The tangled web of the new Official Languages Act

Once again, Bloc Québécois MP Mario Beaulieu recently stood up in the House of Commons to object to federal funding for the English-speaking community in Quebec. The $820-million dollars earmarked for English-speaking Quebecers, which represents about 20 per cent of the money being made available through the Action Plan for Official Languages, Beaulieu charges, is “financing the anglicization of Quebec.” This money should be used instead, he says, to promote the francization of English-speaking Quebecers. Since earlier this year, when the Action Plan for Official Languages was introduced to provide funding for minority language communities across the country, Beaulieu has made it his mission to oppose any effort to provide federal money for the English-speaking community in Quebec. “It is French that is in decline in Quebec,” he notes, “so I don’t see the logic in funding English.” Jean-François Roberge, Quebec’s minister of the French language, seems to agree with Beaulieu, describing the sums proposed by the federal government to support the English community in Quebec as “absurd.” This idea appears “absurd” to Roberge and Beaulieu because neither one of them believes that there is really such thing as an English-speaking minority in Quebec. There are, they readily acknowledge, English-speaking people living in Quebec. But the presence of these English-speaking people in Quebec should be seen as threats to the survival of the French-speaking majority of the province and not as a deserving minority eligible for federal support intended for linguistic minorities under the terms of the Official Languages Act. According to Beaulieu, the Official Languages Act is not to be used to support and promote Canada’s two official languages. It is to be used, instead, to support and promote minority language groups that he deems to be threatened. What this means in practice is that francophones living outside Quebec would deserve funding because they are minorities in their provinces and thus are threatened. Francophones in Quebec also deserve funding, however, because they are a minority within Canada and thus also threatened. As for the English-speaking minority in Quebec, it is not to be seen as a minority at all. It is to be seen, rather, as an extension of the English-speaking majority in the rest of Canada and thus not threatened at all and certainly not in need of any support or funding from the federal government. The new Official Languages Act, according to Beaulieu, is not intended to protect and promote linguistic minorities across the country. It is intended, rather, solely to protect and promote French inside and outside of Quebec. Unlike the English-speaking community in Quebec, which is seen as an extension of the English-speaking majority in the rest of Canada and thus not a minority at all and certainly not a threatened minority, the French-speaking community in the rest of the country is not to be considered an extension of the French-speaking majority in Quebec. It is to be seen, instead, as made up of a series of dispersed communities in each province that require legal protections and federal financial support. Taking this all a step further, the French-speaking majority in Quebec is not a majority in the province at all; it is, in fact, a minority group in Canada fighting for its survival. All federal funding destined for minority language communities across the country thus should be reserved for francophones both inside and outside Quebec. In other words, the Official Languages Act, according to Beaulieu and Roberge, is not there to protect and promote Canada’s two official languages. It is there to protect and promote French. The federal Liberals have created the conditions that have led us to this point. Having declared that French is threatened all across the country—including in Quebec—and enshrining this idea in law with Bill C-13 and the new Official Languages Act, the government is now having a hard time defending the idea that any federal funding should be allocated for Quebec’s English-speaking minority. Not that the Liberals appear all that bothered by any of this, or even interested in standing up for the English-speaking community in Quebec. Recently in the House of Commons, Minister of Tourism Soraya Martinez-Ferrada boasted that it was her government that first recognized that French was in decline in Quebec and in need of greater support. And the government recently promised that $50-million of the funding allocated for the English community in Quebec would be used instead for “francization” programs in the province. Meanwhile, the minister in charge of official languages, Randy Boissonnault, hinted that more of the money allocated for the English-speaking community in Quebec could be diverted into programs promoting French in the province. Having turned away from the original Official Languages Act of 1969 that recognized the equality of both languages and replaced it with one that recognizes only one language to be in decline and under threat in this country, the federal Liberals have effectively committed the government to the protection and promotion of French across the entire country and made any attempt to support the English-speaking community in Quebec appear like a violation of the spirit of the new Official Languages Act. Jeffery Vacante is an assistant professor of history at the University of Western Ontario. He is the author of National Manhood and the Creation of Modern Quebec. The Hill Times

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The tangled web of the new Official Languages Act

The federal Liberals have effectively made any attempt to support the English-speaking community in Quebec appear like a violation of the spirit of the new Official Languages Act.

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