Saskatoon, April 18, 2001
Trust, Dialogue and Partneships:
Enhancing the Linguistic and Cultural Dimensions of Canada
Speech delivered to the Canadian Club of Saskatoon
Dr. Dyane Adam – Commissioner of Official Language
Check against delivery
Ladies and Gentlemen,
It is an honour for me to have this opportunity to address you today.
The Canadian Club of Saskatoon is a unique institution with a long history of building better community relations.
I understand that in August last year six of your members visited members of the Société Saint-Jean-Baptiste in Sherbrooke, Quebec, and that representatives from Sherbrooke may visit Saskatoon in the near future. This is the type of grass-roots activity that pays remarkable dividends to both communities and to the unity of our country.
In hearing about this initiative, I was reminded of a passage in Antoine de Saint Exupéry's The Little Prince. The Little Prince has the following conversation with a fox:
"Come and play with me," proposed the little prince. "I am so unhappy.""I cannot play with you," the fox said. "I am not tamed.""What does that mean ? 'tame' ?""It is an act too often neglected," said the fox. "It means to establish ties.""'To establish ties'?""Just that," said the fox. "To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of you. And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you, I am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world . . . . If you tame me, it will be as if the sun came to shine on my life. I shall know the sound of a step that will be different from all the others. . . . . Think how wonderful that will be when you have tamed me!"
I take this to mean that if we take the time to know one another better as individuals and as communities, we will inevitably come to understand one another. This is particularly important at this time in our history.
We are on the hinge of a new century and a new millennium. Canada, almost without knowing it, is facing a number of new threats to its values and its culture. If it is to counter these threats, if it is to rise to the challenge, it will have to rely even more than in the past on very Canadian strengths like trust and dialogue.
Fortunately, Canadians are good at this. It is probably why we have an excellent reputation throughout the world as a nation of peacekeepers and peacemakers. We know that trust and dialogue are as much about active listening as they are about talking. We know that dialogue is about problem-solving in a spirit of fairness.
Trust and Dialogue
Let me first describe what I believe are some of the threats that Canada faces today.
- There is a political threat or danger. It is related to a growing disenchantment with government and bureaucracy. It is a sense of weariness about the intractability of certain problems, like health care or national unity. Regional cleavages only add to the perception that our governments are powerless giants.
- There are economic threats related to globalization. How is it that we are growing richer collectively, but that some people ? too many people ? continue to struggle below the poverty line?
- There are threats created by the growth of technology and the deterioration of the environment. Can we continue to plunge headlong into the future without worrying about the gradual weakening of traditional industries and, in particular, the agricultural industry?
- There are dangers created by the uneven distribution of our population. Saskatchewan, for example, in spite of strong community and church based programs, is attracting less that 1% of new immigrants and most of these go elsewhere within five years.
- At the same time, there is a latent fear of diversity and change. How can we manage so many transformations so quickly without losing our identity?
The broad problems I have just identified contribute to a weakening of our sense of belonging to a community. Sociologists have a term for this: "lack of social cohesion". What it means in simple terms is that things are becoming unstuck, that the glue that holds us together as a nation is no longer as strong. We are not, if you like, as "connected".
When this happens, we care less for others and we become less willing to work together. We also tend to become less productive. Indeed, there are a number of studies that show that high levels of trust or "social cohesion" and high rates of economic growth go hand in hand.
This is why it is so important for a country as big and as diverse as Canada to try very hard to build strong communities based on shared values.
I am optimistic however. I believe that the way Canada is now "working through" its linguistic and cultural diversity will be seen as a model for the world. A model which of course has to include all the aboriginal peoples in a spirit of mutual openness, dialogue and cooperation. Like the harnessing of our great rivers, our harnessing of social diversity will give us in the decades to come the soft and renewable power that we need to play a stronger role in the world.
In this regard, I would like to say a few words about the efforts of the Fédération des communautés francophones et acadienne ? the national spokesperson group for minority francophone communities across Canada ? to establish lasting links with other groups within Canadian society.
After extensive consultations over two years with representatives of the majority and members of ethnocultural and aboriginal associations, the Fédération has produced a remarkable report, aptly entitled: Let's Talk.
