French farce abroad

Canada's official languages commissioner has gone overseas

By Greg Weston -- Sun Ottawa Bureau
In today's episode of "Canada: Nuts 'R' Us," we find the federal bureau of official language loonies travelling the world at taxpayers' expense.

The office of Canada's official languages commissioner recently concluded a global investigation into the use of French at Canadian embassies -- even in countries that wouldn't know bonjour from bad hair.

Apparently not content with the fortune wasted on bilingualism boondoggles in this country every year, Official Languages Commissioner Dyane Adam recently turned her sights abroad.


Hired consultants

Last fall, a team of four of Adam's staffers and a hired consultant visited a dozen Canadian embassies. By pure coincidence, the embassies and consulates selected were all in dreadful corners of the world: Paris, Madrid, Brussels, Berlin, Prague, Budapest, Washington, Mexico City, Santiago, Washington, Chicago and New York. Nice make-work if you can get it.

Naturally, we assumed all the effort and expense of Adam's international embassy investigation must have been prompted by a flood of complaints from Canadians abroad, unable to get consular assistance in the official language of their choice.

Indeed, statistics obtained from Adam's office confirm language complaints about our embassies have been skyrocketing among the 3.5 million Canadians who travel abroad every month.

In 2002, there were 10. Last year, there were 12.

Virtually all complaints were about a lack of French, and almost half the gripes were over unilingual websites, a situation that clearly demanded Adam's language police get on the next plane to Europe.

Whatever the reason for the study, its 32 pages of findings are packed with powerful stuff. One of Adam's harshest criticisms was directed at a security guard at the Washington embassy who apparently told a francophone visitor to "talk in English."

"The language of security services at our diplomatic missions has been ignored at many locations," she complains. "The situation calls for a department-wide solution."

Like many of Adam's suggestions, the notion of finding bilingual or even trilingual candidates for low-wage security jobs at all 164 embassies and consulates around the world drew a polite "uh-huh" from Foreign Affairs.

The department noted that in most countries, it is hard enough to find low-wage locals with security clearance, and that safety "will often take precedence over languages competence."

That drew a further rebuff from Adam, saying she found the department's position "difficult to reconcile." No surprise there.

One of Adam's more stunning findings was that some embassy staff actually don't speak French. The main reason for this travesty is that about 60% of embassy staff are not even Canadians, but are hired locally in cities where missions are situated, saving taxpayers here a gazillion dollars a year.

In countries where the native tongue is neither French nor English, it's tough recruiting low-paid staff who speak either, much less both.

Okay then, says our lady of the two tongues: Foreign Affairs should immediately launch a "comprehensive program" to teach French at all of our foreign missions.

Alternatively, maybe we could fix health care.

And how about them Yankees?

Adam discovered the New York consulate, for some odd reason, decided not to blow its budget supporting "regional activities celebrating the 2004 international Francophonie celebrations." Shame on you, Pam Wallin.

Similarly, the language czar reports an international crisis in Washington where our embassy website includes English-only text of some speeches to American audiences. Say it ain't so.

In her latest annual report to Parliament, justifying her $21-million office budget, Adam stated: "Canadians expect the governments that serve them to be accountable and able to show results. This principle applies to official languages."

Truer words she may never have spoken, in either official language.

As much as non-French speakers think that the country is wasting time and money with French; one has to understand that it would be foolish to alienate Quebec. Quebec contributes greatly to the Canadian economy. It has a massive aerospace industry, is the largest producer of electricity in Canada and even exports to the U.S. and Ontario. Quebec is very rich in mineral deposits and natural resources. Ignoring French would strengthen some of the separatist movements in Quebec. Why do we crib about multilingualism when in India most people speak 2 languages.

Unfortunately, this is exactly the kind of thinking that has gotten Canada into so much trouble. Instead of pushing ahead with our future, we are stuck with enormous baggage from our past. Amazingly, this nation does not have such a long and complicated history that would warrant such a situation. It is NOT comparable with the Indian subcontinent that has thousands of years of occupations and conquests, leading to 22 different languages in the same country.

Canada is simple. The British won. The French were abandoned by France. To the victors go the spoils. The British allowed the French to live in peace. Today, we suffer the consequences of Quebec feeling miserable because they live in a sea of North American English.

Quebec is no more of a contributor to the economy than its share of GDP! Alberta and BC now combined contribute more to the Canadian economy.

It is a mistake to let ourselves be blackmailed by any one province into legislating their language and culture just because we fear they might walk. This was the first mistake our politicians made.

Ontario is and remains the economic engine of Canada. Together with BC and Alberta, these 3 provinces are pouring billions into Quebec through equalization payments. The situation is ridiculous.

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Orginally posted by nicefolks20


By pure coincidence, the embassies and consulates selected were all in dreadful corners of the world: Paris, Madrid, Brussels, Berlin, Prague, Budapest, Washington, Mexico City, Santiago, Washington, Chicago and New York. Nice make-work if you can get it.

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