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37th PARLIAMENT, 3rd SESSION

Standing Committee on Official Languages

EVIDENCE

CONTENTS

Wednesday, February 25, 2004

1535

The Chair (The Hon. Don Boudria (Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, Lib.))

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau (Repentigny, BQ)

The Chair

Mrs. Colette Watson (President and General Manager, CPAC)

1540

The Chair

Mrs. Colette Watson

1545

The Chair

Mr. Scott Reid (Lanark—Carleton, CPC)

Mr. Barry Kiefl (President, Canadian Media Research Inc., CPAC)

Mr. Scott Reid

Mr. Barry Kiefl

1550

Mr. Scott Reid

Mr. Barry Kiefl

Mr. Scott Reid

Mr. Barry Kiefl

Mr. Scott Reid

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Scott Reid

Mr. Barry Kiefl

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Scott Reid

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Scott Reid

The Chair

Mr. Eugène Bellemare (Ottawa—Orléans, Lib.)

1555

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Eugène Bellemare

Mrs. Colette Watson

1600

The Chair

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mrs. Colette Watson

Ms. Natalie LeMay-Calcutt (Director of Business Affairs, CPAC)

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

1605

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

The Chair

Mr. Marcel Proulx (Hull—Aylmer, Lib.)

1610

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Marcel Proulx

The Chair

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Marcel Proulx

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Marcel Proulx

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Marcel Proulx

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Marcel Proulx

The Chair

Mr. Yvon Godin (Acadie—Bathurst, NDP)

1615

The Chair

Mr. Yvon Godin

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Yvon Godin

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Yvon Godin

Ms. Colette Watson

Mr. Yvon Godin

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Yvon Godin

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Yvon Godin

The Chair

Mrs. Colette Watson

The Chair

1620

Mrs. Colette Watson

The Chair

Mrs. Colette Watson

The Chair

Mr. James Lunney (Nanaimo—Alberni, CPC)

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. James Lunney

Mr. Barry Kiefl

Mr. James Lunney

1625

Mr. Barry Kiefl

The Chair

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Barry Kiefl

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mrs. Colette Watson

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Mr. Barry Kiefl

1630

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

The Chair

Ms. Yolande Thibeault (Saint-Lambert, Lib.)

Mrs. Colette Watson

Ms. Yolande Thibeault

Mrs. Colette Watson

Ms. Yolande Thibeault

The Chair

Mrs. Colette Watson

The Chair

Ms. Dyane Adam (Commissioner of Official Languages, Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages)

The Chair

Mr. Scott Reid

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Scott Reid

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Scott Reid

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Scott Reid

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Scott Reid

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Scott Reid

The Chair

Mr. Marcel Proulx

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Marcel Proulx

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Michel Robichaud (Director General, Audit Branch, Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages)

Mr. Marcel Proulx

Mr. Michel Robichaud

Mr. Marcel Proulx

Ms. Dyane Adam

The Chair

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Ms. Dyane Adam

The Chair

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Ms. Dyane Adam

The Chair

Mr. Christian Jobin (Lévis-et-Chutes-de-la-Chaudière, Lib.)

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Christian Jobin

Ms. Dyane Adam

The Chair

Mr. Christian Jobin

Ms. Dyane Adam

The Chair

Mr. Yvon Godin

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Yvon Godin

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Yvon Godin

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Michel Robichaud

Ms. Dyane Adam

Ms. Louise Guertin (Director General, Corporate Services Branch, Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages)

Ms. Dyane Adam

Ms. Louise Guertin

Mr. Yvon Godin

The Chair

Mr. Marcel Proulx

The Chair

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

The Chair

Mr. Yvon Godin

The Chair

Mr. Yvon Godin

The Chair

Mr. Yvon Godin

The Chair

Mr. Yvon Godin

Ms. Dyane Adam

The Chair

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

The Chair

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

Ms. Dyane Adam

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau

The Chair

CANADA

Standing Committee on Official Languages

NUMBER 003

3rd SESSION

37th PARLIAMENT

EVIDENCE

Wednesday, February 25, 2004

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

¹ (1535)

[Translation]

The Chair (The Hon. Don Boudria (Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, Lib.)): Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. I will now call the meeting to order. I should point out that we do not have full quorum according to our rules; we have a reduced quorum or mini-quorum.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau (Repentigny, BQ): It is not so much about quantity, but about quality.

The Chair: That is what that means, yes. It is another way of saying the same thing, Mr. Sauvageau.

That being said, I want to thank in advance, on behalf of the committee, the witnesses appearing before us this afternoon. Ms. Watson and entourage, welcome to this committee. It is a pleasure for us to have you here. We already know, of course, that there is some information we would like to get from you which does not exactly come under your area of expertise, and we will have to call other witnesses. Through your testimony, you will be able to help us, however, ensure that Canadians get a better understanding of the services offered by the House of Commons.

Do you have a brief presentation, or would you like us to go directly to questions? I note that you have provided us with an information kit and that there is a television set nearby. So I suppose you want to show us something on-screen. It would be abnormal for people who work in the field of broadcasting to not have us watch television. Ms. Watson, you have the floor.

Mrs. Colette Watson (President and General Manager, CPAC): Thank you very much.

Mr. Chair, members of the committee, good afternoon. My name is Colette Watson and I am the President and General Manager of the Cable Public Affairs Channel/la Chaîne d'affaires publiques par câble, or CPAC. I am accompanied today by Nathalie LeMay-Calcutt, CPAC's director of Business Affairs, Barry Kiefl, President of Canadian Media Research, and by Joel Fortune, of the law firm Johnston and Buchan, CPAC's legal counsel.

[English]

Thank you very much for the invitation to appear before this committee, Mr. Chair.

CPAC's last appearance before a parliamentary committee on official languages took place in May 2001 before the Joint Standing Committee on Official Languages of the House of Commons and Senate. A great deal has happened since that time, including the renewal of both CPAC's agreement with the House of Commons and CPAC's CRTC broadcasting licences. It will be our pleasure to bring the committee up to date regarding the impact of these renewal arrangements on CPAC.

In May 2001 the joint standing committee issued a report on “The Broadcasting and Availability of the Debates and Proceedings of Parliament in both Official Languages”. That report contained two recommendations that were directly relevant to CPAC: first, that CPAC's renewed agreement with the House reflect CPAC's commitment to install an infrastructure that would allow CPAC's distributors to use the secondary audio programming channel, or SAP channel, to make proceedings of the House of Commons available to subscribers in both official languages; and second, that the CRTC and CPAC take steps to make SAP technology better known to the public. These recommendations have been followed and we believe surpassed.

In November 2001 the CRTC released Public Notice 2001-115. In that public notice the CRTC stated that starting in September 2002, all larger broadcasting distribution undertakings, or BDUs, consisting of satellite DTH BDUs, class 1 BDUs, and class 2 BDUs, and all higher capacity class 3 BDUs--those employing digital technology and having a distribution capacity in excess of 500 megahertz--would be required to distribute the proceedings of the House of Commons to all subscribers as part of the basic service. All class 1 and class 2 BDUs would be required to make available a second-language audio feed of the proceedings of the House of Commons using SAP technology. All DTH BDUs and class 1 and class 2 BDUs that employ digital technology and have a distribution capacity of 750 megahertz or more would also be required to make available a separate video channel of House proceedings in the official language of the minority. Finally, all higher capacity class 3 BDUs would be required to distribute House proceedings in both official languages and could satisfy this requirement by using SAP technology or by using a second audiovisual channel.

The CRTC also stated that class 3 BDUs interconnected with larger BDUs would be required to distribute proceedings of the House in the same manner as the larger BDU and that class 3 BDUs owned by the four largest multiple system operators that were then distributing House proceedings would be required to continue such distribution and to use SAP technology to deliver the service in the language of the minority.

[Translation]

The CRTC requirements are now included in the CRTC's Broadcasting Distribution Regulations, in the exemption orders that apply to licence exempt BDUs, such as class 3 BDUs, and in the CRTC's Distribution Order 2002-1, which applies to CPAC's public affairs programming service.

[English]

These requirements are referred to in CPAC's agreement with the House of Commons regarding the distribution of House proceedings. CPAC is, of course, obliged under that agreement to make the proceedings of the House of Commons available to BDUs in both official languages, so that these BDUs may fulfil their own regulatory obligations, which I detailed above. CPAC's agreements with BDU affiliates require that those affiliates distribute CPAC service in accordance with applicable laws, including the laws relating to the distribution of proceedings in both official languages.