The report calls on Francophone minorities to become more open to the cultural communities, First Nations and, in general, to people across the country who support the status and use of French as one of our two official languages.
The report also points out that the falling demographic weight of Francophone communities makes it imperative that they create a larger and more open space for the majority, for cultural communities and that they be more welcoming to immigration.
How does this fit in with a vision of Canada for this new century?
First, I believe it is important to recognise our minority language communities as one of the realities that makes up Canada's essential diversity. You cannot build the future if you do not accept that its foundations lie deep in the past. In short, you cannot really claim to be open to diversity in Canada if your first reaction is to shut the door to French.
Second, I believe that the future of minority communities lies in the recognition of their added social value, of their importance as "human capital". Let me explain. With the growing competitiveness of trade and international markets, no country can afford to squander its social assets, its human resources.
Any group that is not empowered to contribute to the general growth and development of the community as a whole impoverishes all of us, both economically and socially. When society excludes, it pays an enormous price in the sterility of conflict, in the alienation of individuals and in lost productivity.
I believe that just as the success of our agriculture depends on its own productivity and on government support, the success of minority communities also depends on their own resilience and on government support.
Communities and individuals will not succeed if they have to spend each day simply trying to survive until tomorrow: they must have the tools to grow and prosper.
Let me give you an example of what I mean. It concerns educational attainment among Francophones outside Quebec. Let's look at the picture in 1971, when many federal official-languages support programs were in their infancy and the right to minority instruction had not been guaranteed in the Charter.
In this context, it's worth remembering, for example, that up until 1967, the 100th anniversary of Confederation, Saskatchewan had only permitted instruction in French one hour per day.
In 1971 then, 31.6 % of Francophones outside Quebec between the ages of 25 and 34 had left school with less than a grade nine level of education, compared to 17.1 % of non-Francophones.
As you know, in the 1980s and 1990s, much was done to implement minority language education rights. The 1996 census, as might be expected, painted a much brighter picture. Only 3.3% of Francophones outside Quebec in the same age range had less than a grade nine education compared to 2.8% in the non-Francophone population. Roughly the same catching up has also taken place in terms of post secondary education.
But past losses weigh heavily and long on the present. Although the state of education in French-speaking minority schools has improved, there are still significant problems. Today, the challenge is to increase enrolment in order to remedy, at the national level, the progressive historic erosion of minority communities.
When I became Commissioner of Official Languages, I promised myself that I would be an agent for change. It was with this vow in mind that I recently released a study by Professor Angéline Martel, entitled Rights, Schools and Communities in Minority Contexts; 1986-2002.
The study proposes a plan to increase or at least stabilize enrolment in French schools over the next ten years. The target population consists of children who have at least one parent who has French as a mother tongue. To achieve this, all the players will have to work together. French-language school boards, community leaders, education professionals and, above all, families will have to be made aware of the importance of passing the French language on from one generation to the next. This is particularly important in Saskatchewan where the target student population has dropped more than 30% since 1986, the largest single drop observed in any province or territory.
My purpose in mentioning this is to illustrate the relationship between productivity and minority community development. As I suggested earlier, strong communities make Canada stronger.
Partnerships
This is why, when the federal government revamped its Official Languages Act in 1988, it added a section, Part VII, that deals specifically with support for minority community development and promotion of English and French in society. This inclusion of this section was not, as some would have you believe, just another twist in an evil plot to make all things French.
No, it is essentially another step in a policy of fairness. It is about providing minority communities with reasonable access to the institutional resources (education, culture, health, economic development, etc.) which make it possible for them to thrive. It is, if you will, a reformulation of the commitment contained in the Charter to promote equal opportunities for the well-being of all Canadians, not just those who speak the language of the majority.
It is also about ensuring that minority language communities, like majority communities, can renew their ranks through immigration. Because immigration is central for the long term development of both communities and for Saskatchewan as a whole, cooperation between the majority and the minority is not only desirable, it appears essential.
Finally, Part VII is about assisting provincial governments in providing enhanced opportunities for learning both English and French.
These objectives were to be achieved in consultation and negotiation with the provinces. In short, it proposed new forms of partnership in building more cohesive communities.
