The Office québécois de la langue française draws a distinction between its language inspectors and ‘francization advisers.’
It all started on Tuesday when The Gazette reported that Santa Cabrini managers issued a memo to staff in advance of a planned visit Wednesday by the OQLF that would include a tour of its operating rooms.
A Santa Cabrini source described the visit as an “inspection” by the OQLF, likely as a result of a complaint. In response to queries by The Gazette, OQLF spokesperson Chantal Bouchard did not allude to Santa Cabrini but did say that “if a (hospital) facility offers to include an operating theatre in the tour, the visit always takes place in an unoccupied OR, in compliance with the facility’s safety guidelines.”
Bouchard explained that following the adoption of Bill 96 two years ago, health-care institutions must now “submit an analysis of their linguistic situation to the office, leading to the issuance of an attestation of compliance. The office issues an attestation of conformity when their use of French complies with the provisions of the charter and they meet their other obligations under the charter.
“It is within the framework of this approach that visits to different spaces can take place in (a health) establishment,” Bouchard added. “It is up to the establishment to determine the schedule and the sites to be visited, in conjunction with a representative of the establishment.”
“They didn’t attack us. They just looked at us in small groups,” the worker told the CBC. “They came to the hospital to check if everything was written properly.”
Bouchard of the OQLF denied to the CBC that it dispatched inspectors to Montreal hospitals recently or is planning to send inspectors in the coming days. “The office does not remove staff members from pressing medical tasks,” Bouchard was quoted as saying. “The office never goes into a busy operating room to check what language is spoken there.”
Meanwhile, a spokesperson for the east-end health authority in charge of Santa Cabrini informed the CBC that “the OQLF visits our establishments, like all public establishments governed by the French language law. We comply with the requests of the OQLF.”
On Thursday, the OQLF spokesperson acknowledged for the first time that one of its representatives did visit Santa Cabrini. However, that employee was a “francization adviser,” not an inspector.
“A francization adviser visited Santa Cabrini Hospital this week to meet with an administrative representative of the facility,” Bouchard told The Gazette. “The visit was part of the hospital’s efforts to comply with the Charter of the French Language. However, no inspector from the (OQLF) has visited a Montreal hospital or is scheduled to do so in the next few days.”
On its website, the OQLF draws a distinction between its inspectors and francization advisers. An inspector handles language complaints, “visits the inspection site” and determines whether the charter was contravened, among other duties.
In contrast, an OQLF adviser “accompanies companies in their francization process to encourage the implementation, use, maintenance and consolidation of French at all levels of the company.”
The OQLF uses the French word “enterprise” for company or business and it lists on its website businesses of at least 25 employees that have been “certified.” By comparison, the OQLF uses the French word “établissement” for health-care facilities like a hospital.
Ultimately, the 300-person OQLF did send one of its representatives to Santa Cabrini this week, to ensure — in the words of its official spokesperson — “the hospital’s efforts to comply with the Charter of the French Language.”