All these requirements, CPAC believes, have had a direct impact on the distribution to subscribers of House of Commons proceedings in both official languages. Because of these requirements, CPAC has, in the face of intense competition among distributors, maintained its almost ubiquitous level of distribution to reach the vast majority of subscribers, and we estimate that fully 93% of all households receiving service from Canadian BDUs receive CPAC as part of the basic service. The 7% who do not receive CPAC service are subscribers to smaller cable and other terrestrial BDUs that are facing daunting challenges and the intense competition that characterizes the BDU industry. However, all these subscribers do have the ability to secure access to CPAC's service in both official languages by means of Canada's two DTH suppliers or on the web through CPAC's website, cpac.ca.

These figures do not, of course, reflect the percentage of Canadians who are unable to receive CPAC because they do not obtain television service from a Canadian distributor. As of the fall of 2003 these represented approximately 11% of Canadians, the vast majority of whom receive television signals over the air using rabbit ears. However, this group now includes Canadians who are opting out of the Canadian broadcasting system and entering the grey or black market for television signals. Regrettably, it appears that this group of Canadians is growing. CPAC has detected evidence in its own data of a declining growth in subscriber households that is likely attributable to the grey and black markets. Canadians who do not subscribe to Canadian distribution service or have left the Canadian system do not have access to CPAC or to the proceedings of the House of Commons. We estimate that these two groups together amount to approximately 8% of Canadian television households.

Of the 93% of subscribers who receive CPAC service CPAC has been able to confirm through a recent survey that close to 95% receive it in both official languages, either through a separate channel or through SAP technology. CPAC has no reason to believe that the remaining 4.5% of these subscribers do not similarly receive in the official language of the minority, but CPAC has yet to receive a response to its survey from these distributors.

To increase the penetration of CPAC service in both official languages and to reach the last 7% of subscribers to Canadian BDUs, CPAC is committed, as outlined in the CRTC's decision renewing CPAC's licences, to provide technical and financial support to smaller class 3 BDUs to encourage them to adopt SAP technology. This commitment is noted as an explicit regulatory expectation in our licence. CPAC has conducted an ongoing awareness campaign to promote SAP technology since September 2003. This campaign is intended both to raise BDU subscriber awareness of the availability of SAP technology and to encourage those small class 3 BDUs that do not currently employ SAP to do so.

CPAC produced a 30-second promotional television spot featuring the capability of the secondary audio program in accessing CPAC service in both languages. This promo, which was produced in both French and English, has been airing on CPAC since last fall. In addition, the four largest Canadian cable MSOs have been airing these spots using the advertising avails within U.S. satellite services that are used to promote Canadian services. These four MSOs reach approximately 63% of CPAC subscribers. I'd like to play that commercial for you now, if I may.

¹ (1540)

The Chair: Please do.

[Video Presentation]

Mrs. Colette Watson: CPAC has also produced a print ad in both official languages describing that technology. This advertisement has been offered to members of Parliament for inclusion in the information packages sent to households within their constituencies.

[Translation]

You should find them in the kits we have distributed to you.

[English]

CPAC followed with great interest the work of this committee that led to its February 2003 report “Role and Responsibilities of the CRTC in Developments in the Area of Official Languages in Canada”. Recommendations 4 and 5 from this report touched on matters that are relevant to CPAC, including the recommendation that the Governor in Council issue a direction to the CRTC requiring all BDUs, without exception, to distribute video and audio signals of the debates of Parliament via CPAC in both official languages and that CPAC's signal be protected from displacement on closed circuit systems, in hotels, for example, through amendments to the broadcasting distribution regulations.

CPAC understands that the Government of Canada provided a written response to the committee's report in which it reviewed these two recommendations in detail. CPAC respects the government's conclusions in these areas, which balance the public interest against the impact a blanket distribution requirement would have on small BDUs with limited channel capacity and often even more limited financial resources. CPAC also notes that the government's conclusions, as detailed in their report to this committee, reflect the conclusions that had been reached by the CRTC itself following lengthy public consultation.

[Translation]

I would like to turn briefly to the significant progress CPAC has made in delivering high-quality French-language programming to our viewers.

CPAC licence renewal reflects a substantial commitment by CPAC to increase the level and quality of French-language programming on CPAC. CPAC provides 100 per cent of its programming in both official languages through simultaneous interpretation. As a part of CPAC licence renewal, CPAC undertook to the CRTC to create more high-quality programming originating in French.

CPAC has now launched Revue politique, a daily political review produced in French and anchored by veteran broadcaster Pierre Donais. Together with other original French-language programming, CPAC has fulfilled the requirements that at least 25% of our in-depth programming be produced in French.

CPAC's enhanced commitment to French-language programming appears to have worked. Audience research reveals that in the past year, CPAC's audience reach among francophones has increased significantly. Audience reach refers to the number of people who have watched the channel at least once.

From September 2003 to January 2004, CPAC's audience reach was 1.65 million francophones aged two-plus. According to Nielsen Media Research, that was 300,000 more viewers than in the same period in 2002-2003 and approximately 500,000 more viewers than in the two years prior to that.

The 24-hour average minute audience, which measures the number of people tuned in to CPAC the average minute of the day, has more than doubled from 300 francophone viewers in 2000-2001 to 700 viewers in 2003-2004.

[English]

We've prepared a summary of the audience data and similar research findings for our anglophone audience in tabular form for this committee, and we would be pleased to address any questions you may have regarding these results.

Mr. Chair, thank you very much for the opportunity to appear before this committee. We welcome any questions you may have.

¹ (1545)

[Translation]

The Chair: Thank you very much, Ms. Watson, and thank you to your group.

Mr. Reid, you may ask the first question.

[English]

Mr. Scott Reid (Lanark—Carleton, CPC): Thank you very much.

Let me start, Mr. Chairman, by saying how nice it is to see you here in the capacity of chair. We've had you as a witness before, and it's a change of role.

I want to ask about one of the statistics you've thrown out. Some 1.6 million people, you said, tune in to CPAC weekly. That means at least once a week?

Mr. Barry Kiefl (President, Canadian Media Research Inc., CPAC): No. The 1.6 million is actually for the season to date, from September 2003 to the beginning of February of this year. So it's a season-to-date reach, as opposed to a weekly reach. The weekly reach of CPAC, in general--both anglophone and francophone combined--will generally run from 700,000 to 800,000, to upwards of 1.5 million.

Mr. Scott Reid: So if it's typically 800,000, that means about half of people who tune in at all tune in weekly, more or less. Would that be the rough...?

Mr. Barry Kiefl: Yes. On the weekly reach concept, if you have a big Loblaws and a small Mac's Milk side by side, it's the number of people who go into Loblaws. They may spend a lot more money in the Loblaws compared to the people who go into the Mac's Milk. Even though Mac's Milk is a smaller store and doesn't have as great a volume of dollars spent, let's say, it can actually reach as many customers in a particular area of a city.

Reach is a similar kind of concept. It's the number of non-duplicated people who've tuned in for at least one minute over the course of a week, a month, or the year to date.

¹ (1550)

Mr. Scott Reid: Maybe you don't have this information, but how long does the average person tune in? Is it for more than a minute?

Mr. Barry Kiefl: Yes, it is more than a minute. I don't have the number right here with me, but it's something we can provide for you. Somebody who tunes in watches for a period of about ten minutes in a week.

Mr. Scott Reid: Once you've gone through this whole process of introducing SAP, as you've outlined, what do you anticipate the effect will be on the total number of people who are tuning in for some reasonable length of time? I'm not sure if the people who are tuning in for a minute are partly tuning in and then tuning out because they aren't getting the service in the language they need to hear it in, or if there are other reasons. But I'm just wondering if you've projected ahead and have an estimate as to how many new people will be tuning in and staying in.

Mr. Barry Kiefl: The data we've been talking about is provided by Nielsen Media Research Canada. It doesn't ask people whether they're watching using SAP, or watching in the original language. You can't answer the question from this sort of data. You would have to do a special survey asking people how they're receiving the service.

Mr. Scott Reid: Do you plan on doing something of that nature?

Mrs. Colette Watson: I guess to help supplement that our audio reach has increased significantly over the last two and a half years. Over that period of time, many changes have occurred at CPAC, including new programming, different scheduling, as well as more and more distributors, including SAP. So it would be difficult, without doing phone interviews or written interviews with the viewers, to determine whether it was the programming, the scheduling, or the fact that they had SAP.

We have determined that by adding new French programming and having SAP out there, a larger stream of francophones is tuning in to CPAC than two years ago. That's about it. But we can't really pinpoint why they're there.

Mr. Scott Reid: It's primarily francophones outside Quebec, who were formerly unable to access it in their own language. Would I be correct in assuming that?

Mr. Barry Kiefl: It's primarily the francophone audience within Quebec. As Colette said, if nothing else has changed and you've just added SAP into a lot of systems, it's likely that is one of the major contributing factors to the increase.

Just to go back to the 1.6 million, for clarity sake, 1.6 million francophones have spent at least a minute watching CPAC so far in this 2003-04 TV season.

