What is the official language of Ontario?
Ontario
Ontario's official language is English. Numerous French-language services are available under the "French Language Services Act of 1990 in designated areas where sizeable francophone populations exist.
French Canadians
Francophones living in Canadian provinces other than Quebec have enjoyed minority language rights under Canadian law since at least 1969, with the Official Languages Act, and under the Canadian Constitution since 1982, protecting them from provincial governments that have historically been indifferent towards their presence. At the provincial level, New Brunswick formally designates French as a full official language, while other provinces vary in the level of French language services they offer. All three of Canada's territories include French as an official language of the territory alongside English and local indigenous languages, although in practice French-language services are normally available only in the capital cities and not across the entire territory.
Language policies of Canada's provinces and territories
Many Aboriginal and European languages were once widely spoken in Newfoundland and Labrador. However, Britain eventually gained firm and unchallenged control of the island and adjacent coast following the French defeat in the Seven Years' War, and English then became the language of administration and commerce, as in most of the British Empire. In isolated fishing villages many minority languages persisted in private use, however, until the coming of standardized education in the 19th, and more so the 20th centuries. When Newfoundland joined Confederation in 1949 it had already used English as the sole language of government for several centuries. Today, Newfoundland is the most linguistically homogeneous province in Canada. In 1999, 98% of the population spoke only English as their sole mother tongue. The Government of Newfoundland and Labrador has no statutory language policy, simply having inherited English from colonial times. The island of Newfoundland was once the homeland of the Beothuk language, and also seen some Mi'kmaq speakers. The Labrador coast is home to the Innu-aimun and Inuttut languages. Newfoundland was also home to unique regional dialects of the French and Irish Gaelic languages, now extinct, as well as smaller groups of Old Norse, Basque, Spanish, Portuguese, German, and Scots Gaelic speakers. Today the Government offers minimal French-language services through its French-language webisite, in all other respects, it is English-only, including in the legislature, the courts, the schools, and the civil service.
Language policies of Canada's provinces and territories
Most provinces have laws that make either English or both English and French the official language(s) of the legislature and the courts, but may also have separate policies in regards to education and the bureaucracy.
Official bilingualism in Canada
Although no Canadian province has officially adopted English as its sole official language, English is the de facto language of government services and internal government operations in Canada's seven remaining provinces. Service levels in French vary greatly from one province to another (and sometimes within different parts of the same province).
Languages of Canada
A multitude of languages are used in Canada. According to the 2011 census, English and French are the mother tongues of 56.9% and 21.3% of Canadians respectively. In total 85.6% of Canadians have working knowledge of English while 30.1% have a working knowledge of French. Under the Official Languages Act of 1969, both English and French have official federal status throughout Canada, in respect of all government services, including the courts, and all federal legislation is enacted bilingually. New Brunswick is the only Canadian province that has both English and French as its official languages to the same extent, with constitutional entrenchment. Quebec's official language is French, although, in that province, the Constitution requires that all legislation be enacted in both French and English, and court proceedings may be conducted in either language. Similar constitutional protections are in place in Manitoba.
French language in Canada
French is one of the official languages, with English, of the province of New Brunswick. Apart from Quebec, this is the only other Canadian province that recognizes French as an official language. Approximately one-third of New Brunswickers are francophone, by far the largest Acadian population in Canada.
Languages of Canada
According to the 2011 census, 94.3% of Quebecers have knowledge of French, and 47.2% have knowledge of English. Bilingualism (of the two official languages) is largely limited to Quebec itself, and to a strip of territory sometimes referred to as the "bilingual belt", that stretches east from Quebec into northern New Brunswick and west into parts of Ottawa and northeastern Ontario. 85% of bilingual Canadians live within Quebec, Ontario and New Brunswick. A majority of all bilingual Canadians, (57.4%) are themselves Quebecers, and a high percentage of the bilingual population in the rest of Canada resides in close proximity to the Quebec border.
Languages of Canada
Most provinces have laws that make either English or both English and French the official language(s) of the legislature and the courts but may also have separate policies in regards to education and the bureaucracy.
Francophone Assembly of Ontario
AFO, or L'Assemblée de la francophonie de l'Ontario ("Francophone Assembly of Ontario") is a Canadian organization which coordinates the political and cultural activities of the Franco-Ontarian community.
