Canadians for Language Fairness Inc.
P.O. Box 40111
Bank & Hunt Club Postal Outlet
2515 Bank Street.
Ottawa, ON, K1V 0W8
Tel (613) 321-7333 Fax (613) 524-3247
Website:
www.languagefairness.ca Email:
clf1@sympatico.ca --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
March 19, 2008
Jean Chretien, when he was PM of Canada, once said that the brain-drain phenomenon was not real and even if it was real, so what? The 2006 census revealed a lot of very interesting statistics: 1. The policy of Official Bilingualism is not working 2. It doesn't unite the country (Elizabeth Thompson's article). Now we also have other conclusions that have come to light. The article written by Henry Aubin refers to the brain drain of anglos from Quebec and the reasons have been identified by a letter-writer as, "endless political debate on sovereignty and language, narrowmindedness (things are good only when they're in or from Quebec) and high taxes." Isn't this interesting? I'm sure the ordinary Quebecer must realize that the main political parties in that province are too ethno-centric and overly focussed on the supremacy of the French language & culture and that they cannot forever depend on the generosity of English Canada to keep funding this extravagance.
Another disturbing StatsCan report written by Becky Rynor & Shannon Proudfoot (printed by the Canwest New Service) revealed that "Canada may see itself as a nation of immigrants, but more than 10 times as many of us move to the US every year as Americans who move here". Between 2000 & 2004, an average 68,900 Canadians moved south of the border & about 6,100 Americans moved to Canada. The report also says "Canadians who migrated south were more highly educated than the US population".
Canadians are also moving to Australia & the UK. The British Home Office & Canada House estimate that there are about 200,000 Canadian ex-pats living in Britain. The bulk of those who go abroad are in their prime working age (between 18 & 49 years). For a copy of the complete report, please ask.
Kim
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http://www.canada.com/montrealgazette/n ... 51b9dcdc19The Gazette
Published: 15 hours ago
Bilingualism doesn't unite Canada, poll finds
Majority of respondents outside Quebec don't think speaking two languages is important
ELIZABETH THOMPSON
Former prime minister Pierre Trudeau's dream of a Canada united by bilingualism appears to be fading everywhere in Canada except in Quebec, according to a new public opinion poll.
The Léger Marketing poll carried out for the Association for Canadian Studies found that only 40 per cent of Canadians polled agreed that bilingualism keeps the country united, compared with 58 per cent who disagreed.
"It's the ultimate paradox," said Jack Jedwab, executive director of the association. "There is this schizophrenia vis-à-vis Trudeau. On the one hand in terms of his view that everyone should be bilingual, that view is more widely endorsed in Quebec than in the rest of the country, even though there are some mixed feelings in Quebec (about Trudeau)."
"But clearly it is not faring well outside of Quebec and it is also not faring as well as one would hope with the population that is neither English nor French mother tongue - which is a very crucial segment of the population."
The poll of 1,500 respondents across Canada found that francophones were twice as likely to agree that bilingualism keeps the country united than anglophone respondents by a gap of 63 per cent to 31 per cent. When it comes to allophone respondents, 49 per cent disagreed with the idea that bilingualism keeps Canada together, while 43 per cent agreed.
The poll also found sharp differences between regions in how important they say bilingualism is to Canadian unity.
While 63 per cent of Quebecers agreed bilingualism keeps the country united, that view was shared by only 20 per cent of respondents in Alberta and 27 per cent in British Columbia. The rate rose to 35 per cent in Manitoba and Saskatchewan, 37 per cent in Ontario and 43 per cent in the Maritimes.
University-educated respondents were more likely to agree with that view than those without a university education by a score of 45 per cent to 38 per cent.
When it came to whether Canadians should be required to learn a second language, 52 per cent said it shouldn't be required, compared with 45 per cent who said it should.
Women were more likely than men to say Canadians should learn a second language, with 50 per cent of female respondents agreeing with the statement compared with 39 per cent of men - well beyond the poll's margin of error of 2.9 per cent, 19 times out of 20.
Jedwab said the attitudes toward bilingualism that are revealed by the poll have important public policy implications.
"We need to change the psychology in Canada about the view of the importance of bilingualism. All of the measures in place and the investments we make on the (bilingualism) action plan risk not bearing fruit if the openness to bilingualism, the attitudinal dimension, isn't strong enough."
ethompson@thegazette.canwest.com© The Gazette (Montreal) 2008
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http://www.canada.com/montrealgazette/n ... d8f28043d7The Gazette : March 6, 2008
The brain drain of anglos from Quebec is getting serious
Just when Quebec needs all the talent it can get, the exodus is continuing
HENRY AUBIN
Everyone knows that a serious brain drain is weakening Quebec's anglophone community. But a sobering new study shows that this exodus is more serious than widely understood.