At the end of March, I had the good fortune of being invited by the Assemblée communautaire fransaskoise to learn about their plans to build partnerships with the federal government departments in Sakatchewan and with provincial and local authorities to ensure more co-operative and co-ordinated community development. I also met with a number of provincial politicians and officials. Everywhere I went, I was encouraged by what I sense to be a renewed spirit of openness and cooperation.
I was particularly struck by the boldness and originality of some of the projects being proposed, projects such as the creation of electronic networks to link minority communities and to deliver a range of governmental and educational services more effectively and efficiently. I was also much taken by the idea of creating a network of small community radio stations. I think that these types of projects can be of interest to both Francophones and Francophiles because, in many respects, they are natural partners.
By Francophile, I mean, of course, all those people who are interested in French and in Canada's French-speaking communities. Often they or their children have learned to speak French and to enjoy French-language cultural products.
In most provinces, bilingual Anglophones far exceed the total Francophone population. Moreover, in most provinces, the number of children enrolled in immersion programs significantly exceeds the total enrolment in minority French language schools. In Saskatchewan, for example, there are about seven children in immersion for every child in a minority school. There are over 9000 children in immersion programs and another 88,000 or so in core programs which are gradually being enhanced. If the rate of bilingualism among young Anglophones living outside Quebec (aged 15 to 19) has now reached 16%, it is largely due to programs which provide more and better exposure to French.
This is surely a new and extraordinary social phenomenon for which organizations such as Canadian Parents for French deserve praise. We are witnessing at the grassroots level the emergence of a new vision of Canada. It is being championed by the young who know that French has a future.
They know that French is important in Canada and is a major international language. They have shown no hesitation in adding that language to their tool-box of skills. And once they have two major languages under their belt, there is no stopping them.
John Ralston Saul, in a recent article in the Financial Post, entitled "Bilingualism ready for a second wave" described this situation as follows:
What about other languages? Of course we need them. It's not a matter of either/or. The more languages the better. But I have noticed something revealing. The young Canadians I meet who have another language besides English and French tend to come out of immersion or French language schools. Why? They first learn two languages while young. They get into the habit of bilingualism ? the creative, exciting mindset of seeing everything through two windows. Almost naturally they themselves want to add a third language. Many a fourth.
By the way, this is just as true in Quebec. Parents there are clamouring for better teaching of English as a second language and for an earlier start on teaching a third language.
Canada is no longer the country it was even thirty years ago. Immigration and cultural diversity are leading our young people to develop their own definitions of identity and community. Many of them are developing multiple identities based on where they came from, where they are now and where they are going in the future. If ever you have heard a child of Chinese origin speak French with a Lac St-Jean twang, you will immediately know what I mean.
Young people across Canada believe that this diversity can only make us richer, economically, culturally and spiritually, if we learn to develop the tools of dialogue and understanding. They want to be the ambassadors for a new social compact founded on mutual recognition and respect.
Conclusion
I began my speech by talking about a number of threats to our values and culture. I then tried to suggest that the best way to combat these threats was to enhance our sense of belonging by forming open communities bound together by a shared vision.
I also attempted to explain how trust and dialogue could help strengthen the ties that exist between all the citizens. I pointed out that supporting the growth and development of Saskatchewan's minority official language community was important to the development of the province as a whole in an era of globalization. Finally, I underscored the crucial role that human capital, that is a highly trained, productive and strongly motivated workforce, will play in future prosperity.
I have now just realised, of course, that this has all been said before and better by the members of the Canadian Club of Saskatoon who visited Sherbrooke last year. They forged the motto:
"On se rencontre ? On s'entend ? On s'engage."
WE MEET ? WE UNDERSTAND ONE ANOTHER ? WE ACT TOGETHER.
I wish I had said that. That's what I call trust, dialogue and partnerships.
Ladies and gentlemen,
As Canadians, we are indeed privileged. We have incredible wealth, not only material riches, but wealth in the many people who call this land their home and are working together to make it even better. We also have about six months of winter just to keep us humble. We have two important world languages. And we have, I hope, the wisdom to see that all of this is a blessing.
Merci. Thank you.