Catholic Church in Canada
The major flashpoint was public support for Catholic French language schools. Although the Confederation Agreement of 1867 guaranteed the status of Catholic schools where they had been legalized, disputes erupted in numerous provinces, especially in the Manitoba Schools Question in the 1890s and Ontario in the 1910s. In Ontario, Regulation 17 was a regulation by the Ontario Ministry of Education, that restricted the use of French as a language of instruction to the first two years of schooling. French Canada reacted vehemently and resisted the implementation of the Regulation. This conflict, which was first rooted in linguistic and cultural questions, transformed into a religious divide. In 1915, Ontario clergy was divided between French Canadian and Irish allegiances, with the Irish supporting the position of the provincial government. Pope Benedict XV asked his Canadian representative to study the divide in order to reestablish unity among the Catholic church in the province of Ontario. Regulation 17 is among the reasons why French Canada distanced itself from the war effort, as its young men refused to enlist.
Province of Canada
The Province of Canada ceased to exist at Canadian Confederation on 1 July 1867, when it was divided into the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. Ontario included the area occupied by the pre-1841 British colony of Upper Canada, while Quebec included the area occupied by the pre-1841 British colony of Lower Canada (which had included Labrador until 1809, when Labrador was transferred to the British colony of Newfoundland). Upper Canada was primarily English-speaking, whereas Lower Canada was primarily French-speaking.
Section 20 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
Section 20 of the "Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms" is one of the sections of the Constitution of Canada dealing with Canada's two official languages, English and French. Along with section 16, section 20 is one of the few sections under the title "Official Languages of Canada" that guarantees bilingualism outside Parliament, legislatures and courts. This also makes it more extensive than language rights in the "Constitution Act, 1867". Section 20's specific function is to establish a right to English and French services from the governments of Canada and New Brunswick.
Franco-Ontarian
There are more than 600,000 francophones residing in Ontario. According to the 2016 Canadian census, there were 550,600 people living in Ontario who declared French their first official language spoken, 490,715 people who declared French their mother tongue, and 277,045 Ontarians who declared French as the language they speak most often at home. Over 1.4 million Ontarians reported themselves as bilingual, and 1.3 million Ontarians reported partial or full French ethnic origins. French-speaking Ontarians constitute the largest French-speaking community in Canada outside Quebec, as well as the largest minority language group within Ontario, and French is the fourth most common ethnic background in the province after English, Scottish and Irish.
French language in Canada
In Quebec, French became again the official language; until then it was the vernacular language but with no legal status.
Language policies of Canada's provinces and territories
Manitoba was established as an officially bilingual province under section 23 of the Manitoba Act, 1870. However, in subsequent years the provincial government moved to end French-language services and become English-only. In the famous Supreme Court of Canada case "Reference Re Manitoba Language Rights" of 1985 the court found these policies unconstitutional. The province of Manitoba is now overwhelmingly English-speaking and the first language of the courts, government ministries, and schools is English. However, in order to comply with the court's ruling the province is required to provide nearly all its services in French (as well as English). The government's policy is summarized in the "French Language Services Policy", last updated in March 1999.
Francophone Association of Municipalities of Ontario
The Francophone Association of Municipalities of Ontario (or AFMO, from its French name, Association française des municipalités d'Ontario) is a Canadian political organization of municipalities in the province of Ontario which have significant Franco-Ontarian communities. The organization oversees the maintenance and development of municipal government services in French, and works with other levels of government, as well as organizations in other Canadian provinces, on issues unique to francophone and bilingual communities.
List of francophone communities in Ontario
The provincial average of Ontarians whose mother tongue is French is 4.1%, with a total of 549,000 people in Ontario who identify French as their mother tongue in 2016. The majority of francophones in Ontario live in eastern and northeastern Ontario. While most communities in these areas have sizeable French minorities, several municipalities have francophone majorities.
Manitoba
English and French are the official languages of the legislature and courts of Manitoba, according to §23 of the Manitoba Act, 1870 (part of the Constitution of Canada). In April 1890, the Manitoba legislature attempted to abolish the official status of French, and ceased to publish bilingual legislation. However, in 1985 the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in the Reference re Manitoba Language Rights that §23 still applied, and that legislation published only in English was invalid (unilingual legislation was declared valid for a temporary period to allow time for translation).
