening anywhere.
Do you think it would be helpful if this plan put forth the idea that the Privy Council Office of the Prime Minister should be responsible for official languages, rather than a department that is the alter ego of the other ones—everyone minds their own business because they are all alter egos—and that senior officials should learn both French and English if they don't already know them? In such a case, you would need to meet with all the departments so they can hear what your expectations are. Do you think that that would be a good idea, the people from Quebec and the francophone and Acadian people? I'm all ears.
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In Quebec, ELAN, The English Language Arts Network is in charge. As I indicated a few minutes ago, the Roadmap includes envelopes for arts and culture, but it is difficult to get access to them. We saw concrete examples of this last year.
As I concluded my remarks, Ms. Boucher asked me if it was because it was the Quebec anglophone community. The answer is yes and no. This has never been done before. It is new. So when it comes time to provide funding in support of arts and culture in Quebec’s minority anglophone communities, we do not quite know how to proceed. I can confirm, once again however, that it is difficult.
As far as the consultative process is concerned, we worked for six months on a big file covering all regions of Quebec, especially those outside Montreal. Those efforts did not pay off however, and we were not told exactly why. It was not clear. So where do you go from there? You start over and make changes. Perhaps it is not that they did not want to tell us this. As with immigration and many other files, supporting the arts and letters in Quebec’s minority anglophone communities is so complicated.
[English]
Is it supportive of Canadian English culture? We know for the arts and for the role that it plays in community vitalities,
[Translation]
it is so important. We need money. We are still working, even now. We had money for a research project on artists and communities, but it did not end up getting approval. We persevere nonetheless.