Question Period Note: Post-censal Survey of Official Language Minority Communities

The mandate letter (December 2019) of the Minister of Economic Development and Official Languages includes the commitment to undertake an “enumeration of rights-holders and a thorough post-Census survey to better account for and better serve minority language communities.”

• Good data and research are essential for evidence-based decision-making.
• The Government of Canada is committed to carrying out a post-censal survey of official language minority communities.
• The results of this survey will contribute to a data ecosystem that will enable the enumeration of
rights-holders.

• In 2006, Statistics Canada carried out a post-censal survey on the vitality of official language minority communities (OLMCs). Various scientific articles, monographs, detailed community portraits, and a large number of analyses resulted from this important data.
• In 2017, the Stranding Committee on Official Languages published its report “The Enumeration of Rights-Holders Under Section 23 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms: Toward a Census that Supports the Charter.”
o In it, it recommends that the Government of Canada mandate Statistics Canada to proceed with a new post-censal survey on the vitality of OLMCs, based on the results of the 2021 Census, and that it provide the statistical agency with the required financial resources to do so.
o The Standing Committee on Official Languages also recommends that Statistics Canada put in place a consultative committee including representatives of OLMCs.
• In its response to the report of the Standing Committee on Official Languages, the Government of Canada committed to working with Statistics Canada to “examine options for collecting additional data on the vitality of official language minorities, including a new post-censal survey, during the preparations for the 2021 Census.”
• The mandate letter (December 2019) of the Minister of Economic Development and Official Languages includes the commitment to “Modernize and reinforce the Official Languages Act” and to undertake an “enumeration of rights-holders and a thorough post-Census survey to better account for and better serve minority language communities.”
• Since 2019-2020, Canadian Heritage and Statistics Canada have been working collaboratively to prepare the next post-censal survey of OLMCs.
• The results of the next post-censal survey of OLMCs will contribute to a data ecosystem that will enable the enumeration of rights-holders to education in the minority language, under section 23 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. In particular, the survey will enable the collection of data from rights-holders as to their intentions to register their children, or not, in minority language schools.
• Statistics Canada is an independent federal agency, but is administratively within the Department of Innovation, Science and Development.

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