Ontario
The majority of Ontarians are of English or other European descent including large Scottish, Irish and Italian communities. Slightly less than 5 per cent of the population of Ontario is Franco-Ontarian, that is those whose native tongue is French, although those with French ancestry account for 11 per cent of the population. In relation to natural increase or inter-provincial migration, immigration is a huge population growth force in Ontario, as it has been over the last two centuries. More recent sources of immigrants with large or growing communities in Ontario include South Asians, Caribbeans, Latin Americans, Europeans, Asians, and Africans. Most populations have settled in the larger urban centres.
42nd Canadian Parliament
Official Languages
Demographics of Ottawa
The city offers municipal services in both of Canada's official languages (Canadian English and Canadian French). Nearly 300,000 people, or 37% of Ottawa's population, can speak both languages, As such it is the largest city in Canada where municipal services are offered in both English and French. However, the city is not officially bilingual in law. Those who identify their mother tongue as English constitute 62.4 percent, while those with 
French as their mother tongue make up 14.2 percent of the population. In terms of respondents' knowledge of one or both official languages, 59.9 percent and 1.5 percent of the population have knowledge of English only and French only, respectively; while 37.2 percent have knowledge of both official languages. An additional 20.4 percent list languages other than English and French as their mother tongue. These include Arabic (3.2%), Chinese (3.0%), Spanish (1.2%), Italian (1.1%), and many others.
Francophone Assembly of Ontario
The organization was created in 1910 as the "Association canadienne-française d'Éducation de l'Ontario" ("ACFÉO") to lobby for French language education rights in the province. The organization and the Franco-Ontarian community at large faced a serious early crisis when the provincial government adopted Regulation 17 in 1912, effectively banning the teaching of French in schools. The regulation was never fully implemented because of ACFÉO's litigation, and it was eventually repealed in 1927.
Official bilingualism in Canada
The Liberal Party sees itself as the party of official bilingualism, as it was a Liberal prime minister, Pierre Trudeau, who enacted the first "Official Languages Act" in 1969 and who entrenched detailed protections for the two official languages in the "Charter of Rights and Freedoms" in 1982.
French Canadians
Since 1968, French has been one of Canada's two official languages. It is the sole official language of Quebec and one of the official languages of New Brunswick, Yukon, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut. The province of Ontario has no official languages defined in law, although the provincial government provides French language services in many parts of the province under the French Language Services Act.
McCreary, Manitoba
English is the main language used in McCreary, being spoken fluently by virtually all of the population. In terms of Canada's official languages, 92.1% of the population speaks exclusively English, while 6.8% also speaks French. Other languages spoken as a mother tongue include Ukrainian (3.4%), German (2.2%), Tagalog (1.1%), and Ojibwe (1.1%), though only Ukrainian sees regular use at home, by 1.1% of the population.
Quebec Sign Language
LSQ is recognized as an official language in Ontario only in domains of education, legislation and judicial activities after the passing of Bill 213 within the Ontario Legislative Assembly. Across the rest of Canada, there is no protection or oversight for the language as neither federal, provincial nor territorial governments recognize LSQ as a language other than Ontario.
French language in Canada
By the Official Languages Act in 1969, Canada recognized English and French as having equal status in the government of Canada. While French, with no specification as to dialect or variety, has the status of one of Canada's two official languages at the federal government level, English is the native language of the majority of Canadians. The federal government provides services and operates in both languages. French is the sole official language in Quebec at the provincial level and is co-official with English in New Brunswick. The provincial governments of Ontario, New Brunswick, and Manitoba are required to provide services in French where justified by the number of francophones (those whose mother tongue is French or who use French on a daily basis). However, the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms requires all provinces to provide primary and secondary education to their official-language minorities.
The Nation, Ontario
The Nation also contains one of the larger concentrations of the French in Ontario. According to the 2006 Statistics Canada census, 70% of the population have French as their first language, while 25% have English as their first language.
