The leaders of dozens of Quebec-based technology companies are warning Premier François Legault that the province’s new language law, known as Bill 96, will make it hard to recruit talent and threatens to do “enormous damage to the province’s economy.”
Bill 96 was adopted last month and aims to strengthen Quebec’s language laws, with new and expanded rules for businesses, harsher penalties for violations and limits on who can access certain government services in English.
One part of the law stipulates that immigrants who have been in Quebec for six months or more will only be able to access most government services in French.
In a letter published Tuesday, more than 30 executives called on Legault and the province to delay implementation of Bill 96 until there is better French-language support, such as tutoring, available for workers.
“We have team members who come from South America, who come from Europe. We need to give them more time and more support,” said Lloyd Segal, president and CEO of Repare Therapeutics, a Montreal-based biotechnology company that develops cancer drugs, and one of the letter’s signatories.
“These phenomenal researchers who embrace coming to Quebec — and everything about coming to Quebec. They can go anywhere and we don’t want to lose them.”
The Repare Therapeutics lab in Montreal develops cancer drugs, but the company’s CEO worries the province’s new language laws will make it harder to recruit workers. (Alison Northcott/CBC)
Until now, some of the province’s French-language requirements for businesses only applied to companies with more than 50 employees. But under Bill 96, those rules will also apply to smaller companies with more than 25 people on staff.
Repare has more than 50 employees, so it had already been subject to French requirements since it started operating in Quebec six years ago.
The problem now, Segal said, is that the new law could make his company less attractive to the talent it needs, noting that Repare is already competing with businesses around the world in the face of a labour shortage across the tech sector.
WATCH | Head of the Council of Canadian Innovators explains the calls to delay Bill 96:
Tech companies say Bill 96 could hurt Quebec economy
19 hours ago
Duration 1:00
The head of the Council of Canadian Innovators explains why dozens of Quebec tech companies have signed a letter asking the province to delay implementing its updated language law.
Benjamin Bergen is the president of the Council of Canadian Innovators, the organization behind the letter. He acknowledges the importance of protecting Quebec’s culture, but said the law was prepared hastily and will make it harder for domestic companies to grow.
“You’re actually damaging your own culture and your own economy,” said Bergen.
‘Duty to protect our common language’
Legault has said that strengthening the province’s language laws is a question of survival when it comes to the French language in Quebec.
“We are proud to be a Francophone nation in North America and it’s our duty to protect our common language,” he said in May, when Bill 96 was adopted.
His Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) government has said the law won’t be applied for another year, as the province works to set up a new French language ministry to develop language policies for the public service, municipalities and government organizations.
There are several parts of the legislation that will touch businesses and many companies are now looking for guidance on how to comply, said Brittany Carson, a partner in labour and employment law with the Montreal-based firm Lavery.
For instance, companies with more than 25 employees will need to ensure the use of French is generalized in the workplace — a requirement that previously only applied to larger businesses, with more than 50 employees.
Quebec Premier François Legault, shown here at the Quebec Legislature on Friday, has said Bill 96 is necessary to protect the French language. (Jacques Boissinot/The Canadian Press)
The Office québécois de la langue française, or OQLF, which enforces the French-language charter, will be looking to ensure communication with staff, training materials, policies and contracts are all in French, said Carson.
“What does that mean for the person sitting in New York City, who’s managing employees here in Quebec? Obviously, the Charter is not going to force them to speak French,” she said.
“I think that companies are going to have to start thinking about making sure that they’re respecting the fundamental right of their Quebec employees to work in French.”
Despite fielding many questions from clients, Carson said she hasn’t heard of anyone considering leaving Quebec because of the stricter rules, in part because many larger companies have already been subject to the province’s French language rules for decades.
Montréal International, the city’s economic promotion agency, said it has received an influx of calls from investors about Bill 96, with questions and concerns about immigration and French requirements for employees.
But Stéphane Paquet, the agency’s president and CEO, said in a statement that he doesn’t expect the debate around the new law to drive talent away.
