Official Languages

The committee studied the draft regulations under Part VII of the Official Languages Act, which aim to implement the modernized act’s commitments to minority language communities and to the full recognition and use of English and French across Canada. Appearing were Étienne-Alexis Boucher, Chief Executive Officer of Droits collectifs Québec; Derrek Bentley, Network Chief Executive Officer of Canadian Parents for French; Stéphanie Chouinard, Associate Professor, as an individual; and Ahdithya Rajan P. Visweswaran, Director, Advocacy and Public Policy, Canadian Parents for French.

Étienne-Alexis Boucher and François Côté of Droits collectifs Québec argued the draft regulations are too vague and fail to comply with international law on minority language protection, as they do not recognize French as a minority language across Canada, including in Quebec. They called for clear, measurable objectives such as demographic targets and language transfer rates, and criticized the lack of consultation with Quebec’s francophone civil society, noting that only one federal-provincial agreement under the action plan supports the anglophone minority in Quebec, with no comparable measures for French.

Derrek Bentley and Ahdithya Rajan P. Visweswaran of Canadian Parents for French expressed concern that the regulations asymmetrically prioritize minority community protection over the act’s second pillar of fostering societal bilingualism. They recommended explicitly recognizing “other stakeholders” as organizations advancing linguistic duality, providing structural supports for their participation, and creating differentiated consultation mechanisms to prevent their perspectives from being overshadowed. They noted their pre-consultation input was not reflected in the draft.

Stéphanie Chouinard, as an individual, argued the regulations must go beyond setting processes to include clear, measurable objectives and evidence-based impact indicators, warning that without such changes, the risk of a “Gascon 2.0” court ruling remains. She recommended defining “strong institutions” as those managed by and for communities, requiring federal institutions to explain how consultation findings are used, and specifying obligations for federal-provincial-territorial agreements, especially when provinces refuse to cooperate.

During questions, Boucher and Côté stressed that the regulations lack concrete measures to support French in Quebec, despite the act’s recognition of its minority status, and that ineffective consultation undermines transparency. Bentley and Visweswaran noted that Canadian Parents for French receives federal grants but lacks capacity for both service delivery and policy engagement, and they called for equitable access plans for French immersion programs. Chouinard emphasized that while regulations cannot set specific targets for all departments, they must require each institution to establish and publicly report on measurable objectives using evidence-based data. No procedural debate, motions, or votes occurred during the meeting.