Minister Ginette Petitpas Taylor intends to give new powers to the Commissioner of Official Languages, including the power to “impose monetary administrative penalties” on companies, such as Air Canada, in order to ensure respect for the language rights of Canadians.
To achieve this, she tabled Bill C-13 (An Act to amend the Official Languages Act and to enact the Act respecting the use of French within private enterprises under federal jurisdiction) on Tuesday, more than 125 days after having been designated Minister of Official Languages.
Crown corporations already subject to the Official Languages Act that “operate in the field of transportation” and “provide services to and communicate with travellers” may be subject to an “administrative monetary penalty” an amount not to exceed 25,000 dollars, can we read in the document of nearly 75 pages.
“Administrative financial penalties are a tool that has been added to the toolbox,” said Minister of Official Languages Ginette Petitpas Taylor during a press conference in Grand-Pré, New -Scotland, Tuesday. “There are many other tools that have been added, such as the power to mediate, the power to order, and the list goes on,” she added.
“The imposition of a sanction is not intended to punish, but rather to encourage respect for the [loi] “, for their part, underlined senior officials in a technical briefing.
The Trudeau government has been careful not to impose fluency in French and English as a condition for hiring the bosses of companies like Air Canada, subject to the Official Languages Act. After saying she was still “disappointed and angry” at the remarks made last fall by the President and Chief Executive Officer of Air Canada, Michael Rousseau, according to which he had no intention of learning the French language in Because of her busy schedule, Ginette Petitpas Taylor indicated that she wanted to respond to the main “concern” of Canadians, which is to “have service in French”.
Increased protection of French
Furthermore, Bill C-13 will give workers in private companies under federal jurisdiction in Quebec, but also “in regions with a strong Francophone presence” — which have not yet been identified — “the right to do their work and ‘to be supervised in French’, ‘the right to receive any communication and documentation […] in French” as well as “the right to use work instruments and computer systems in common and general use in French”.
Private companies under federal jurisdiction may not “adversely treat an employee [au Québec] on the sole ground that he does not have sufficient knowledge of a language other than French” unless they are “capable [s] to demonstrate that knowledge of this language is objectively necessary because of the nature of the work to be performed by the employee”.
The federal government intends to offer free choice to private businesses under federal jurisdiction present in Quebec to conduct “their communications with consumers” in compliance with the Act respecting the use of French within private businesses under federal jurisdiction — which reiterates that “consumers in Quebec have the right to communicate in French with a private enterprise under federal jurisdiction that exercises its activities there and to receive services in that language from it” — or even to the Charter of the French language of Quebec .
The Tongues of Justice
Bill C-13 also provides that “final decisions of federal courts having “precedential value” be “simultaneously made available to the public” in French and English.
It also states that like other federal courts, the Supreme Court of Canada shall “ensure that whoever hears the case [notamment] understands French without the aid of an interpreter when the parties have opted for the case to take place in French”.
More details will follow…