French Language Services Act
In order for an area to obtain designation, Francophones must make up at least 10% of its population, and urban centres must have at least 5,000 francophones. Previous to 2009, the definition of a francophone in Ontario included only native French speakers. This definition was broadened by the Government of Ontario in June 2009 "to better reflect the changing face and diversity of Ontario's Francophone communities." The new Inclusive Definition of Francophones (IDF) now includes allophones, "those whose mother tongue is neither French nor English but have particular knowledge of French as an official language and use French at home, including many recent immigrants to Ontario for whom French is the language of integration."
Brampton was designated as the province's 24th bilingual service centre in 2004, and the designation officially came into effect in March 2007. Kingston was designated as the 25th bilingual service centre in May 2006, and French services officially came into effect in 2009.
Howard Galganov
Galganov, along with Jean-Serge Brisson, a local business owner, is challenging in provincial court a regulation on mandatory bilingual signage adopted on June 16, 2008 by the township of Russell. He claims that the regulation, by making French-only or English-only signs illegal, is threatening the French language in Ontario. One Galganov associate is Elizabeth Trudeau, an official spokesperson for Canadians for Language Fairness, which battles forced bilingual legislation in Canada, claiming that it elevates "French speakers to first-class status and the rest of us to second and third-class status".
Ottawa
Bilingualism became official policy for the conduct of municipal business in 2002, and 37% of the population can speak both languages , making it the largest city in Canada with both English and French as co-official languages. Those who identify their mother tongue as English constitute 62.4 percent, while those with French as their mother tongue make up 14.2 percent of the population. In terms of respondents' knowledge of one or both official languages, 59.9 percent and 1.5 percent of the population have knowledge of English only and French only, respectively; while 37.2 percent have a 
knowledge of both official languages. The overall Ottawa–Gatineau census metropolitan area (CMA) has a larger proportion of French speakers than Ottawa itself, since Gatineau is overwhelmingly French speaking. An additional 20.4 percent of the population list languages other than English and French as their mother tongue. These include Arabic (3.2%), Chinese (3.0%), Spanish (1.2%), Italian (1.1%), and many others.
Filipino community in Toronto
Tagalog is one of the fastest-growing languages in Canada. In the period 2006-2011, Canadians who consider Tagalog their first language at home increased by 64%. Most Canadians of Filipino origin can converse in one of Canada's official languages. In 2001, 99% said they could converse in one or both official languages, while 1% reported they could speak neither English nor French. Most, 93%, could carry on a conversation in English only, while 6% could converse in both English and French and below 1% spoke French only. In 2001, 59% of the Filipino community said that their mother tongue was a non-official language, while 41% said that their mother tongue was English and 1% said that it was French. 60% of the Filipino community considered Tagalog their mother tongue.
Official bilingualism in Canada
English and French have had limited constitutional protection since 1867. Section 133 of the "Constitution Act, 1867" guarantees that both languages may be used in the Parliament of Canada, in its journals and records, and in court proceedings in any court established by the Parliament of Canada. The section also mandates that all Acts of the Parliament of Canada be printed and published in both languages. Guarantees for the equal status of the two official languages are provided in sections 16–23 of the "Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms", which became law in 1982. Sections 16–19 guarantee the equal status of both languages in Parliament, in all federal government institutions, and in federal courts. These sections also mandate that all statutes, records and journals of Parliament be published in both languages, with the English and French versions both holding equal status before the courts. Section 20 guarantees the right of the Canadian public to communicate in English and French with any central government office or with regional offices where there is "a significant demand for communication with and services from that office". Significant demand is not defined in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. One of the purposes of the "Official Languages Act" of 1988 was to remedy this omission.
Toronto
While English is the predominant language spoken by Torontonians, many other languages have considerable numbers of local speakers. The varieties of Chinese and Italian are the second and third most widely spoken languages at work. Despite Canada's official bilingualism, while 9.7% of Ontario's Francophones live in Toronto, only 0.6% of the population reported French as a singular language spoken most often at home; meanwhile 64% reported speaking predominantly English only and 28.3% primarily used a non-official language; 7.1% reported commonly speaking multiple languages at home. The city's 9-1-1 emergency services are equipped to respond in over 150 languages.
