Secretariat gets $24.5 million over six years
QUEBEC Following years of complaints that the needs and concerns of the province’s Englishspeaking minority have gone largely unheeded, Quebec announced it will invest $24.5 million over the next six years to support community institutions and work to keep young anglo Quebecers in the province.
The money will go toward the secretariat of anglophone affairs created last November, with Minister Kathleen Weil at its helm. To date, the bureau within Quebec’s civil service designed to ensure the needs of the community are reflected in government policy, had received $1 million in funding and counted five employees. Tuesday ’s budget marked the first time a firm dollar figure had been connected to the secretariat.
Funding will now increase to roughly $2 million for the next two years, and increase to $5.4 million a year between 2020 and 2023. The funding will be used to: Support non-profit organizations ■ and institutions.
Disseminate scientific knowledge ■ that supports the vitality of the English-speaking communities.
Help keep young English-speaking ■ Quebecers in Quebec through employment.
“There is a relatively large number of younger English Quebecers who do not have a great level of education and therefore are at the bottom of the labour market,” Finance Minister Carlos Leitão said. “What we are trying to do is ensure that those young anglos who are having trouble finding a job, stay here, and find a job.”
Coalition Avenir Québec Leader François Legault, however, accused the Liberals of trying to buy anglo votes.
“I think it’s more marketing than anything else. … I hope the anglophones won’t be bought for $5 million a year,” he said. He added that a CAQ government would likely uphold the funding.
Geoffrey Chambers, vice-president of the Quebec Community Groups Network, said the $24.5 million is in line with what the anglophone-rights group was hoping to see for the secretariat.
“We know what it costs to run that scale of an operation and that’s the kind of budget they’ve allocated,” Chambers said. “We’re very pleased.”
Beyond the investment, Chambers said the group was happy to see the English-speaking community acknowledged in the budget after years of “not particularly encouraging ” responses.
“The fact that we’re mentioned at all, that we’re kind of a category of consideration, is a brand new thing,” he said. “It’s an acknowledgment of the existence of the community and the validity of the community’s historical contributions.”
At a forum of minority groups held last February, anglophones from 65 community associations complained they’ve long felt they’re just an afterthought in their home province. Access to institutions or government programs, particularly in the field of education, is limited, and little communication exists between community groups and the government, they said. Navigating Quebec’s daunting bureaucracy was also cited as a major impediment.
Weil said the government intends to draft an action plan to ensure the vitality of English communities by the end of this spring.
Last June, the provincial and federal governments also announced they are studying the needs of the more fragile English rural community, which is aging rapidly and in some communities in danger of dying out. Access to services is often an issue, particularly with members who are unilingual.
Couillard did not nominate a minister to represent the English community, a common staple among previous governments, for the first four years that he was premier.
Roughly 80 per cent of the anglophone community lives in Montreal, with the rest dispersed in pockets throughout the province.
Statistics Canada says in 2011, people whose mother tongue was English formed 7.7 per cent of the Quebec population. When anglophone individuals whose first official language spoken is English are added, the English-speaking community in 2011 represented 935,635 people, about 12 per cent of the total population.