Mrs. Colette Watson: The total CPAC reach, I think, is a little over 3 million.

Mr. Scott Reid: I didn't realize that. So that's out of the total pool of francophones in Canada, whatever it is--8 million--as opposed to 30-odd million Canadians.

Mrs. Colette Watson: Right.

Mr. Scott Reid: Thank you.

The Chair: Is that it? Thank you very much.

Monsieur Bellemare.

[Translation]

Mr. Eugène Bellemare (Ottawa—Orléans, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Good afternoon, Ms. Watson. Your CRTC licence was renewed for seven years. So you have about five years left. You have taken some steps in the right direction with respect to official languages and I commend you on it. However, I have some concerns.

According to CPAC, 37% of cable subscribers in Canada can actually use SAP technology, and 8% of subscribers have access to French and English versions of CPAC through their distributor. I am concerned about something. Take for instance the National Capital Region. It includes the city of Gatineau and the city of Ottawa. The city of Gatineau is considered a francophone market. The city of Ottawa, according to you, is an anglophone market. We are talking about the National Capital Region.

Ottawa is Canada's capital and in the capital of the country, francophones do not have access to French language programming, unless they have SAP technology. I have access to this technology. I am one of your subscribers and I often watch CPAC. I can tell you that you would have to be Flash Gordon or Superman in order to go from one language to the other quickly enough. If someone delivers a speech in French, I can listen to it in French by using SAP technology, and if it is in English, I can listen to it in English. But if someone switches from one language to the other, I can assure you that it is impossible, even with SAP technology, cable TV converter in hand, to switch quickly enough. It takes at least two to three seconds, if not five seconds to do it; meanwhile the person has already started speaking in the other language. It is not easy.

I want to ask you, first, whether you plan on making technological improvements to the system. And second, do you not find it odd that the city of Ottawa, which is the capital of Canada, be considered an anglophone market, when 30% of the population is francophone and at least 60% of people are bilingual, according to me. Moreover, oftentimes people would like to improve their skills in the other official language but cannot do so because even though they may have access to this technology, they cannot switch quickly enough.

My first question, therefore, deals with technology, and the second one deals with the fact that the capital is considered an anglophone market. On the Gatineau side, anglophones cannot have access to the programming they want either. They can hear English if the person is speaking English, but as soon as someone speaks French, they have a problem. How can you solve these two problems?

¹ (1555)

Mrs. Colette Watson: I do not foresee any technological improvements that will allow users to switch languages more rapidly. Even if there were two separate television channels, one would have to press on buttons and at least a second would be lost doing that. Therefore, the solution for bilingual people like us would be to have...

Mr. Eugène Bellemare: Two televisions?

Mrs. Colette Watson: ...for the debates in the House of Commons, the system we used to use, that is the language of the floor. Debates represent approximately 30 per cent of CPAC's programming, which includes conferences and parliamentary committees, programming which is for the most part produced in one of either language.

There would still be interpretation services for the floor and people would have to choose one of the languages. In my opinion, approximately 75% of conferences, committees and inquiries take place in English. If bilingual people were to choose the language of the floor, they wouldn't waste those two seconds required for switching languages. I agree with you that it is preferable to listen to what is being said in the spoken language rather than in the translated version.

I'd like to tell you a little story. Last spring, when the possibility of a war in Iraq was being debated at the United Nations, we picked up a speech that the French Ambassador was giving at the United Nations. Through that organization's system, we could pick it up in 11 different languages. We therefore chose English and French. CPAC therefore picked up the speech in its original version, that is French, but it was retranslated by our interpretation services. In the end, we were listening to a translation of the translation. If you switched to the second audio track to listen to the French version, you heard the interpreter's translation rather than the speech itself.

I admit that it is very frustrating to try to offer programming to all people in their own language. I admit that some aspects of the technology in use are equally frustrating and that they cause delays. I do believe, however, that we need to meet these challenges and offer a better service. Even with two channels, buttons will have to be pressed. A few seconds will be wasted moving from one channel to another.

So I do not feel that using two different channels will be a solution to the problem you have raised. Perhaps if the technology were improved this would be possible. However, in terms of the problem you mentioned, what we would have to do is offer the floor language. This service is provided by Videotron in Gatineau. Those who have digital service have access to a second channel, in this case the floor, which broadcasts the spoken language rather than the interpretation.

º (1600)

The Chair: With your permission, Mr. Bellemare, we will now move on to our second round of questions.

Mr. Sauvageau now has the floor.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming before this committee once again in such a short period of time.

In our first report, in May 2001—correct me if I am wrong—we had questions about the CPAC situation, and I quote:

The problem the committee is considering is not the availability of audio signals in both official languages, but rather the distribution of French and English versions by cable operators.

If I read the situation correctly, you offer your programs to the cable operators in both official languages, but they do not distribute them. The problem is not the availability of the signal. If that were the case, CPAC would be to blame. If, however, the issue is distribution—and I do not want to conduct a witch hunt—then it is the cable operators who are responsible.

Am I right up until now?

Mrs. Colette Watson: That was the case in 2001.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Your licence was renewed in 2002. We recommended that it be for five years, but it was renewed for seven years. I do not yet have any objections.

I am now going to quote a document provided by our researcher:

... turned into a channel that most cable and satellite providers are obliged to offer in both official languages.

Still correct?

Mrs. Colette Watson: Yes.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Fine.

With technology and everything, can you now tell us—I also read your document—that CPAC is now available to more than 80% of the Canadian population in both official languages?

Mrs. Colette Watson: It's closer to 95%.

Ms. Natalie LeMay-Calcutt (Director of Business Affairs, CPAC): Between 95 and 96 per cent of CPAC subscribers have access to those services in both official languages.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: As you mentioned in your speech, those numbers may be lower because of those using the black market, who are using American cable, or other means to receive cable.

If I remember well—and correct me if I am talking about the wrong person—you had just started in your position when we met you in 2001, and you said that there was new satellite technology that would easily and quickly make signals available in the western part of Manitoba where there weren't yet any.

Did that happen, after your appearance here?

Mrs. Colette Watson: I was talking about SAP technology. When we came here in May 2001, less than 40% of operators were providing this service to subscribers. Now that number is 93%. So that number has increased significantly. Approximately 96% of Canadians, more specifically 95.9%, have access to CPAC and to the House of Commons proceedings in both official languages.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Fine.

A variation on the same theme. In your brief, you state that:

When it was time to renew its licences, CPAC made the commitment to the CRTC to increase the amount of its original programming produced in French.

You go on to say:

CPAC launched Revue Politique, a current affairs program produced in French [...] When you add to that other programs produced [...] we feel that CPAC has met the requirement...

Though I admit that I am not one of those 700 viewers who watch CPAC on a daily basis, I occasionally watch it. Are you telling me that you have met the CRTC's requirements by starting only one new program, Pierre Donais' program, that I won't criticize because I have never seen it, to my recollection? Is that all you have done? And if you have done anything else, can you tell us about it?

Is this a daily program, a weekly program or a monthly one? What are the other programs or means that you have used in order to meet the CRTC's requirement, that is that you produce more programs in French?

º (1605)

Mrs. Colette Watson: When we came before your committee, Revue politique was a weekly program. Now it is a daily program broadcast from seven to eight o'clock p.m. Monday to Friday and, occasionally, Saturday and Sunday. The host of the program is Pierre Donais. We've also acquired a program from Rogers called Gens d'ici. I believe you have participated in this program, that profiles francophones in public affairs. There's also Vie publique, which is another program that profiles francophones using a biographical style. We also broadcast symposiums, public hearings and conferences in French. We have broadcast all the Quebec National Assembly's hearings on city de-amalgamation, which is about 68 hours long.

When you include all that, this programming represents approximately a fourth of our time slots.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: One last question.

Could you send us—I don't expect you to be able to tell us this from memory now—the amount of time you grant each political party, or the number of members you have per political party? I believe you have received comments regarding the few invitations made to the Bloc Québécois for your various programs. Perhaps we could have some statistics to back up our arguments.

I would also like to ask you to send your program scheduling to the committee, because when you talk about Gens d'ici, about francophones or about the Revue politique for francophones—I'm not sure, I'm just putting out an idea—I would like to point out that there aren't only francophones outside Quebec, there are francophones inside Quebec as well. Too often francophones outside Quebec are spoken about, and this is fine, but one forgets to invite francophones from inside Quebec to these programs. You tell us that you have broadcast the National Assembly, and this is a good thing, but I would like to see the breakdown by political party. Take, for example, a political party representing 25% of the members of the House of Commons, who only has 10 per cent of air time on CPAC. That may not be fair and we could work on improving that representation.

