Last spring, Mélanie Joly, then Minister responsible for Official Languages, presented Bill C-32, a major reform of the law in the spirit of the document she had made public in February 2021 under the title French and English: vtowards a tie real official languages in Canada.
After the election, the Trudeau government relaunched this reform without watering it down. Bill C-13, tabled by Minister Ginette Petitpas Taylor, takes up the bill that died on the order paper, adding a few marginal elements.
The most important part of the reform consists in strengthening the powers vested in the Commissioner of Official Languages, that pug who yelps at regular intervals but never bites.
Thus, the Commissioner will continue to deliver his observations and recommendations, but he will have an order-making power to force the public service and federal Crown corporations to comply with the law. He will also be able to play the mediator and sign compliance agreements.
The Commissioner—and this was not provided for in the previous bill—will be able to impose financial penalties of up to $25,000 on companies whose activities fall under federal jurisdiction in the field of passenger transport, such as Air Canada, Via Rail and major airports.
Like Bill C-32, the latest version mentions that the Act aims for the “substantive equality” of French and English, rather than formal equality. It is said that the federal government is committed to protecting and promoting French. However, the symmetry of the Official Languages Act adopted more than 50 years ago remains. Despite the disproportion between the strength of French-speaking institutions outside Quebec and that of English-speaking institutions in Quebec, the federal government undertakes to take all measures “to support sectors essential to the development of French-speaking and English-speaking minorities and to protect and promote the presence of strong institutions that serve these minorities”, as if the two minorities, one of which is in fact a majority that has managed to ensure its supremacy, were experiencing the same realities.
In fact, achieving real equality between the official languages, however laudable this objective, is illusory. Generally speaking, no francophone outside Quebec can live in French like an anglophone can live in English in Quebec.
Furthermore, the bill states that the Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship is required to adopt a policy on francophone immigration, which must result in the establishment of objectives and targets. It’s already the case. But the target is never reached. In a report published last fall, the Commissioner of Official Languages deplored the situation, noting that less than 3% of immigrants landed outside Quebec were Francophones, whereas the target is 4.4%, i.e. the demographic weight of Francophones in the rest of Canada in 2001. However, even this objective is insufficient when we know that more than 40% of them become anglicized. It is rather 7% or 8% of French-speaking immigrants that should be recruited if Ottawa really wanted to maintain the demographic weight of the minority. And there again, nothing is certain: English Canada remains a formidable machine for assimilating French-speaking citizens.
With regard to language of work, Bill C-13 contains provisions that affect the right of employees in corporations under federal jurisdiction to work in French. In this sense, Ottawa will be duplicating work since Bill 96 currently under study in a parliamentary committee in Quebec provides for subjecting these companies — carriers, banks, telecommunications companies — to the Charter of the French language. The federal government intends to give them a choice, which will undermine the application of Quebec law and will no doubt fuel legal disputes.
There is no equality between francophones outside Quebec and anglophones in Quebec even in their reactions to the bill. The former praised the initiative while the latter, who are nevertheless clearly favored compared to the French-speaking minority, cried out loud.
In Quebec City, some have pointed out that Bill 96 will not be enough to stop the decline of French and that other measures will have to be considered, particularly with regard to immigration. The same could be said for Bill C-13. The Trudeau government is pursuing an immigration policy which, faithful to the historical trend, is harming the French presence in Canada, and this reform will not be able to change anything, nor remedy the failure of Canada’s venerable language policy.