Among adults born in Quebec whose mother tongue is English, an astonishing 61 per cent of those whose top university degree was a bachelor's had moved to other parts of Canada as of 2001, the latest census year for which this mobility data are available. (See table.)
Among those with a master's degree, 66 per cent had left, according to this study by William Floch, a federal civil servant specializing in the official languages, and Joanne Pocock, a PhD candidate in sociology at Carleton University. And, finally, among those in the small, elite category of holders of PhDs, a staggering 73 per cent had departed.
The category most likely to remain in Quebec? High-school dropouts. Only 40 per cent went.
As a rule of thumb, then, the more educated you are, the more likely you are to leave.
Please note that these are not foreign students who study at Montreal universities at considerable expense to provincial taxpayers before returning home - that is, the sort of students whom Quebec nationalists regularly complain about (particularly in the context of McGill's faculty of medicine). No, these are Quebecers, born and bred.
Note, too, that the census can track only people who still reside in Canada. (If you move to another country, you don't get a census form.) So, if anything, the study actually underestimates the outflow of talent. It doesn't count all those Quebec-born doctors, nurses, scientists, musicians, computer whizzes and others who are now making careers in the U.S. or elsewhere.
It goes without saying that this exodus has a huge impact on Quebec's economy (more specifically in the Montreal metropolitan region, where most of these émigrés would be working if they'd stayed). It also has a commensurate effect on the tax base.
What might be less understood is the trend's effect on civic leadership in the English-speaking community. As the study's co-author, Pocock, told me yesterday, the outflow helps explain an erosion in the institutional base. Well-educated people who give their time to, say, their local school board, city council, hospital board or volunteer group are becoming less numerous. Her observation recalls something former MNA Reed Scowen wrote in 2007 edition of his book Time to Say Goodbye: "It is impossible to identify a leader of the English community today."
(It's worth pointing out, however, that the Quebec Community Groups Network has started trying to fill this void. Indeed, it was at its conference on the English community last week that this study was released.)
The Quebec anglos who are leaving are predominantly bilingual and have educational credentials that shine. The province is scrambling to replace them with immigrants, but the latter often lack the same skills in French and diplomas of equal weight.
Anglos leave for many reasons. Better career opportunities is one. High taxes here are another. As well, sovereignist politicians keep alive the largely obsolete but ever-useful image of the haughty anglo. As La Presse's Lysiane Gagnon noted this week, "anti-English rhetoric is still politically correct." The Quebec civil service remains a shocking symbol of an unaccommodating majority culture. Although 8.2 per cent of Quebecers have English as their mother tongue, they have only 0.7 per cent of government jobs.
Pocock expects that the 2006 census's mobility data, to be published in a few months, will show a slight improvement in Quebec's record of retaining well-educated anglos in the 2002-2006 period. This good news would reflect to some degree the election of a federalist Quebec government in 2003.
But how about 2007 and 2008? These are the years of the Parti Québécois's launch of Nous-ism. Overt ethnic nationalism is becoming respectable after long hibernation. The timing is bad. Demographers predict Quebec is only several years from a broad manpower shortage - what we're already seeing among doctors and nurses could become generalized.
haubin@thegazette.canwest.com--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The anglo brain drain (table below is not properly formatted, unfortunately)
Among Quebecers whose mother tongue is English, it is the most educated who are the most likely to move to other provinces, according to the 2001 census. Total No High- Bachelor's or population high-school school first professional Master's age 15+ diploma diploma degree degree Ph D.
Anglos born in Quebec
and still live in Quebec 305,513 86,232 49,663 36,270 8,388 1,170
Anglos born in Quebec now
living in another province 303,882 56,442 35,234 56,830 16,401 3,173
source: "emerging trends in the socio-economic status of english speaking quebec: those who left and those who stayed," by William Floch and Joanne Pocock, published by the centre d'Études ethniques des universités montréalaises and the Canadian institute for research on linguistic minorities
© The Gazette (Montreal) 2008
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The Gazette : March 7, 2008
Francophones flee, too
Re: "The brain drain of anglos from Quebec is getting serious" (Opinion, March 6).
It's not just anglophones who are leaving. I am sure some bilingual educated francophones are following them, or will be soon.
The reasons: endless political debate on sovereignty and language, narrowmindedness (things are good only when they're in or from Quebec) and high taxes. If you're single, with a good paycheque, it's cheaper to live elsewhere and there are more career opportunities.
Sure, Quebec is a great place to live but at some point in one's life, choices have to be made. For a brighter future, that might mean leaving.
Maxime Dupont-Demers
Montreal
Active Member 
