The Promotion of Francophone Immigration Will Be Incorporated Into Canadian Law

Canada’s Bill C-13 is on its way to the Senate after passing the House of Commons, putting its goal of encouraging francophone immigration into law.

Under the proposed legislation, Canada’s immigration minister would be required by law to do something that the present government is already doing: maintain the vibrancy of French-language minority communities throughout the nation.
Bill C-13 would mandate Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) to establish a francophone immigration strategy in order to strengthen the viability of Canada’s French language minority communities, especially by restoring and expanding its demographic weight.

This policy will include:

objectives, targets, and indicators; mechanisms for information sharing and reporting; a statement that the government of Canada recognises immigration as one of the factors contributing to the demographic weight of French linguistic minority communities in Canada; and a statement that the government of Canada recognises the importance of francophone immigration to economic development.
In practise, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s administration, a minority government run by the Liberal Party of Canada, already does a lot of that. Bill C-13, by changing the Official Languages Act, would make the present government’s policy a legislative necessity.

In late January, Immigration Minister Sean Fraser declared that Canada has met its 2022 objective of 4.4 percent French-speaking immigration outside of Quebec.

“Francophone immigration is at the heart of the values that make Canada rich, both culturally and through the distinct characteristics of its two official languages,” Fraser said.
“We will continue to welcome French-speaking immigrants to ensure the viability of these key communities that are helping to shape the future of our country.”

More than 16,300 new immigrants have settled in francophone minority communities throughout Canada in the last year. Since data collection started, the nation today has the highest number of French-speaking immigrants outside of Quebec.

“Francophone immigration plays a critical role in restoring the demographic weight of francophone minority communities while also contributing significantly to our country’s economic development,” stated Official Languages Minister Ginette Petitpas Taylor.

Last year, Canada met its 4.4% Francophone immigration target.
When Ottawa announced in January that it had met its 2022 francophone immigration target, Petitpas-Taylor anticipated the development of a “robust new francophone immigration policy, presented in Bill C-13, with objectives, targets, and specific indicators that will ensure the sustainability of the French language.”

Since then, Ottawa has unveiled its new Action Plan for Official Languages 2023-2028: Protection-Promotion-Collaboration, as well as announced a $137.2 million investment over the next five years to increase immigration to Canada by French-speaking foreign nationals from Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and the Americas.

The Canadian government states in its five-year francophone immigration strategy that the proportion of francophones in Canada is decreasing despite growth in the total number of francophones in the nation.

“In general, Statistics Canada data show that the number of Canadians who speak French as their first official language has increased since 2016, reaching 7.8 million in 2021 (a 1.6% increase).” However, that rise has been overtaken by the total expansion of the Canadian population (5.2%), indicating a fall in the overall demographic weight of francophones in Canada,” according to the plan. “This gap is especially significant for francophone minority communities, which rely more on immigration to offset demographic decline.”

The new policy and operational framework for francophone immigration to Canada is estimated to cost $13.4 million over five years under that proposal.
This would need a review of its francophone immigration policy, which was announced in 2019, with the goal of increasing francophone immigration and offering additional settlement and integration assistance to French-speaking and bilingual immigrants.

Another $18.5 million will be committed over the next five years to help companies in official language minority areas attract additional francophone immigrants from Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and the Americas.

In addition, the Canadian government has pledged $16.3 million during that time period to recruit more internationally-trained French-speaking and French instructors for elementary, middle, and secondary schools, addressing a perceived scarcity of such teachers in francophone minority areas.

Canada will invest $25 million in the Francophone Immigration Innovation Centre.
Canada plans to invest approximately $50 million over the next five years to further unify the francophone integration route and strengthen settlement and integration services for these individuals.

“This will be accomplished through existing initiatives such as Welcoming Francophone Communities as well as new measures such as a strategy to better support French-speaking women immigrants,” the plan said.

Over the next five years, the cost of building a new Centre for Innovation in Francophone Immigration is estimated to be $25 million.

Its purpose is to provide francophone communities the chance to engage in events that promote local communities while also identifying, supporting, and recruiting French-speaking and bilingual people. The facility will also attempt to meet the manpower demands of Canada’s many economic sectors.

Over the next five years, newcomers who desire to study English or French will benefit from an extra $10.5 million in language instruction. In addition, Ottawa has set aside $3.5 million over the next five years to build new capacity to analyse its own efforts to increase the selection of francophone and bilingual immigrants under existing programmes in order to improve their effectiveness and increase levels of francophone immigration.

Due to Ottawa’s ongoing efforts to guarantee the vitality of French-language communities throughout the nation, Francophone immigration to Canada, excluding Quebec, was over five times greater last year than during the 2006 census year.