The French Language Services Commissioner of Ontario, Kelly Burke, received 15% more complaints in 2020-2021, compared to last year. Government communications remain the main source of complaints, according to the 50-page report filed by the Commissioner on Tuesday, as was the case in 2019-2020.
The absolute number of complaints has decreased by 80 from 2019-2020, but the Commissioner’s previous study covered a period of 17 months, instead of 12 months like this year, which will become the norm from now on.
Complaints about government communications relate primarily to pandemic communications and services. At the start of it, in March 2020, government press briefings were not notably translated into French. Press releases were sometimes sent in French several hours after the English version.
Last year, the Commissioner relied on better planning within the departments in order to improve the offer of services in French. Kelly Burke assured during a press briefing in Queen’s Park, Ontario’s parliament, that the Ontario government had taken planning “seriously”. But the plans of the various ministries for the improvement of services in French are not due until 2022.
The 2020-2021 report this year now introduces the CSEF Compass (Communication, Services, Equivalence and Ease of Access) to further guide the government. The latter will have to self-assess according to the four aspects of the compass. “This evaluation allows […] it is up to government to have evidence that tells it where its planning is meeting its objectives and where it needs to be improved, ”says the report.
“Humiliating” services
“The experience of Francophones who use the services [en personne] of government is negative, even very negative. Francophones were uncomfortable, humiliated, frustrated, ”Kelly Burke explained Tuesday morning. “They had to continue in English,” she says. Direct or in-person government services represent nearly 40% of cases handled by the French Language Services Unit in 2020-2021.
Just a few months ago, members of the Francophone community at the University of Ottawa reported Francophobia on campus. Commissioner Burke did not want to comment on the state of Ontario’s Francophonie, however, in light of the experience of Francophones who use government services in person.
“We have had a 15% increase in complaints, which means that the Francophone community recognizes our services, that they are exercising their language rights more and more and that there is satisfaction among Francophones with our service”, underlined the French Language Services Commissioner, in office since January 2020. The increase in cases, according to Kelly Burke, “can be attributed to a lot of things”.
Over the past year, however, 60 complaints were filed against Laurentian University in Sudbury, which took shelter from its creditors at the start of 2021. The complaints prompted the Commissioner to launch a formal survey of the university, the results of which will be known next year.
Last week, the Auditor General of Ontario, who herself is investigating the financial woes of Sudbury University, recently criticized the post-secondary institution for its lack of transparency. The university would not have shared with him certain privileged documents, important for the investigation. The commissioner did not say whether she had such problems. “The investigation is ongoing, it is progressing well,” she said.
This story is supported by the Local Journalism Initiative, funded by the Government of Canada.