Mrs. Colette Watson: CPAC's policy is to ensure a balanced treatment of political parties. I do not know if the same policy exists in terms of language for political parties, but I will gladly send you a list of those members who have come to our studios. It will be more difficult to provide you with a list of politicians or members, because when we broadcast symposiums or hearings, we are only the receivers. We do not organize these events, we are only a window. Therefore I do not have those statistics.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: I'm talking about the programs for which you have organizational responsibility. I'm not talking about the programs that you rebroadcast for others. I would like to know what the participation by political party is on programs such as Revue politique or Gens d'ici, if that's possible.

Thank you.

The Chair: Let's try to speed things up a little, if you will, because there are other witnesses.

The next speaker on the list is Mr. Proulx.

Mr. Marcel Proulx (Hull—Aylmer, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Good afternoon, Ms. Watson.

As opposed to my colleague, I am very familiar with Mr. Pierre Donais' program, mainly as a viewer but, occasionally, as a participant. It is an excellent program. He often talks about you. Don't worry, everything is fine.

Ms. Watson, do you have any figures for the number of televisions that are still in use but do not have the SAP system?

º (1610)

Mrs. Colette Watson: I do not have any official numbers, but I can speculate. I think that all televisions that are less than 10 years old have SAP. VCRs also have it. Therefore, if your television is not equipped with it, then you can gain access to it through your VCR or you can subscribe to a digital service, and the provider's convertor will allow you to use it.

There are several ways to obtain this service.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: However, as a rule, people who have televisions that are more than 10 years old don't necessarily tend to have VCRs, CDs or digital technology. It is my impression that all those televisions in Canada that don't provide access to SAP are in my riding, that of Hull—Aylmer. Many people who call me do not have VCRs, either. These people have to be satisfied with watching what you broadcast. If they are francophones, then half the problem is dealt with, but if they are anglophones, there's a problem.

You said earlier that two channels would not solve the problem. Obviously, the solution would be to have three channels. I can tell you that in the National Capital Region, there are many viewers who would listen to the floor channel.

I want to be sure I understand this, in connection with the drop in your ratings.

Do people who subscribe to satellite services or who own a satellite dish have access to CPAC currently?

The Chair: The legal ones!

Mrs. Colette Watson: Yes.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: I'm talking about those Canadians who are legally subscribing to a satellite system.

Mrs. Colette Watson: Yes.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: So CPAC is available to those subscribers.

Mrs. Colette Watson: It is a mandatory service.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Perfect. Therefore, that decrease in ratings is not due to the fact that people are switching from cable services to satellite services.

Mrs. Colette Watson: Ratings have increased.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Fine.

Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you very much, Mr. Proulx.

Mr. Godin, you have the floor.

Mr. Yvon Godin (Acadie—Bathurst, NDP): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to welcome Ms. Watson and her team.

In my opinion, the fact that the Committee on Official Languages has taken the trouble to invite you here and to ask you about the situation means that people are interested in CPAC. That's the positive side.

I have a few comments to make and some questions to ask. I have trouble believing the 95% statistic and I'll tell you why. In my riding, located in northeastern New Brunswick and for the most part francophone, as well as in the city of Bathurst, where I live, which is mainly anglophone, we receive the floor signal. So you have to switch from SAP to the floor. I have received complaints from both anglophones, and, justifiably, from francophones.

If, for example, as a member, I ask a question in French, then the anglophones do not hear it at all. On the other hand, if the minister replies in English, then the francophones do not hear the answer. In my opinion, if you're going to provide a mandatory service, that's the worst possible system you could have. You yourself, Ms. Watson, said that there is no time to switch to SAP. It's not the first time that I have raised this issue with you: I did it the last time you appeared before this committee. The problem has still not been dealt with.

Then there's the problem of television. I live in Gatineau, in the Hull area, in Mr. Proulx's riding. Last week, I went to buy a television at Canadian Tire. I believe I'm familiar enough with electronics, but today, in the year 2004, I have still not figured out where the SAP is. Even if some people do figure out how to use this system, I think it is a bad one. It does not reflect Judge O'Keefe's ruling in the Federal Court. Some people are lucky enough to view programs in their own language, but it seems to me that the number of people who constitute the majority in a region should make a difference. In this case it has just created problems.

The last time we discussed this television issue, I did not have a television with the SAP option. I just bought a new one, last week, and I still cannot find that option. I know that first you have to access the menu, then audio, then SAP, but it doesn't work. I'm asked if I'm hooked up to cable! Yes, and on top of that it's not the black market service! I am completely above-board, but this situation has become a real problem. Should I be telling the people in Bathurst, New Brunswick...

º (1615)

[English]

I may as well switch to English now, because maybe they're not getting the signal, and I want them to hear this. Do I have to tell the people of Bathurst that when I speak in French in the House of Commons, they should charge the government or charge the House of Commons, as Mr. Kingsley did in Moncton? The decision has already been taken; it was already appealed by the Speaker of the House, and he lost the appeal. We have a major problem when it goes to Canadians, and Canadians are asking questions about it. That's one of my questions.

[Translation]

That is one of my first questions. My second is about...

The Chair: Could you speed up a little? If you don't there will not be enough time for the answers, Mr. Godin.

Mr. Yvon Godin: The other question will be a brief one, given that it has already been raised. It's about broadcasting more French programs on CPAC. Some tell me that the priority is Parliament. Therefore Parliament comes first.

When programs are postponed, the French programs are broadcast around one o'clock in the morning, which means two o'clock in the morning in New Brunswick. Of course, nobody listens to them. The majority of francophones outside Quebec reside in this province—apparently in Ontario and in New Brunswick—however, at two o'clock in the morning in New Brunswick, the ratings can't be very high. I would like answers to both those questions.

Mrs. Colette Watson: To answer your first question, you are right in saying that the problem has not been solved in your riding. As the chairman explained, we are the providers. It is the cable operators who must comply with existing regulations. We spoke to the company this morning to find out what the problem was. We found out that you were receiving the floor and the French version on SAP, whereas it should have been French and English on SAP. I have been told that this will be changed this afternoon. However you are in a market where the ratio is 50-50. You can't win in a market like that. There are people who will be calling the cable operator this afternoon to say that they don't understand anything anymore, if they're having trouble getting SAP.

Mr. Yvon Godin: [Editor's note: Inaudible] do that after the election.

Mrs. Colette Watson: We can call them back if you like.

Mr. Yvon Godin: That is the issue and you acknowledge it yourself. I don't know who provided the 50-50 statistic but for your information, 80% of the people in that riding are francophone and 20% are anglophone. So I don't know where the 50-50 came from. This will become a real problem when a group not familiar with the SAP system doesn't have access to it any more.

Ms. Colette Watson: But 80% of subscribers will now receive everything in French and 20% will have to learn how to use it.

Mr. Yvon Godin: Well, we would require two CPAC channels, one French and one English, to truly have access to the service in both languages.

Mrs. Colette Watson: But you have it if you...

Mr. Yvon Godin: No. I gave the example of my television that the system doesn't work on. There must be others who have the same problem.

Mrs. Colette Watson: Can I ask you what kind of television you have?

Mr. Yvon Godin: I bought it at Canadian Tire. I don't think it's a black market one.

The Chair: Well, before we delve too deep into Mr. Godin's shopping habits, I think that your time is up. We can come back to this, unless you would like to give a brief answer, Ms. Watson.

Mrs. Colette Watson: To the second question?

The Chair: You can sum up quickly.

º (1620)

Mrs. Colette Watson: When the House of Commons proceedings end at midnight, whether it is midnight, one o'clock or two o'clock in the morning, I don't think that is convenient for everyone in New Brunswick. So regardless of when these debates are broadcast, it is difficult for people in eastern Canada to stay up to watch the programs.

The Chair: I would like to ask you a quick question myself, with your permission, Mrs. Watson. Could one hope that one day, at least in some parts of the country, there will be standardization? I know that I should be putting this question to the cable operator who will be appearing later, but could I ask you to speculate? I'm talking about a type of standardization that would mean that on our televisions, channel 2 is always the House of Commons in English and channel 3 is always in French, some type of standardization in several areas, an approach that would serve as a point of reference. Perhaps in the distant future this service will be available everywhere, but could we at least hope to see it somewhere to begin with?

Mrs. Colette Watson: Program providers have been asking distributors that same question for about 20 years. For about 20 years they have wanted to do that type of marketing and be able to say that TSN is on channel 30 throughout the country, but it is very difficult. There are so many differences between providers per region, per territory and per city... Ten years ago, there were two cable companies in Ottawa. The technology is very different. I think that digital services offer some hope. The more people subscribe to digital services the more this service will expand and the better we will be able to serve clients by taking into consideration factors such as language, standardization, etc.

The Chair: Fine.

[English]

Mr. Lunney, please. We're into the second round, and we'll have to go quickly, because we have another witness, as we all know.

Mr. James Lunney (Nanaimo—Alberni, CPC): Thank you.