Edwardsburgh/Cardinal
In 2011 in Edwardsburgh/Cardinal, 92.0% of the population spoke only English as a mother tongue; 4.5% of the population reported French, and 2.9% a non-official language, as a mother tongue. 97.6% of the population reportedly spoke mostly English while at home. The most common non-official language mother-tongue was Dutch, which accounted for 27.9% of the non-official language speaking population. In comparison, the most commonly reported non-official mother-tongue in Ontario was reportedly Italian.
Upon the Loyalists first arrival in 1784, there was already two missionaries belonging to the Roman Catholic church in what would later be Upper Canada. Shortly after settlement, the British appointed chaplains to attend to the needs of both Anglican and Presbyterian Loyalists. Later on, Methodism was introduced to the area by ancestral German Protestants. These four religious denominations maintained strong influence in Edwardsburgh/Cardinal into the modern age.
In 2011, 81.5% of the population of Edwardsburgh/Cardinal associated themselves with a religion, according to NHS data. The most common religion stated was Roman Catholic.
Central Ojibwa language
Central Ojibwa (also known as Central Ojibwe, Ojibway, Ojibwe) is an Algonquian language spoken in Ontario, Canada from Lake Nipigon in the west to Lake Nipissing in the east.
Ajax, Ontario
According to the 2011 Census, English is the mother tongue of , French is the mother tongue of , and French/English bilingualism is mother tongue for of the population; other reported mother tongues were Urdu (), followed by , Tamil (), , Arabic (), Spanish (), and Italian (), with having one or more other mother tongues.
Languages of Canada
Canada's linguistic diversity extends beyond the two official languages. "In Canada, 4.7 million people (14.2% of the population) reported speaking a language other than English or French most often at home and 1.9 million people (5.8%) reported speaking such a language on a regular basis as a second language (in addition to their main home language, English or French). In all, 20.0% of Canada's population reported speaking a language other than English or French at home. For roughly 6.4 million people, the other language was an immigrant language, spoken most often or on a regular basis at home, alone or together with English or French whereas for more than 213,000 people, the other language was an Aboriginal language. Finally, the number of people reporting sign languages as the languages spoken at home was nearly 25,000 people (15,000 most often and 9,800 on a regular basis)."
Section 22 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
Section 22 of the "Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms" is one of several sections of the "Charter" relating to the official languages of Canada. The official languages, under section 16, are English and French. Section 22 is specifically concerned with political rights relating to languages besides English and French.
Northern Ontario
The government of Canada provides French and English equally in all matters. In 2011, 10.2% of people in Northern Ontario spoke French most often at home, mostly in Northeastern Ontario.
Court system of Canada
English and French are both official languages of the federal government of Canada. Either official language may be used by any person or in any pleading or process in or issuing from any Court of Canada established by Parliament under the "Constitution Act, 1867". This constitutional guarantee applies to the Supreme Court of Canada, the Federal Court of Appeal, the Federal Court, the Tax Court of Canada and the Court Martial Appeal Court. Parliament has expanded on that constitutional guarantee to ensure the federal courts are institutionally bilingual.
Language policies of Canada's provinces and territories
From the 1890s until the 1960s, English was the only language in which most government services were provided outside of Quebec (which was functionally bilingual) and using French in the courts or in schools was often illegal. These developments led to fears by French-Canadian nationalists that French speakers would be assimilated into the increasingly Anglophone culture of Ontario, leading the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism (1963–1969) to recommend that the Government of Canada and all provinces offer more services in French.
Charter of the French Language
Language in Canada is defined federally by the Official Languages Act since 1969 and is part of the Constitution of Canada since 1982. Parts of the Charter of the French language have been amended in response to rulings by Quebec Courts which were upheld by the Supreme Court of Canada.
Languages of Canada
Ottawa Valley Twang is the accent, sometimes referred to as a dialect of English, that is spoken in the Ottawa Valley, in Ontario. The Ottawa Valley is considered to be a linguistic enclave within Ontario.
