Speech by the Honourable Madeleine Meilleur, Minister of Community and Social Services and Minister Responsible for Francophone Affairs
at a conference on the theme, The Forest: Our Roots, Our Future, organized by the Association française des municipalités de l'Ontario
Hearst, Ontario
Thursday, September 14, 2006
Thank you Jacques (Jacques Hétu, President of AFMO) and good afternoon to one and all.
First of all, I would like to congratulate Jacques and AFMO's board of directors for their commitment, their leadership and their vision, and Réjean Nadeau and the Town of Hearst for organizing the conference. Thanks to them, AFMO is welcoming a record number of participants this year. Bravo !!!
On behalf of all of my colleagues, and especially on behalf of the Honourable John Gerretsen, Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, who would very much have wanted to be with us, I thank the Association française des municipalités de l'Ontario (AFMO) for inviting us here to Hearst.
I would also like to take the opportunity to congratulate the Town of Hearst for holding this important conference right in the heart of Ontario's boreal forest on the theme The Forest: Our Roots, Our Future.
As the Ontario Heritage Trust plaque that we will be unveiling shortly points out, in Hearst, Francophones and the forest are very closely linked and are the roots of the community.
They are also its future.
In this way, the conference program will allow you to take up the challenges you face every day, all for the benefit of the citizens you represent.
In addition, thanks to the quality of the speakers and the diversity of the presentations, all of you, no matter where in the province you live, will take back useful knowledge and solutions to your municipalities.
You know that I have a strong personal interest in the subjects and themes being dealt with at this conference and in your work.
There is no need to look back at my former municipal responsibilities in the City of Vanier, in the municipality of Ottawa-Carleton and in the new city of Ottawa.
The municipal world has always been close to my heart because municipalities are the places with which we feel a special affinity.
We identify with our communities: they are like us because it is there that together we live our culture and our language on a daily basis.
For our communities to have promising future, we must build on this powerful and intimate relationship between municipalities, language and culture.
And for the French language to grow within our municipalities and be passed down from generation to generation, French must be more than a language of personal, family or community culture; it must also be a carrier of participative, effective and responsible democracy.
Of course, municipalities, just like the provincial government, cannot do everything by themselves.
I firmly believe in close cooperation between the government and the municipal sector.
Translation of municipal by-laws and other key documents
Last year, in Kirkland Lake, I had the immense pleasure of announcing the result of a concerted approach between the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing, the Office of Francophone Affairs and Canadian Heritage: the conclusion of a partnership with AFMO for the translation into French of municipal by-laws and other key documents related to municipal affairs.
This important project meets a need voiced over many years, and Ontario and the federal government have gladly made a commitment to meet this need by investing 700,000 dollars over four years.
I had told you that AFMO would be called upon to play a key role in implementing this innovative project.
Today we see the results. In the final analysis, what counts more than words are concrete results.
It gives me great pleasure to launch the Centre d'archives des règlements municipaux.
This Web site, where you will find the English and French versions of municipal by-laws, will be an invaluable resource for everyone.
It will enable our municipalities to use the right words when it comes to the terminology of municipal by-laws.
The Centre d'archives des règlements municipaux will be a shared resource for dealing with the complexity of the French language and legal jargon.
The Centre is part of a program aimed at equipping us with quality tools for municipal governance and will thus have an immediate impact on the citizens of AFMO's member municipalities.
And quality municipal governance in French is a source of pride for all of us.
To top it off, today's announcement is a reminder that the government has made a commitment to support and encourage initiatives that promote access to top-quality French language services.
Francophone Affairs
At the provincial level, we have continued to forge ahead on Francophone affairs.
I am particularly proud of a number of the achievements on our long list of accomplishments since we came to power:
The decision to give full governance to TFO, which is becoming an independent organization with its own board of directors and which will be managed independently in terms of both its administration and its budget;
The expansion of Montfort Hospital (185 million dollars) ;
Colossal investments in elementary, secondary and postsecondary education.
The signing of the Ontario-Québec cooperation initiative on francophone affairs, which cannot fail to remind us of last year's conference on the theme Without Frontiers: Common Challenges;
The designation of Kingston as the 25th area to be designated under the French Language Services Act;
The addition to the preamble of the Local Health System Integration Act of a provision mandating respect for the requirements of the French Language Services Act and the creation of an advisory committee on French language health services;
The allocation of two million dollars to services for the prevention of violence against Francophone women. This investment almost triples the amount allocated to these services for women; and
The creation of the Ontario Francophonie Awards, which recognize those who have made a significant contribution to the advancement of the French fact in Ontario.
Conclusion
In closing, I would be remiss in not mentioning another source of pride: the Association of municipalities of Ontario (AMO) this year adopted a by-law stating that the president of AFMO is entitled to a seat on its board of directors.
This is definitely proof, if any were needed, of the importance and growing influence of the Association française des municipalités de l'Ontario across the entire province.
I congratulate AFMO for the work it is accomplishing on a host of issues affecting the municipal world and la Francophonie; we are going to see one of the results in a moment.
Before proceeding to the official launch of the Centre d'archives and our first "click", I would like to recall my friend Jacques Hétu to my side.
Jacques, you know that I like to come to AFMO's annual conference and to bring good news with me.
And so, on behalf of the Government of Ontario, and especially on behalf of my colleague John Gerretsen, Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, who would have liked to be here with us, it gives me immense pleasure to present to you this second payment of $100,000, a first this year.
This will allow you to continue work on the translation of municipal by-laws and other key documents, as planned.
Bravo to AFMO and keep up the good work!