First, I'd ike to offer congratulations to CPAC. In my opinion, the viewership has gone way up in the west. I'm always surprised at the people who are watching and commenting on what they've seen on CPAC. So I think you're doing a lot of things right in that regard.

Mrs. Colette Watson: Thank you.

Mr. James Lunney: It's good to see Canadians participating in what's going on in Parliament.

[Translation]

I would like to ask a question in French. I am going to try.

I come from the west coast, from Vancouver Island. There are many francophones there, but most of them speak English well. Do you have any statistics regarding the number of people in the west or in British Columbia who watch these programs in French?

[English]

Mr. Barry Kiefl: Unfortunately, at this point that information is not available. There are two rating systems in Canada, one run by Nielsen, the other by BBM, and they measure CPAC as a whole; they don't distinguish between the English and the French versions of it. If you want to look at the francophone audience by region, it can be done, but sample size is a problem. The audience of CPAC relative to major networks, like TVA or CTV or CBC, is small, and these rating systems have been designed for the major networks. Services like CPAC are using the data, but they have to be a little more cautious about the sample size. The francophone audience for CPAC, as we were saying earlier, has a pretty substantial weekly reach and a pretty substantial seasonal reach, 1.6 million as of just a week or so ago. But if you start breaking it down by region, you run into some sample size issues, and in looking at British Columbia, you'd have a great deal of statistical error with that kind of breakdown.

Mr. James Lunney: Thank you.

On the 24-hour average-minute audience, which has increased from 300 to around 700 viewers, can you just explain that concept to me? We're not talking about one-minute audiences--at least I wondered from Mr. Reid's comments. Are we talking about how many people in a 24-hour period, on average, are watching the program per minute?

º (1625)

Mr. Barry Kiefl: It is the major audience statistic that is used in the television industry. When somebody runs a commercial during a 30-minute program or a one-hour program, what they want to know is the probable audience for a one-minute or a 30-second commercial. The data are derived so that you can express the audience in the average minute of the program. If a program has an average-minute audience of 100,000, the likely number of people seeing a particular commercial would be 100,000. It might be 90,000 at the beginning of the program and 120,000 at the end of the program, and it is the average throughout the program distilled down to the minute average.

When you're looking at CPAC's audience, this is 700 viewers averaged across 24 hours in the day, seven days a week, however many weeks one is looking at. So it includes times like middle of the night, when there is virtually no one watching, and other times of the day when there are a lot more than 700 people watching. So in the average minute of the day, it's 700 people who are tuned in to CPAC.

To follow up Mr. Reid's question very quickly, I was able to calculate how many minutes the 1.6 million francophones spend watching CPAC. It's about 100 minutes over the course of the season to date. In a typical week a francophone viewer will spend about 15 minutes tuned to CPAC.

The Chair: Thank you.

[Translation]

Mr. Sauvageau, you indicated that you have one last question. After that we'll switch over.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Could you send us the breakdown of those 1.6 million francophones by province? My question is related to Mr. Lunney's question. How many are there by province?

[English]

Mr. Barry Kiefl: Most of it is in Quebec. It can be broken down by region, and we'd be happy to provide that to you.

[Translation]

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: There can't be 96% of the Canadian population receiving the signal in the language of their choice, and at the same time have 1.6 million francophones receiving it. Something doesn't make sense.

Mrs. Colette Watson: It is not a matter of how many people have access to CPAC, but how many people watch it.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: All right, it is not...

Mrs. Colette Watson: We are talking about people who sit down and watch it.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: I thought you were talking about availability.

Mrs. Colette Watson: No.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: So we are not talking about viewing area, but rather viewership.

Mrs. Colette Watson: That is right.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: So 1.6 million people watch it.

Do you have the breakdown by province?

Mrs. Colette Watson: Those figures are from Quebec.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: There must be some elsewhere. I am sure that francophones in my colleague's riding watch CPAC.

Mrs. Colette Watson: As Mr. Kiefl was explaining, the data come from a device on the television set...

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Is that the case only in Quebec?

Mrs. Colette Watson: No, it is done across the country. The device tells the computer which station is being watched, for example, if channel 24 has been watched for 30 minutes, channel 9 for 9 minutes, etc. In Ottawa, CPAC is broadcast on channel 24. So it shows whether people have watched CPAC, but not whether they have used SAP technology. And we have no way of knowing whether the person watching channel 24 was a francophone or an anglophone.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: But you are saying that 1.6 million francophones watched it.

Is it possible to get a breakdown of that data by province?

[English]

Mr. Barry Kiefl: It's possible to break it down by region, with Quebec being one of the regions. But again, there are the sample sizes; about 5,000 people are wired up by Nielsen to provide these ratings in the way Colette was describing--it's called a people-meter system in the television industry. And there are a small number of francophones in the sample outside Quebec; there are several in British Columbia, a handful in Saskatchewan, and so forth. Because it's such a small sample of francophones in the English provinces, especially the western provinces, it's ill advised to look at the data; the sample size is too small. It's the same as a poll by Angus Reid: if the sample size is 1,000 on a national basis, you hesitate to look at Vancouver results, or even B.C. results.

º (1630)

[Translation]

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Thank you.

The Chair: I got mixed up in my order and I forgot Ms. Thibeault. I apologize to her.

You have the floor, Ms. Thibeault, and then we will move to our other witness, of course. Keep in mind that our meeting is shortened today because there will be a vote later.

Ms. Yolande Thibeault (Saint-Lambert, Lib.): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.

I was here when you came in 2001. That is when I learned about SAP technology. I went home to my riding and I installed SAP. It was marvelous, it worked and everything was fine. If I am not mistaken, CPAC was on channel 62 at that time and it moved, in September I believe, to channel 77, and the SAP technology no longer works. I just wanted to mention that to you in passing.

I want to discuss an ad that you prepared for us. I think it is very good. When you came in 2001, you also sent one, and I included it in my householder. Before printing it, I asked people to test it and it did not work. If you followed the instructions, it did not work. This time, it all looks very simple, and I hope that it will work.

Your promotional message is very well done. I would like to know what frequency you broadcast it on.

Mrs. Colette Watson: I cannot tell you that right now, but I promise to look into it and give you an answer. We broadcast promotional messages every half hour, but I do not know the frequency of that one.

Ms. Yolande Thibeault: Is it only during the week, or do you do it on a regular basis?

Mrs. Colette Watson: I think that it is done daily.

Ms. Yolande Thibeault: Thank you very much.

The Chair: Thank you very much, Ms. Watson. I would also like to thank my colleagues for having respected the time limits that we need to work within because of the circumstances today.

Ms. Watson, many of the questions that members have asked you today will be put to the cable companies as well. It seems that you have increased the availability considerably, but we are not sure that consumers have access to everything that they could get from you.

I congratulate you on all the good work that you have done.

I just want to make an editorial comment about Mr. Donais' program. I believe that it really fills a gap.

Thank you for having appeared here today.

Mrs. Colette Watson: Thank you.

The Chair: The meeting will be suspended for about two minutes so that we can change witnesses. Thank you.

º 1632

º 1635

The Chair: I am sorry to be such a disciplinarian, but I have no choice. Thank you very much, Madam Commissioner, for being here with us this afternoon. On one of your recent visits, you raised a question that I subsequently asked in the House of Commons. Perhaps you could make some comments in that respect and tell us, among other things, if you are satisfied with the assurances that we have been given.

I would invite you to make your presentation now. Of course, the issues that we will look at today will be part of our study of the Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages estimates.

Ms. Adam.

Ms. Dyane Adam (Commissioner of Official Languages, Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages): I would like to thank the committee members. Mr. Chairman, in my presentation I will deal with the question that you asked me concerning how I feel about Minister Pettigrew's statement in the House.

[English]

I'm really pleased to appear before you again, to provide this time a brief overview of the activities my office has carried out during the past year with the resources that were obtained. I would also like to speak about the results we intend to achieve in the coming months. They flow from our four strategic orientations, which are ensuring the equality of French and English within organizations that are subjected to the Official Languages Act; promoting the equality of English and French as a fundamental value of Canadian society; reviving the dynamism of official language minority communities in Canada; and moving towards a complete modernization of our management practices.

[Translation]

I would like first to speak to you about our funding. In 2003-2004, our planned spending is about $18.3 million. Next year, we plan to spend a comparable amount, about $18.5 million. The additional funds allocated since fiscal year 2002-2003, thanks to the support of members of Parliament—I want to highlight that—have allowed us to develop the capacity to evaluate the linguistic situation in federal institutions subject to the Official Languages Act, restore our auditing work, and increase parliamentary monitoring and regional liaison.

It is worth recalling that the budget of the Office of the Commissioner was substantially reduced during the 1990s. The increases of the past few years have simply allowed us to refocus our activities and to be proactive in priority areas.

