Anglo seniors need to be heard, too
English-speaking seniors need a chance to make their needs known
How do we make Montreal an age-friendly city for everyone? The Plante administration recently announced that it will hold public consultations on its new Municipal Action Plan for Seniors 2018-2020. It has since been criticized (rightly, in my opinion) by two research organizations based at Concordia University for developing a plan using a process that excludes some of Montreal’s most vulnerable and marginalized seniors, including unilingual anglophones, immigrants and people with limited mobility. Mayor Valérie Plante has issued a response stressing that she wants to hear from English-speaking seniors during this process. The good news: They’ve added a new English consultation meeting that will take place on Feb. 26 from 2-4 p.m. at the Cummings Centre. As well, the phone number listed on the consultation website now comes with a voice message in both French and English (it was previously only in French).
The bad news: The website remains entirely in French with no English translation.
Does the Plante administration want to reach Montreal’s most vulnerable seniors or not?
This is not just about language. Montreal’s demographics are headed for a major shift in the coming years. According to the 2016 census figures, people age 65 and older currently represent 17 per cent of the population of Montreal. It is estimated that by 2036 that number will grow to 21 per cent. Any long-term action plan to create an age-friendly city needs to get this right.
Yet, this consultation process offers up a perfect example of how some seniors in Montreal face different kinds of challenges. For one thing, it highlights the challenge of language barriers for English-speaking seniors when accessing (or trying to access) information from government agencies and other public institutions. Keep in mind that many older seniors came of age before Quebec’s language laws took effect, and were educated at a time when French was barely taught in English schools. They are also less likely than their francophone counterparts to have adult children living nearby to serve as a support network, as many of their children have left the province. Montreal’s senior population is not a uniform group. While Montreal’s Englishspeaking seniors have many of the same needs and priorities as their French-speaking counterparts, some of their needs and priorities are unique. A few years ago, the Quebec Community Groups Network released a research report on the situation of English-speaking seniors in Quebec. (Full disclosure: I was the research project manager who oversaw this study.) Some of the findings are worth highlighting here:
Did you know that more than one-quarter of Quebec’s English-speaking population is 55 years of age and older, and that the majority of them live in Montreal and the Montérégie on the south shore of the metropolitan area?
Did you know that English-speaking Quebecers tend to live longer than their francophone counterparts? Or that women, who constitute the majority of our English-speaking seniors, are less likely than men to be bilingual? They are also more likely to be caregivers or living alone as they age. That’s not all. Englishspeaking seniors are almost five times more likely than their francophone counterparts to have been born in a province outside of Quebec. Nearly half of English-speaking seniors across Quebec were born outside of Canada. All of this shapes their experience of aging.
What is particularly disappointing is that Projet Montréal prides itself on being grassroots oriented, inclusive and attuned to the needs of vulnerable communities. Yet some of Montreal’s most marginalized seniors were not even on their radar. Talk about a blind spot.
Montreal’s seniors — all of them — need to have their voices heard during this consultation process, with the goal of developing policy and programs that acknowledge their diverse situations as they age. Only then can Montreal bill itself as an age-friendly city for everyone.