Official bilingualism in Canada
Knowledge of the two official languages is largely determined by geography. Nearly 95% of Quebecers can speak French, but only 40.6% speak English. In the rest of the country, 97.6% of the population is capable of speaking English, but only 7.5% can speak French. Personal bilingualism is most concentrated in southern Quebec and a swath of territory sometimes referred to as the "bilingual belt", which stretches east from Quebec through northern and eastern New Brunswick and west through Ottawa and that part of Ontario lying to the east of Ottawa, as well as north-eastern Ontario. There is also a large French-speaking population in Manitoba. In all, 55% of bilingual Canadians are Quebecers, and a high percentage of the bilingual population in the rest of Canada resides in Ontario and New Brunswick. Statistics Canada collects much of its language data from self-assessments.
Official Languages Act (Canada)
However, the changes found some opposition in English Canada. "Toronto Telegram" columnist Braithwaither sums up the position of the opponents of the bill like this: "We are not afraid of any aspect of the language bill, we simply regard it as unnecessary, politically-motivated, costly to implement, divisive, and, as it affects the non-English, non-french third of the population, wholly discriminatory."
Uxbridge, Ontario
English is the mother tongue of 91.7% of the population, whereas French, the other official language, of 1.0%. German is the mother tongue of 1.4% of the residents of Uxbridge, while native speakers of Italian make up exactly 1.0% of the population.
Aurora, Ontario
English is the mother tongue of 73.7% of Aurora residents. Following are Italian (2.4%), Russian (2.3%), Persian (1.7%), Chinese, not otherwise specified (1.5%) and Spanish (1.4%).
Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages
The Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages of the Canadian government is responsible for achieving the objectives of, and promoting, Canada's Official Languages Act. Canada has two official languages: English and French.
Flag of Ontario
The flag of Ontario is the provincial flag of Ontario, Canada. It is a defaced Red Ensign, with the Royal Union Flag in the canton and the Ontario shield of arms in the fly. The flag was introduced in 1965 in the wake of lengthy debates on changing the Canadian Red Ensign with a unique Canadian flag.
Constitution Act, 1867
Section 133 establishes English and French as the official languages of the Parliament of Canada and the Parliament of Quebec. No provision was made for the official languages of other government bodies.
Languages of Canada
Canada's Official Languages Act, first adopted in 1969 and updated in 1988, gives English and French equal status throughout federal institutions.
List of endangered languages in Canada
There are about 8,000 speakers in the central Ojibwe language, and it has been spread over 16 communities in Canada. The language is spoken from Ontario Canada to Manitoba. It is also spoken in places from Michigan to Montana next to the Great Lakes which is the home of the Ojibwe people. The language today is spoken by people over the age of 70. The people of the Ojibwe language note that double vowels in their language are treated as standing for unit sounds, therefore they are alphabetized after corresponding single values.
Official Language Act (Quebec)
The Official Language Act of 1974 (French "Loi sur la langue officielle"), also known as Bill 22, was an act of the National Assembly of Quebec, commissioned by Premier Robert Bourassa, which made French the sole official language of Quebec, Canada. Provincial desire for the Official Language Act came after the repeal of Bill 63. It was ultimately supplanted by the Charter of the French Language (also known as Bill 101) in 1977, which imposed French as the only language for advertising and education (with many exceptions).
Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages
The 1988 Official Languages Act mandates this office and its commissioner, who holds office for seven years. Its mission has three main objectives: ensuring the equality of English and French within the Government of Canada and institutions subject to the Act; preserving and developing official language communities; and ensuring the equality of English and French in Canadian society at large.
British people
It was not until 1977 that the phrase "A Canadian citizen is a British subject" ceased to be used in Canadian passports. The politics of Canada are strongly influenced by British political culture. Although significant modifications have been made, Canada is governed by a democratic parliamentary framework comparable to the Westminster system, and retains Elizabeth II as The Queen of Canada and Head of State. English is the mostly commonly spoken language used in Canada and it is an official language of Canada.
French language in Canada
French is an official language in each of the three northern territories: the Yukon, the Northwest Territories, and Nunavut. Francophones in the Yukon are called Franco-Yukonnais, those from the Northwest Territories, Franco-Ténois (from the French acronym for the Northwest Territories, "T.N.-O."), and those in Nunavut, Franco-Nunavois.
Franco-Ontarian
The dialects of French spoken in Ontario are similar to, but distinct from, Quebec French and constitute part of the greater Canadian French dialect. Due to the large English majority in the province, English loanwords are sometimes used in the informal or slang registers of Franco-Ontarian French. While English loanwords occur to a large extent in many varieties of French in Canada and Europe, there has been more of a conscious effort in Quebec to eliminate anglicisms.