I would like to broaden our perspective a little to consider the whole range of our activities. A lot of water has flowed under the bridge since I presented my first Report to Parliament four years ago. Having observed a lack of leadership with regard to linguistic duality, I sounded the alarm and called for a recovery plan. That call was heard and in March 2003, the federal government announced its Action Plan for Official Languages. If that plan is to bear fruit, the government must, within the next few months, ensure that proper interdepartmental coordination takes place and that all the key players work in close cooperation, and consult official language minority communities.

Extra effort will also be required to ensure the support of majority groups. Our role, at the Office of the Commissioner, will be to monitor implementation of the action plan and to act as a facilitator, while ensuring that institutions respect both the spirit and the letter of the Official Languages Act.

In terms of the implementation of the action plan, I was delighted to hear Minister Pettigrew publicly confirm last week the government's intention to maintain the fund that had been allocated to implementing the action plan. However, as I mentioned in my last appearance, it remains essential for the government to put in place an effective accountability framework for evaluating its implementation and the results achieved.

I still hope, as I recommended in my last annual report, that the Prime Minister will give the Ministerial Reference Group on Official Languages the status of a permanent committee and that the government will clarify part VII of the act. Finally, to encourage and facilitate cooperation between the federal government and the provinces and territories in terms of official languages, we need a framework for intergovernmental cooperation.

[English]

As for what we do in my office, we still have some ground to cover in mobilizing the federal administration. However, thanks to the forecasted budget, as I mentioned previously, the office of the commissioner is better equipped to play its role as an agent of change, which is manifested, as you are aware, in the following six related roles: the ombudsman; the auditing; the liaison; the monitoring role; promotion and education; and finally, court intervention.

I would now like to provide you with an overview of some of our activities related to these roles. I will not dwell on the activities related to the ombudsman role, which primarily involves receiving and investigating complaints, because this function is well known to all of you. Of course, it is an important part of my mandate; it's central to the mandate, and I would be pleased to come back to it in our discussions.

[Translation]

Coming now to auditing, which is our second role, one of the functions that suffered particularly from the budget cuts of the 1990s was the external auditing function. Yet this tool is essential for an officer of Parliament who must report on the linguistic performance of institutions that are subject to the Official Languages Act. This function is even more important now, given the major transformation of the federal government in recent years. Among other things, Treasury Board has seen its role of monitoring and auditing federal institutions reduced, in light of an increasing number of independent agencies.

New budgetary resources allocated since 2002-2003 have allowed us to restore this function; in so doing, we are modelling our approach on the Officer of the Auditor General. In order to optimize resources, we are emphasizing results rather than process, and we are calling for the cooperation of managers. Since we started doing so, we have had a solid commitment from managers to look for the best solutions to the problems identified. An audit is currently underway at Canada Post. We intend to complete three major audits during fiscal year 2004-2005 and in future years, we hope to increase that number to four. We will also, of course, be doing follow-ups on our recommendations as necessary.

[English]

Now to the third role, which involves liaison and increased monitoring. During the past two years, we have considerably increased our monitoring and liaison capacities and broadened our basis of intervention. We play a liaison role between federal institutions, communities, and different levels of government across the country, to intervene in important issues and to facilitate communication of needs and expectations concerning official languages. For example, over the last year, we have strengthened regional liaison by opening a new office in Sudbury.

In terms of monitoring, the office of the commissioner takes preventive action by intervening when legislation, regulation, and policies are being developed, to ensure that language rights are a central concern for decisions-makers.

We are counting on our partners to bring these projects to a successful result. To do that, we must analyze the degree to which our recommendations have been implemented. We also need to do follow-ups to our investigation reports and our studies. In each case, this means a new assessment of the situation, to measure the results achieved and to define our strategies for follow-up.

We must remain vigilant, because full compliance with the Official Languages Act is still a work in progress for most of our federal institutions. For that reason, we are monitoring very closely some of the objectives of the act, like the implementation of part VII of the act, and related programs, language-of-work issues, and the modernization of human resources in the public service.

So our increasing number of interventions, the fragmentation of institutions, and even the nature of the major issues require all the resources available to ensure the full implementation of the Official Languages Act and the viability of existing programs.

As far as our studies are concerned, we have developed a plan that brings together research and policy and strategic monitoring. The type of research that we are now conducting deals with trends, emerging issues, and measuring attitudes and opinion on global issues, in search of a solution that will advance official languages.

It is in this perspective that we are currently doing projects that concern, for example, the language of work of federal public servants, the place of linguistic duality in Canada's international activities, and the availability of bilingual service in commercial outlets located in federal buildings. Many other projects are in the works, including a study on the demographic, sociological, and institutional realities of the Anglo-Quebec community.

[Translation]

Finally, the role of promotion and awareness is one of my greatest priorities and I devote a great deal of effort to that role. For example, during the past year I delivered about 30 speeches and the Office of the Commissioner responded to some 200 media requests. Of course, staff members both in the regions and here in Ottawa also make many presentations to various groups.

There is also a symposium that will take place next week, which is a good example of our promotion activities. The goal is to develop a strategy that will help achieve one of the objectives of the action plan, which is to double the number of bilingual young Canadians by 2013. The Office of the Commissioner is organizing this conference in partnership with Canadian Heritage, Intergovernmental Affairs and Canadian Parents for French.

The purpose of the symposium is to identify courses of action to offer equal access and increase the availability of second-language education across Canada. If this great Canadian project is to succeed, all members of our society must support it. Its success depends on the concerted efforts of many players, primarily governments, teachers, community groups, school administrators, public servants, students and their parents. Of course, the official language minority communities are already committed partners.

Finally, the sixth role of the Office of the Commissioner is court interventions. The number of court cases in which I intervened this year has nearly doubled. It is unfortunate that communities are so often obliged to resort to the courts to have their rights respected. As you know, resorting to the courts is very demanding on individuals and communities, not only in terms of cost but also in terms of energy. It would be a wonderful achievement if government showed more leadership in working with communities to find solutions rather than waiting for the courts to impose them. However, given the reality of the situation, the Office of the Commissioner will need the additional resources provided to intervene before the courts when that proves necessary.

[English]

Finally, like other government organizations, my office has adopted modern management principles and practices. It is encouraging measures that make it a learning organization. Specifically, the plans and priorities of the office for 2004-05 bring together key elements of the Treasury Board Secretariat's management accountability framework. The new outlook and attitudes in management methods represent a profound change in the culture of the office of the commissioner.

OCOL is not satisfied with merely conducting investigations after receiving complaints. It is acting as an agent of change by working in close collaboration with other organizations; parliamentary committees; federal departments and agencies; private institutions subject to the act, such as Air Canada and NavCanada; and different levels of government and communities.

As an officer of Parliament, I have to show great diligence in the management of my work. I intend to continue my efforts to improve the management practices of the office. For example, beginning this year, and in coming years, the financial statements of the office of the commissioner will be audited by the Office of the Auditor General. With the forecasted budget, we will be able to build on our previous results and will continue to act as an agent of change in terms of official languages.

I thank you for your attention. I'm certainly ready to answer any questions you may have.

Merci beaucoup.

[Translation]

The Chair: Thank you very much, Commissioner. We will begin right away, given that our time is limited.

Mr. Reid, you have the floor.

[English]

Mr. Scott Reid: Thank you, Madam Commissioner. It's always a pleasure to have you here.

I wanted to ask you a bit about how you would divide up the budget. I realize this isn't the way the budgeting is done, but you have six functions or six roles, and your budgeting doesn't tell what number of dollars go for each of the six roles.

I thought that maybe as a possible surrogate for that, it might be possible to look at the way you have them divided up here as corporate services, with one tranche; a second one for communications, research, and analysis; and a third for what you called survey.

Is it possible to take that, and by using that mechanism, to come up with determining how much of your budget actually goes toward being an ombudsman versus liaison versus monitoring and so on?

Ms. Dyane Adam: We could probably combine some of the roles together and give you a figure. I often use those six roles because, for communications purposes, it's a lot easier to understand than budget lines in the way we organize administratively.

If we take the roles of the investigators, the ombudsman, and the audit, which go together, and legal affairs, you have under investigations basically $6.43 million. Those three roles are integrated in that. Communications research and analysis--this is where we do monitoring, we do studies, we liaise with regional offices, etc.--would basically be in the second line. That would be $7 million. Corporate services--this is support, administration, technology, commissioner's office, myself--are approximately $5 million.

Mr. Scott Reid: Do the contents of these divisions change over time? I ask this because I note, for example, looking at the actual spending for the year that's just coming to completion versus a few years ago, that what you refer to as corporate services is down 14%, whereas communications research and analysis is up by close to 70%. These are dramatically different trends. Is this is an indication of a dramatic change in your focus, or is it just a dramatic change in your accounting practices?

