N.B. begins year-long review of official languages law
CBC
New Brunswick has begun a year-long review of legislation meant to guarantee government services are available in both official languages.
A legislative committee on official languages, tasked with reviewing the province's Official Languages Act, met Wednesday to begin that work.
The law aims to uphold the availability of government services in both English and French in New Brunswick, Canada's only officially bilingual province.
But that's become increasingly difficult to achieve in the province's overburdened health and long-term care systems, according to John McLaughlin, a retired deputy minister of the Department of Education.
He conducted the last review of the act in 2021, along with provincial court Judge Yvette Finn, and they both appeared at the standing committee meeting in Fredericton Wednesday.
"The nursing home situation is very precarious right now. We just look at the number of people who are waiting for nursing home placements, who are in beds in hospitals because there aren't enough," McLaughlin said.
"This is a significant challenge for the province, and for you folks to consider, is how can we try to balance those things — to give to our seniors the dignity of being able to live and breathe in their mother tongue, while also having a place where they can be well cared for?"
In their 2021 report, McLaughlin and Finn issued a series of recommendations, which dealt with strengthening governance and certain linguistic obligations in areas such as health and long-term care.
But those have yet to be implemented in full.
Finn said that the 2021 recommendations are still relevant, and noted some still require a lot of work.
“Municipalities, nursing care homes … we’re really just skimming the surface, we have to go more in depth, especially figuring out how to implement it,” she said.
Last month, Premier Susan Holt said in a statement that her government would act on the recommendations, but that they would first be reviewed by the committee.
The province said last month that the Department of Social Development would consult with the long-term care sector on a path forward.
“The government will establish a working group … to draft a progressive and sustainable implementation plan to improve the capacity of nursing homes to provide equal quality of service in both official languages,” a news release said.
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