Bilingual sign
The Government of Canada and the Province of New Brunswick are officially bilingual in English and French, so all signs issued or regulated by those governments are bilingual regardless of where they are located. Provincial road signs are also bilingual in French-designated areas of Manitoba and Ontario. Each local authority decides which language is shown first. In Ottawa, the national capital, the municipal government is officially bilingual so all municipal traffic signs and road markers are bilingual. Since airports are regulated by the federal government, most airports in Canada have bilingual signs in English and French.
University of Ottawa
As of 2016, the university was the world's largest English-French bilingual university. The university is one of the three bilingual universities in Ontario that is not federated with a larger university. Since its inception the university has seen itself as fostering English-French bilingualism. However, bilingualism was only made an official university policy in 1965 when the Government of Ontario passed "An Act respecting Université d'Ottawa" through the Legislative Assembly of Ontario. Section 4 of that Act specifically states that an object and purpose of the university is"to further bilingualism and biculturalism and to preserve and develop French culture in Ontario", and "to further ... Christian principles". Despite that law, these parts of the university's mandate are now arguably superseded by the 1982 "Canadian Charter of Rights and" "Freedoms," which constitutionalizes multiculturalism (not biculturalism) and freedom of religion.
Languages of Canada
In 2011, just under 21.5 million Canadians, representing 65% of the population, spoke English most of the time at home, while 58% declared it their mother language. English is the major language everywhere in Canada except Quebec and Nunavut, and most Canadians (85%) can speak English. While English is not the preferred language in Quebec, 36.1% of Québécois can speak English. Nationally, Francophones are five times more likely to speak English than Anglophones are to speak French – 44% and 9% respectively. Only 3.2% of Canada's English-speaking population resides in Quebec—mostly in Montreal.
Official Languages Act (Canada)
In 2016, another poll was conducted, showing increasing support for official bilingualism in every province. Among telephone respondents, 88% of Canadians said they "strongly support" or "somewhat support" the aims of the "Official Languages Act": 91% in the Atlantic, 94% in Quebec, 87% in Ontario, 83% in the Prairies, 90% in Alberta and 84% in British Columbia. 84% of telephone respondents also said they personally "strongly support" or "somewhat support" official bilingualism. The results were more mixed in the online portion of the poll, where 78% of respondents said they "strongly support" or "somewhat support" the aims of the "Official Languages Act", and 73% said they personally "strongly support" or "somewhat support" official bilingualism. In another poll conducted on this topic in the same year, 67% of respondents across Canada answered "yes" to the question "Are you personally in favour of bilingualism for all of Canada?" while 31% said "no".
Liberal Party of Canada
The Liberal Party under Trudeau promoted official bilingualism and passed the "Official Languages Act", which gave French and English languages equal status in Canada. Trudeau hoped that the promotion of bilingualism would cement Quebec's place in Confederation, and counter growing calls for an independent Quebec. The party hoped the policy would transform Canada into a country where English and French Canadians could live together, and allow Canadians to move to any part of the country without having to lose their language. Although this vision has yet to fully materialize, official bilingualism has helped to halt the decline of the French language outside of Quebec, and to ensure that all federal government services (including radio and television services provided by the government-owned Canadian Broadcasting Corporation/Radio-Canada) are available in both languages throughout the country.
French language in Canada
The province has no official language defined in law, although it is a largely English-speaking province. Ontario law requires that the provincial Legislative Assembly operate in both English and French (individuals can speak in the Assembly in the official language of their choice), and requires that all provincial statutes and bills be made available in both English and French. Furthermore, under the French Language Services Act, individuals are entitled to communicate with the head or central office of any provincial government department or agency in French, as well as to receive all government services in French in 25 designated areas in the province, selected according to minority population criteria. The provincial government of Ontario's website is bilingual. Residents of Ottawa, Toronto, Windsor, Sudbury and Timmins can receive services from their municipal government in the official language of their choice.