Ms. Dyane Adam: We are still using the same accounting, but there was money that flowed to us on a one-time basis to renew and modernize our technology infrastructure and support. That was in the corporate services branch. That money is not on the base. So more or less, we have done what we had to do with this money, but it's not ongoing.

Mr. Scott Reid: It was up last year to $7.6 million, down this year to $5.4 million, and you're on your way down to $4.9 million.

Ms. Dyane Adam: Exactly. That money has run out.

Mr. Scott Reid: With the increase in communications research and analysis, again, which of the roles would be fitting in there?

Ms. Dyane Adam: Monitoring, for example. If we want to be a little more specific, one of the things we asked was really to justify, if not develop, our parliamentary liaison activity. This is something we've really developed in the last two years, so additional resources flowed there. Under that you will have everything linked to the monitoring of our institutions themselves: increasing resources, looking at the reports, analysing the reports of our institutions, and more or less establishing diagnosis and, if need be, corrections or actions, in a way more preventive, not waiting until complaints come. If there seem to be problems or institutions do not understand their obligations, we will call them up--this is the new liaison office. We also increased regional liaison. New people were posted in B.C., where there was no physical presence. There's a physical presence now in Saskatchewan. We increased our office number by one person in Montreal. As well, in Ontario we have an office now, or one person in--

Mr. Scott Reid: The personnel costs tend to wind up in that category, then, is that right?

Ms. Dyane Adam: Yes, it's mostly personnel.

Mr. Scott Reid: Regardless of where they're located--

The Chair: Mr. Reid, I'm afraid we'll have to cut if off there if we're going to recognize everyone before we adjourn.

Monsieur Proulx.

[Translation]

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Good afternoon, Ms. Adam. I would like to welcome you and your team, yet again, as you said yourself. But we are glad to have you!

Ms. Adam, in the Main Estimates for 2004-2005, nearly $6.5 million is allocated for investigations. You told us that you hope to do three audits in 2004 or 2005. If I do a quick calculation, that comes to between $2.1 million and $2.2 million per investigation.

Could you give us a brief overview, so that we understand what these investigations are?

Ms. Dyane Adam: That $6 million is for investigations and audits. Although it varies from year to year, we receive some 1,400 complaints a year of which 1,100 are followed up with an investigation, since some complaints are rejected. We are talking about adding the auditing function. Depending on our resources, we have been able to have three or four auditor positions. So when we are properly set up, since we are still establishing that group, we should be able to do four audits a year as well as follow-ups.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: How long would you say an audit takes and how many people are involved? What resources would you invest for an average audit?

Ms. Dyane Adam: I will ask my director to answer that question.

Mr. Michel Robichaud (Director General, Audit Branch, Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages): An audit may take around three or four months if three or four people are assigned to it, including maybe two auditors, depending on the scope of the audit and the resources allocated to support it.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: An average audit... You mentioned Canada Post. How long might that audit take?

Mr. Michel Robichaud: In the case of the Canada Post audit, a preliminary report has just been completed. That audit took three and a half months.

Mr. Marcel Proulx: Thank you.

Ms. Dyane Adam: Canada Post is a very complex institution. Audits can be done across the country. We audit different parts of the act, like service to the public or part VII, and not necessarily the act as a whole, which would take even more time. So it is quite demanding work.

The Chair: Thank you, Commissioner.

Mr. Sauvageau.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: I was joking with my friend Yvon. We were wondering if you had done an audit on André Ouellet, but I will not ask that question. It would be off topic.

Commissioner, it is very good to have you and your team here with us once again. Mr. Proulx said that, and he and I agree on that and many things. Your 1996-97 budget was $10.6 million. If I am not mistaken, that was really the low point. You now have a budget of $18 million and our excellent researcher tells us in her notes that your budget is expected to be capped at $18 million for the next three years.

Do you feel that this is satisfactory? The budget has increased 74% since 1996-97, and that seems to me quite good. Will a budget limited to $18 million over the next three years be sufficient to allow you and your team to achieve your objectives?

Ms. Dyane Adam: It is sufficient for the objectives we have. If we wanted to increase our activities... For example, the committee has discussed the need to promote French and English and expand promotion activities in a major way. In order to do that, more money would be needed, of course. Considering the budget we have been given, which is actually fairly substantial, I would say that the office of the commissioner is a small organization that needs to consolidate its activities for a few years before thinking about expanding its role.

So I believe that we can certainly act effectively and diligently and really carry out our mandate with the resources that we have right now. But there is no doubt that if I were asked to audit 150 federal institutions to find out whether they are complying with the Official Languages Act and all of its objectives, I would say that our budget is inadequate.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Since you gave me a bit of an extreme example, I will deliberately do the same. If you were asked to audit or investigate the whole question of the accountability of the 29 agencies that report to Canadian Heritage—which has not yet tabled its annual report but needs to do so—that is, the various departments and agencies that have to submit their action plan, etc., to Treasury Board, would you have the financial and human resources to do that?

Ms. Dyane Adam: I believe that the head of an agency has the responsibility to try to reconcile various objectives and needs with the available resources. If there is really an urgent need, the first question in any activity planning process is obviously whether it is possible to postpone certain activities in order to divert resources to where the need is most urgent.

Some aspects of our planning can be rescheduled so that our resources can be devoted to a priority area for six months. In some cases, however, that is not possible. In that case, we can respond that we cannot do it without having funding on a temporary, ad hoc or permanent basis, depending on the situation.

The Chair: Do you have one last question, Mr. Sauvageau?

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: You can interpret what follows as a proposal to do an audit on accountability.

As part of your communication activities, have you ever worked with departments and other organizations to develop a plan to increase the visibility and information available on the Official Languages Act?

Ms. Dyane Adam: Not to my knowledge.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Do you think it would be possible and feasible?

Ms. Dyane Adam: I have no doubt that it would be feasible, since the government and every institution is responsible for promoting official languages, French and English, in Canadian society. I am not sure, however, whether a more federal program would be preferable. I think that that would be a good question to submit to the Minister responsible for Official Languages.

The Chair: Mr. Jobin.

Mr. Christian Jobin (Lévis-et-Chutes-de-la-Chaudière, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Ms. Adam, for your presentation. I would like to ask you two questions.

First of all, your report indicates that your full-time staff will increase from 130 to 162. I would like to know which sectors of activity these people will be recruited for.

Ms. Dyane Adam: A number of staff have already been hired. I do not know exactly how many, so I will check.

We added five regional liaison officer positions, four parliamentary relations positions, four audit positions, two legal counsel positions and four corporate services positions. We also added—I almost forgot this—five new policy research and analyst positions; these are the people who prepare the documents before we appear at this committee. The whole research function in our office has been expanded.

Mr. Christian Jobin: From what you were saying earlier, I understood that you did not have the staff you need to fulfil your various objectives.

I would like to know what type of personnel planning would enable you to do that, and whether you have ever carried out such a planning process.

Ms. Dyane Adam: I do not think I was very clear. Two and a half years ago, almost three years ago now, I requested an increased budget, which was approved by the parliamentary committees and by Treasury Board. I considered we needed a basic increase of $4 million, and the government agreed to increase our budget by $4 million over three years.

I think our resources allow us to function efficiently. If I had more, there is no doubt that there would be more people working for us and we would do more. We have to be very vigilant and alert in order to deal with the official languages properly. The act is 35 years old, but it is still not fully implemented. We have to be realistic as well. I think that for the time being, the important thing for me as commissioner is to consolidate these activities and resources and to use them as effectively as possible to achieve the desired results—namely, to have our institutions show the greatest possible respect for all the objectives of the act. We are not responsible for implementing it; we are trying to ensure that others comply with it.

The more studies and audits we give to you, as parliamentarians, the more tools you have to understand what is going on in federal institutions and to demand satisfactory accountability from them. I think the current government wants to strengthen the accountability of federal institutions and the government itself with respect to all statutes.

I think my role is also to provide you with the tools you need. If you are hungry for more studies, I may come back and tell you that I need more money in order to do what you ask.

The Chair: You may ask a final, quick question.

Mr. Christian Jobin: I will be brief. My bias as an accountant is showing here. In your presentation I read: "... the financial statements of the Office of the Commissioner will be audited annually by the Office of the Auditor General."

Does that mean that formerly there was no audit done? Was this decision made following the matter involving the Privacy Commissioner, when Ms. Fraser said that there would be more audits done of small organizations? The budget of the Privacy Commissioner's office is about $11 million. Did someone realize that in the past no audits were done of small organizations and did the auditor decide that it would be preferable to carry out such audits? Was it as a result of this recommendation that it was decided to audit your financial statements annually? My question in no way contests the quality of your financial statements.

Ms. Dyane Adam: In the past, we did respect the standards for auditing our financial statements. We, the five officers of Parliament, meet to discuss our independence and the difficulty of getting a budget increase, because the situation is not that easy for officers of Parliament. Ms. Fraser could tell you about her own experience in this regard.

