One of the only bilingual candidates in the race for mayor of Ottawa, Mark Sutcliffe, has already won the hearts of influential members of the Francophone community. A letter of which The duty has obtained copy invites the community to a fundraising activity even before the candidate has presented a French-language platform. According to some experts, his support for the Francophone cause — like that of his opponents — is however not certain.
Mark Sutcliffe, a former journalist, is one of two candidates who split from the pack in the race for mayor of Ottawa. He is the main opponent of Catherine McKenney, an adviser since 2014. Like almost all the candidates with the exception of Mark Sutcliffe, Catherine McKenney, who uses the pronoun iel, does not speak French. This did not prevent him from taking a lead in the race according to two polls published by the firm Mainstreet. The most recent, carried out in September, gives him a lead of more than ten percentage points over his main opponent.
The former journalist can, however, count on the support of Ronald Caza, one of the best-known figures in French Ontario by virtue of his defense of Hôpital Montfort in the late 1990s, when it was threatened with to be closed by the province. On September 23, the lawyer, who has known the candidate for a long time, sent a letter asking 25 community members to attend the fundraising dinner. “Our future as a Francophone linguistic minority in the city is at stake,” the letter reads.
The lawyer’s letter leaves University of French Ontario professor Linda Cardinal “a little indifferent”. The former member of the Movement for an officially bilingual capital predicts that there will be “more continuity than change” after the election. “Mark Sutcliffe speaks a little French, but does he have any sensitivity towards French speakers? “, she says to herself. “We don’t hear French spoken during the campaign,” notes Anne Mévellec, professor of political studies at the University of Ottawa.
If elected, Catherine McKenney intends to carry out an audit to determine the shortcomings in French-language services to the community. They have no other elements in their platform. “I think a lot about French since my election in 2014,” he says. Mark Sutcliffe, who will release a full French-language platform on October 7, has so far proposed increasing French-language recreational and municipal services. “I want to make sure that young people have the opportunity to learn French,” he says. Neither, however, presented significant reforms to language policies.
The politics of compromise
The City of Ottawa’s bilingualism policy is a key text in Francophone life: it governs the offer of services in French and the place of the language at City Hall. After a long fight to make the national capital a bilingual city, in 2017, 16 years after its creation, the policy was enshrined in the law establishing the municipality. This had the effect of preventing the council from repealing it, but the council may weaken it. University of Ottawa professor Gilles LeVasseur describes the agreement as the “ultimate compromise” between the municipality and the Francophone community.
According to some community members, the policy could be improved or at least better implemented. According to Linda Cardinal, unilingual Anglophone executives can “easily” be hired by the municipality even if their position is designated bilingual under a derogation clause in the policy. “The mayor can say: ‘We haven’t found a competent person so we would like to hire a unilingual Anglophone’”, she illustrates.
Catherine McKenney took part in board meetings where a unilingual Anglophone was hired. “You only hire an English speaker after serious consideration,” he says. As mayor, iel will ensure that the article of the clause which requires the hiring, as much as possible, of bilingual executives, is more often respected. Mark Sutcliffe, for his part, thinks that the city should put more emphasis on hiring bilingual executives. However, the former journalist does not yet know if his French-language platform will contain an element related to this file.
Linda Cardinal is among those who hoped that the recognition would inject a French-speaking vibrancy into the town hall and lead to a strengthening of the protection of French. The policy has instead remained unchanged ever since. “If we made sure that the spirit of the policy was respected and that we did not use mechanisms to derogate from it, that would be good,” argues Anne Mévellec. Éric Barrette, president of the Ottawa board of the Association canadienne-française de l’Ontario, does not expect any major changes to the policy anytime soon. “You have to be patient and realistic,” he says.
” Everything can happen “
Even if his candidate of choice is not first in the polls currently, Me Ronald Caza believes that “anything can happen”. The lawyer and the co-author of the letter, Benoît Hubert, believe that it is important for Francophones to assert their interests before election day. The two members of the French-speaking community write in the letter that it is important to make their needs known at a time when Mark Sutcliffe “is vulnerable and will see us as allies who supported him when he needed us”.
“I am very proud that there are Francophones who offer me their support,” commented Mark Sutcliffe. Catherine McKenney, on the other hand, maintains that they are always accessible and that they would never participate in a fundraising activity that requires a donation from the participants. “When we put our residents first, we can build a city hall that works for people, not just influential donors,” he says.
This story is supported by the Local Journalism Initiative, funded by the Government of Canada.