[Newsbot]

Title: Poll shows majority support official bilingualism
Category: Business
Posted By: Benn
Date: 2009-09-08 08:11:55
Canadian

[JackCoiner]

44% in Alberta disagree? Quelle surprise!

[Proculation]

I know a lot of people who are now working in Alberta and BC. I guess there must be more french there.

[OldChum]

I do not like the price tagg it puts on all of us Quebec wants it then let them pay .

[EdwardRI]

Oh. Neat. I don't.

[commanderkai]

I don't mind bilingualism, if it was applied equally across the country. The fact there's a large minority of English speakers within Quebec, and yet little no no street signs in English, and whenever there is a mistake that an English sign is put up, it's immediately censored? That annoys me

[Zipperfish]

$1:

One of the biggest misperceptions is people have to be bilingual in order to get a job with the federal government.

While 61% of respondents believe that, in fact 60% of federal government positions only require knowledge of one official language

This is not a misperception. Only 60% require one offical language. But the top 40% require both. Only 17% of Canada is bilingual (last time I checked), the majority of which are in Quebec. You're picking your civil service elite from 17% of teh population. Bascially the federal civil service is run by Quebec. And "that's the way--uh-huh, uh-huh--they like it."

[OldChum]

Hell the country has kissed their ass for too long it time to settle the ? over this country. They are still a minority in the scheme of things

[Bodah]

Since the rate of bilingual Canadians hasn't changed in over 40 years, always hovered around 15%. Lets call bilingualism what it is then = A great career opportunity for 15% of the population. Is that worth the billions we've pumped into this dying horse ?

I'm all for bilingual services to the public were warranted but the internal workings of any government should be in one language only, whatever that majority language is. A bilingual public service wasnt Trudeaus intent of bilingualism when it was created, he's stated that.

Zipperfish Zipperfish:

This is not a misperception. Only 60% require one offical language. But the top 40% require both. Only 17% of Canada is bilingual (last time I checked), the majority of which are in Quebec. You're picking your civil service elite from 17% of teh population. Bascially the federal civil service is run by Quebec. And "that's the way--uh-huh, uh-huh--they like it."

Your bang on Zipperhead. Just watch wich way the traffic flows in the morning in the Ottawa area.

[kenmore]

OldChum OldChum:

I do not like the price tagg it puts on all of us Quebec wants it then let them pay .

Actually M.Diefenbaker wanted it.. and there are two official languages so why shouldn't Canadians be able to speak both? Vive le Québec!, vive la bilingualism!
What about outside of Québec? francophones in Ontario, Manitoba, New Brunswick and all the other provinces?

[Bodah]

Proculation Proculation:

I know a lot of people who are now working in Alberta and BC. I guess there must be more french there.

There is..
I've just met my uncle from BC that I haven't seen in over 20 years, he's been out there most of his life. His english is very good but spoken with a french accent I was very suprised. His french is still there as well.

[kenmore]

Absolutely the internal working of the federal government and each provincial government should be bilingual.... you English unilingual guys are too much.. learn the other official language then you can qualify for a government job and stop whining!

[Canadian_Mind]

How about givig provinces the option? So Quebec can be all french, NB and Ottawa billingual, and the rest of country all English.

[EdwardRI]

I know English, German, Norwegian, Danish, Swedish, Icelandic, and I'm working on Scottish Gaelic. I've had use for each of these languages more than I've had for French, so I won't learn French.

Seems rather silly that it's an official language.

[Zipperfish]

kenmore kenmore:

Absolutely the internal working of the federal government and each provincial government should be bilingual.... you English unilingual guys are too much.. learn the other official language then you can qualify for a government job and stop whining!

I think the fact that Quebec runs the civil service is one of the reasons it is so incredibly inept. Firstt of all, as stated, you're picking all your senior managers from a very limited pool, so an ineffective executive is not a surprising result. These managers have no inkling of Canada outside of Quebec (well, except for Ottawa!). Also they are part of a "Big Government" culture, where the solution to every problem is more government.