Posted on 11/25/2002 8:00:00 AM PST by Podkayne
OTTAWA - Critics are upset with Treasury Board President Lucienne Robillard's plan to make bilingualism mandatory for 40 per cent of the jobs in the federal government.
Senior federal civil servants could be fined or transferred if their French doesn't meet government standards by March, she said in early November.
"If managers don't meet their language profiles by this date, there will be consequences," she said.
FROM NOV. 7, 2002: Senior civil servants warned to improve French
Bureaucrats will have to be bilingual to work in areas of the country where people commonly speak both official languages. That includes Ottawa-Hull, New Brunswick and parts of Ontario and Quebec.
Ron Cochrane, executive director of the Professional Association of Foreign Service Officers, said the government has gone too far.
Critics say the plan will bar many Canadians from government jobs and stunt the careers for civil servants who are unilingual today.
It's unfair, said a spokesperson for the Public Service Alliance of Canada, the main federal union.
Canada is going to wake up from it's socialized feel-good liberal experiment someday. It won't be a pretty sight, either.
Of course no one will actually lose their job over this. They'll just hire more. Another 100,000 hires and they can break Treadu's (sp?) record! (There are about 310,000 Federal employees right now)
What is the French word of the day for this man? Ah yes, MORON!!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.