“Investors consider multiple factors when evaluating their options for investing in a city, including the current economic climate and the existing ecosystem,” he said, adding that the agency’s recruitment activities currently target mainly French-speaking talent pools.
For his part, Segal said he is hopeful the Quebec government will help businesses comply and clear up uncertainty about how the law will be applied and enforced. He has no plans to move his company outside of Quebec, but worries other companies will be dissuaded from setting up here.
“I have deep concerns as one of the builders of our biotech community here in Montreal that, without more certainty, we are almost certainly going to lose new businesses that are being formed.”
OTTAWA – The federal government is expected to boost the minimum hourly wage that must be paid to temporary foreign workers in the high-wage stream as a way to encourage employers to hire more Canadian staff.
Under the current program’s high-wage labour market impact assessment (LMIA) stream, an employer must pay at least the median income in their province to qualify for a permit. A government official, who The Canadian Press is not naming because they are not authorized to speak publicly about the change, said Employment Minister Randy Boissonnault will announce Tuesday that the threshold will increase to 20 per cent above the provincial median hourly wage.
The change is scheduled to come into force on Nov. 8.
As with previous changes to the Temporary Foreign Worker program, the government’s goal is to encourage employers to hire more Canadian workers. The Liberal government has faced criticism for increasing the number of temporary residents allowed into Canada, which many have linked to housing shortages and a higher cost of living.
The program has also come under fire for allegations of mistreatment of workers.
A LMIA is required for an employer to hire a temporary foreign worker, and is used to demonstrate there aren’t enough Canadian workers to fill the positions they are filling.
In Ontario, the median hourly wage is $28.39 for the high-wage bracket, so once the change takes effect an employer will need to pay at least $34.07 per hour.
The government official estimates this change will affect up to 34,000 workers under the LMIA high-wage stream. Existing work permits will not be affected, but the official said the planned change will affect their renewals.
According to public data from Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, 183,820 temporary foreign worker permits became effective in 2023. That was up from 98,025 in 2019 — an 88 per cent increase.
The upcoming change is the latest in a series of moves to tighten eligibility rules in order to limit temporary residents, including international students and foreign workers. Those changes include imposing caps on the percentage of low-wage foreign workers in some sectors and ending permits in metropolitan areas with high unemployment rates.
Temporary foreign workers in the agriculture sector are not affected by past rule changes.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 21, 2024.
OTTAWA – The parliamentary budget officer says the federal government likely failed to keep its deficit below its promised $40 billion cap in the last fiscal year.
However the PBO also projects in its latest economic and fiscal outlook today that weak economic growth this year will begin to rebound in 2025.
The budget watchdog estimates in its report that the federal government posted a $46.8 billion deficit for the 2023-24 fiscal year.
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland pledged a year ago to keep the deficit capped at $40 billion and in her spring budget said the deficit for 2023-24 stayed in line with that promise.
The final tally of the last year’s deficit will be confirmed when the government publishes its annual public accounts report this fall.
The PBO says economic growth will remain tepid this year but will rebound in 2025 as the Bank of Canada’s interest rate cuts stimulate spending and business investment.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2024.
OTTAWA – Statistics Canada says the level of food insecurity increased in 2022 as inflation hit peak levels.
In a report using data from the Canadian community health survey, the agency says 15.6 per cent of households experienced some level of food insecurity in 2022 after being relatively stable from 2017 to 2021.
The reading was up from 9.6 per cent in 2017 and 11.6 per cent in 2018.
Statistics Canada says the prevalence of household food insecurity was slightly lower and stable during the pandemic years as it fell to 8.5 per cent in the fall of 2020 and 9.1 per cent in 2021.
In addition to an increase in the prevalence of food insecurity in 2022, the agency says there was an increase in the severity as more households reported moderate or severe food insecurity.
It also noted an increase in the number of Canadians living in moderately or severely food insecure households was also seen in the Canadian income survey data collected in the first half of 2023.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct 16, 2024.