Of course, the whole Radwanski matter had a significant impact on us. It was clear to us that we would have to be much more transparent. The ability to play our role as officers of Parliament properly depends essentially on the credibility of our organization. We must therefore be absolutely transparent as regards our financial situation and the use of our resources. We must show that we are using them properly, so that there are no doubts about us.

The Chair: You have the floor, Mr. Godin.

Mr. Yvon Godin: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I would like to welcome you again to the Standing Committee on Official Languages. Many questions have been asked, and I am satisfied with the answers. However, I would like to discuss the percentage of your budget that is set aside for outside contracts.

When do you use such contracts? You have your own team, you own employees and your investigators. I would like to know what criteria you use when you decide to use people outside your office. How much money do you pay these contractors? Similarly, when you do turn to people outside your office, how do you go about choosing them?

Ms. Dyane Adam: I will start with the last question, namely, how we choose these individuals.

We follow the procedures established by Public Works and Government Services Canada. There are standards in place and the procedures vary depending on the value of the contract. Consequently, the individuals are chosen by means of a competitive process, and we normally follow these procedures. Contracts are awarded on the basis of a call for tenders.

Mr. Yvon Godin: Yes, but are there always calls for tender, or do you sometimes seek out individuals directly?

Ms. Dyane Adam: For contracts under $25,000, Treasury Board guidelines do not necessarily require a call for tenders.

Mr. Yvon Godin: In that case, how do you select the contractors, if there is no call for tenders?

Ms. Dyane Adam: It varies from one area to another.

Mr. Michel Robichaud: We give out some contracts for investigations, for example. We did a call for tenders and we have the list of approved contractors in the MERX system, the Public Works and Government Services Canada system. When we have a contract to let for an investigation, we use the list of individuals who have been approved for contracts of this type, even if the amount is under $25,000.

Ms. Dyane Adam: It is like a list of qualified people. Perhaps you too, Louise, since you use contracts a lot...

Ms. Louise Guertin (Director General, Corporate Services Branch, Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages): Yes. In the interests of modern management, among other things, we often invite three experts to bid and we choose the group or individual whose services are the most in keeping with our needs. So there are various approaches for ensuring a competitive system.

Ms. Dyane Adam: To answer your first question, this year, we did have a number of outside contracts. I believe Louise is the person who spent the most on outside contracts, and there is a good reason for that. I am sure she could explain that better than me, but there are two main reasons for this—technology, and the whole issue of modern management.

Perhaps you would like to add something.

Ms. Louise Guertin: One of the things we had done this year was an evaluation of our entire information management system in compliance with Treasury Board's new policy. This evaluation also gives us a strategic plan for the next three years. We also awarded a contract for the development of performance indicators and a risk management framework. The objective is to give us even better ways of meeting our accountability requirements within the commissioner's office.

Mr. Yvon Godin: In conclusion, I would like to say that I appreciate the work done by the commissioner. I think it is unfortunate that we have to have such a position; it would be better if this were not necessary. I am not saying that because I do not like you, but simply because if the office were not necessary that would mean that these problems did not exist. It would be good if we needed only $6 million, rather than $18 million. I think the problem remains the same.

On behalf of my community, I would like to thank the commissioner and her team personally for their work in our area on various matters.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Godin.

I would just like to make a very quick announcement, colleagues. I'm told that we cannot have a meeting on Tuesday, March 9, because the Secretary General of the United Nations is making a speech in the House. The estimates are supposed to be passed before the end of the supply period, which falls on March 11. That means that in order to exercise our right to vote on the estimates, we have two choices: we can either do it immediately, or we can meet on Monday after the break. I suggest we take two minutes to do that right away, because the bells should begin ringing any time now. Do you agree? Fine.

PRIVY COUNCIL

Commissioner of Official Languages

Vote 25b—Commissioner of Official Languages—Program Expenditures for... $560,500

(Vote 25b agreed to)

The Chair: Shall I report the Supplementary Estimates to House?

(Motion agreed to)

The Chair: Are you also prepared to vote immediately on the Main Estimates for 2004-2005 while we are at it? Fine.

PRIVY COUNCIL

Commissioner of Official Languages

Vote 30—Commissioner of Official Languages—Program Expenditures for... $16,284,000

(Vote 30 agreed to)

The Chair: Shall I report the Main Estimates to the House?

(Motion agreed to)

The Chair: Both motions are carried.

I would like to add one thing before we close. Since it is not yet certain that the minister we invited to appear before us on Wednesday, March 10 will be able to come, if our witness is not available, would you like to hear from the cable companies? In that way, we could continue discussing the subject we began work on today. I know it is unusual to do that outside of a specific meeting for this purpose, but since time is very short and since this subject generated a great deal of interest a little earlier, could we instruct the clerk to proceed in this way?

Mr. Marcel Proulx: That is a very good idea.

(Motion agreed to)

The Chair: Fine.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Can we still...

The Chair: We could continue for another three or four minutes, since the whip's office told me that we would be informed when we have to leave to go to vote in the House.

In the meantime, would you care to continue, Mr. Godin? Your time was not completely up.

Mr. Yvon Godin: I stopped to give someone else an opportunity to speak.

The Chair: Very well.

Mr. Yvon Godin: With respect to the decision you made earlier, I would just like to mention that we should not forget to invite certain ministers, including the Minister of Canadian Heritage...

The Chair: I have the complete list of the ministers, Mr. Godin. I was actually asking whether we could agree to proceed as I suggested if no minister were available on the 10^th.

Mr. Yvon Godin: I would like to ask the commissioner a brief question, Mr. Chairman.

The Chair: All right, but it will be the last one.

Mr. Yvon Godin: The ACFO has had some problems recently, and I would like to know whether the commissioner is authorized to make recommendations to the government in this regard.

There are committees or associations throughout Canada. In New Brunswick, there is the SANB. The SNA and the ACFO, whose office is in the process of closing down, are really concerned about what is going on. Funds have been earmarked for these associations, but the circumstances are exceptional. Perhaps I could find out something about this.

Ms. Dyane Adam: Usually the commissioner's office does not interfere with the executive. It is up to the government to decide on its expenditures, the way in which funds will be used, and so on. We intervene, rather, with respect to broader principles, and we stress the importance of consulting the communities. We also feel it is very important that the federal government, including Heritage Canada, develop appropriate governance procedures in its dealings with the provinces. In the case you mention, we could talk about appropriate governance in keeping with the situation in Ontario. However, it is not up to us to tell the government how to proceed or how to use its resources.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Godin.

Do you have another question, Mr. Sauvageau?

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: You make the following comment in your presentation:

The goal [of the symposium] is to develop a strategy that will help achieve one of the objectives of the Action Plan, which is to double the number of bilingual young Canadians by 2013.

I would like you to agree to be accountable for this objective, so that in 2013, we see some results, not a complete non-attainment of the objectives. Could we ask you right now to assume responsibility first for defining the term “bilingual young Canadian” and also to determine the number of young francophones likely to be assimilated at the very time we are spending money to make anglophones bilingual.

You or someone in the commissioner's office would be responsible for informing us—in a chapter of the annual report, for example—about the progress being made on the action plan as regards funding, the number of bilingual young people or the number of young people who have been assimilated.

Ms. Dyane Adam: The commissioner's office cannot act for federal institutions. In this case, that would be Canadian Heritage, and of course, the Minister responsible for Official Languages. They are accountable with respect to this objective which is part of the government's strategy. My role...

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: To follow up on the accountability...

Ms. Dyane Adam: My role is to ensure that they are accountable on this. When they are not or when they develop indicators... In fact, this was one of the recommendations in our last annual report: namely, that, together with the ministers of education of each province, they establish a system to measure the progress made toward achieving this objective.

My responsibility to you is to check whether the government has responded to this recommendation which will enable us to keep an eye on things. I must also ensure that you, and citizens generally—because we are talking about their money—are better equipped to determine whether the investment produces the desired results.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: If I may, Mr. Chairman, I would like to conclude...

The Chair: Go ahead, but this will be your final comment.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: In 1996, 1997 and 1998, we heard here on Parliament Hill that all the officials at Foreign Affairs would be bilingual by the year 2000. This never happened, just as the Y2K bug never materialized. That is why we should not wait until 2013 and have to find once again that the objective was not achieved.

Ms. Dyane Adam: You are quite right. Thank you very much.

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau: Thank you.

The Chair: We would like to thank you for appearing before the committee and for providing us with so much information, Madam Commissioner.

In closing, colleagues and committee members, I would like to say a special word of thanks to our clerk and our researcher, who had very little time to prepare for today's meeting. Nevertheless, they did their jobs in grand style. I would like to thank them on behalf of all of the members.

The meeting is adjourned.