Montreal Transit Corp. Misinterpreting Bill 101 According to Civil Rights Lawyer

[no color]

The Montreal Gazette

MONTREAL — Civil-rights lawyer Julius Grey says Montreal’s transit authority
is wrong when it says Bill 101 forbids it from making bilingualism a
prerequisite for more employees who deal with the public.

“They’re completely misinterpreting” Bill 101, Grey said in an interview. The
STM has “an implicit obligation to serve their customers and they have to have
a sufficient number of people who can do so in English to successfully serve
their customers.”

Its clientele “includes a considerable percentage of people — Montrealers,
tourists, business people — who speak English, and English is a reasonable
requirement for a sufficient number of people to serve those customers.”

He said Bill 101 gives organizations some leeway.

“It’s true they must protect those employees who cannot speak English,” Grey
said. “But there’s nothing in that law that was either intended to or does
prevent the proper service to a significant minority.”

Grey was reacting to a Gazette article Friday about how the STM interprets
Bill 101.

The Gazette filed an access-to-information request with the STM, seeking “any
legal opinion received by the STM, either from in-house counsel or outside
lawyers, regarding the application” of Article 46 of Bill 101. That article
covers employee language requirements.

In her response, Sylvie Tremblay, the STM’s executive director of legal
affairs, wrote that “No such legal opinion exists.”

On Friday, STM vice-chair Marvin Rotrand said the STM actually does have
written opinions from its legal department about the issue.

He could not explain the discrepancy.

Read more: MTC is misinterpreting Bill 101, civil rights lawyer says


So it looks as though the MTC (Montreal Transit Corporation) has decided on it's own to apply language restrictions even more discriminatory than bill 101. The Commuter Train Service requires it's employees in Montreal to be bilingual since bill 101 allows such requirement if the nature of the job requires it. However the MTC chooses to ignore this provision of bill 101 and instead decides that it will go even further and apply it's own rules which requires no bilingualism from employees that deal with the public.

I recall back in the 1980's when we already had bill 101, MTC employees were bilingual, and announcements in the subway were always bilingual as well. At one point without any change in the law, and for no apparent reason, the MTC decided to stop it's bilingual policy and instead implemented a French-only policy. From this point on, I stopped taking public transit. Since announcements in the subway are now only in French including evacuation orders for any type of an emergency, I would be putting myself at risk since I would not be able to understand the operator's instructions. For this reason, no one can force me to take public transit.

 

[no color]

The Montreal Gazette

MONTREAL - All it would take is a phone call to Quebec’s language watchdog
for Montreal’s bus and métro authority to be able to require bilingualism among
more employees, Jean-Francois Lisée says.

Contradicting statements by the Société de transport de Montréal, the
provincial minister responsible for anglophones said the STM has never actually
asked for help from the Office québécois de la langue française in interpreting
Bill 101.

The Gazette recently revealed that the STM’s policy of not requiring
bilingualism among bus drivers and métro ticket takers is in sharp contrast to
requirements for such workers at Montreal’s commuter train authority.

The Agence métropolitain de transport compels all employees who deal with the
public to be bilingual.

On CJAD’s Tommy Schnurmacher show Friday, Lisée was asked to tell the STM to
follow the AMT’s lead and make bilingualism a requirement for bus drivers and
métro ticket takers.

“STM, are you listening?” Lisée said. “It’s OK, when you make the case that
you have employees in areas where part of the clientele will be anglophone, they
are in contact with anglophones.

“Simply call the (OQLF) and you will be able to hire bilingual employees in
some of these places.”

Read more: Bilingualism for Public Transit workers a phone call away: Jean-Francois Lisée