Canada 360 | The modernization of the Official Languages ​​Act is long overdue

In 2008, Ottawa concluded an agreement with British Columbia for the transfer of the management of employment services. Since the province does not have the same official languages ​​obligations as the federal government, this agreement leads to the dismantling of a network set up by the federal government in partnership with Francophone organizations in compliance with Part VII of the Official Languages ​​Act (OLA), which aims to promote the development of official language minorities. In doing so, centers offering services in French are closed, depriving Francophones of support in their language and places of socialization necessary for their survival.

The case is taken to court. As always, it takes forever to get answers. In its judgment rendered on January 28, the Federal Court of Appeal held that the Canadian government did not take into account the harmful effects of this agreement and therefore failed in its official languages ​​commitments.

A bogged down file

Although this decision has gone under the radar, it adds to a long series of events or incidents illustrating the stagnation or setbacks with regard to the place of French in the country. We remember the unilingual English speech by the president of Air Canada to the Board of Trade of Metropolitan Montreal. Admittedly, the event caused a lot of ink to flow. In the face of public opprobrium, the principal concerned has pledged to learn French, but we will no doubt have to wait a long time for a change in culture at Air Canada, one of the biggest offenders of the OLA.

At the start of the pandemic, French was also abused with unilingual press conferences or the lack of translation of sanitary product labels. As if French speakers did not deserve, in times of crisis, to receive clear information in their language.

A survey conducted by the Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages ​​also shed light on the linguistic insecurity of federal public servants: 44% of Francophone respondents said they did not feel comfortable using French at work, a troubling phenomenon in a bilingual public service.^⁠1

In short, the official languages ​​file is bogged down. And the modernization of OLA is long overdue. The Speech from the Throne of September 23, 2020 kept hope alive. The Canadian government recalled the need to “protect and promote French” and undertook to strengthen the Official Languages ​​Act by “taking into account the particular reality of French”. Since then, there has been the tabling of a bill with no follow-up due to the elections and a change of minister. The deadline for the delivery of the new bill, set for the beginning of February, has been pushed back again.

A law for real equality

When it was created in 1969, the Official Languages ​​Act had restorative purposes. The country was going through an intense national crisis. The intellectual community and political leaders were concerned about the very sustainability of the federation in a context of rising Quebec nationalism. The OLA was part of an arsenal of recommendations formulated by the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism to bring together the “two solitudes” and create real equality of opportunity between Anglophones and Francophones. At the time, studies had revealed the economic inferiority of French Canadians and the barriers hindering their development.

Upon its entry into force, the OLA engendered a certain relaxation of relations between Anglophones and Francophones. It had become more acceptable to speak French from one end of the country to the other: the “Speak White” were more discreet. On the ground, significant gains have been made by the Francophone communities.

To achieve its objectives, the modernization of the act will have to rely on concrete applications of its Part VII which “provides that all federal institutions have a legal obligation to take positive measures to fulfill their commitment to ensure that French and English have equal status in Canadian society. Indeed, as linguistic minority specialist Rodrigue Landry points out, “if the ambitious goals of Part VII are not translated into concrete and real objectives of community vitality, and into clear commitments and responsibilities for the government, the OLA is likely to be important in appearance given its symbolic nature for the country, but without significant effect on the real equality of the two major linguistic communities concerned. »²

But more than 50 years later, we can also see the weaknesses of the Law : making the federal public service bilingual has not made Canadians more bilingual and has not necessarily made it possible to create these living spaces essential to the influence of French.

Even with a stronger law, the problems of the Canadian Francophonie will persist as long as political ambition has not been demonstrated in this file. In 1969, it was as much the national conversation among Canadians on the importance of bilingualism as a pillar of modern Canada’s identity as the OLA as such which have enabled progress. At the moment, this modernization conversation is happening mostly in insider circles, and failure to expand it could taint the fallout from this long-awaited overhaul.