ACÉPO
The Association des conseils scolaires des écoles publiques de l'Ontario (Ontario French-language Public School Boards' Association ), or ACÉPO, is an educational organization with its headquarters on University Avenue, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. ACÉPO is an organization that represents the public secular French school boards of Ontario. French language education is a Canadian constitutional right of Francophones in Ontario. Parents who do not have that constitutional right may also register their children in French Schools by applying to an admission committee.
French language in Canada
Quebec is the only province whose sole official language is French. Today, 81.4 percent of Quebecers are first language francophones. About 95 percent of Quebecers speak French. However, many of the services the provincial government provides are available in English for the sizeable anglophone population of the province (notably in Montreal). For native French speakers, Quebec French is noticeably different in pronunciation and vocabulary from the French of France, sometimes called "Metropolitan French", but they are easily mutually intelligible in their formal varieties, and after moderate exposure, in most of their informal ones as well. The differences are primarily due to changes that have occurred in Quebec French and Parisian French since the 18th century, when Britain gained possession of Canada.
Different regions of Quebec have their own varieties: Gaspé Peninsula, Côte-Nord, Quebec City, Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean, Outaouais, and Abitibi-Témiscamingue have differences in pronunciation as well as in vocabulary. For example, depending on one's region, the ordinary word for "kettle" can be or .
Language policies of Canada's provinces and territories
At the time of Confederation in 1867, English and French were made the official languages of debate in the Parliament of Canada and the Parliament of Quebec. No specific policies were enacted for the other provinces, and no provisions were made for the official languages to be used in other elements of the government such the courts, schools, post offices, and so on. The official language policies of the provinces and territories were initially set when they were created by the federal government, or in the case of provinces that were separate colonies before joining Confederation (Newfoundland, Prince Edward Island, and British Columbia) were inherited from their own histories. Language policies in all provinces have evolved over time in response to changing demographics, public attitudes, and legal rulings.
Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages
In November 2017, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau nominated Raymond Théberge, the President and Vice-Chancellor of Université de Moncton, as the commissioner replacing Fraser. The nomination was approved in December 2017, and Théberge is the first Commissioner from Western Canada and from outside Ontario and Quebec.In 2009, Commissionner Graham Fraser created the Award of Excellence – Promotion of Linguistic Duality. The prise is given annually by the Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages to an individual or organization in Canada that is not subject to the federal "Official Languages Act" but that makes a difference by promoting linguistic duality in Canada or abroad, or by contributing to the development of official language minority communities.
Trillium grandiflorum
As an official symbol of Ontario, a stylized trillium flower features prominently in the wordmark of the Government of Ontario and on the official flag of the province's French-speaking minority. Government agencies and programs also frequently incorporate the word "trillium" in their names, such as the Trillium Gift of Life Network (organ donation management agency) and the Ontario Trillium Foundation (which provides grants to nonprofit and charitable organizations). It is also frequently used by the Canadian Heraldic Authority to represent Ontario in grants of arms. Although a network of laws make picking wildflowers illegal in the province on any Crown or provincially owned land, it is not, unlike widely believed, specifically illegal (or necessarily harmful) to pick the species in Ontario.
Section 18 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
Section 18 of the "Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms" is one of the provisions of the Constitution that addresses rights relating to Canada's two official languages, English and French. Like section 133 of the "Constitution Act, 1867", section 18 requires that all statutes and other records made by the Parliament of Canada must be available in both official languages. Section 133 places a similar obligation on the legislature of Quebec, and this is reaffirmed by section 21 of the "Charter". Section 18 of the "Charter" places a similar obligation on the legislature of New Brunswick. New Brunswick is the only officially bilingual province under section 16 of the "Charter".
Winnipeg
More than a hundred languages are spoken in Winnipeg, of which the most common is English: 99 percent of Winnipeggers are fluent English speakers, 88 percent speak only English, and 0.1 percent speak only French (Canada's other official language). 10 percent speak both English and French, while 1.3 percent speak neither. Other languages spoken as a mother tongue in Winnipeg include Tagalog (5.0%), German (2.5%), and Punjabi and Ukrainian (both 1.4%). Several Aboriginal languages are also spoken, such as Ojibwe (0.3%) and Cree (0.2%).
Canadian Senate Standing Committee on Official Languages
The Senate Standing Committee On Official languages (OLLO) is a standing committee of the Senate of Canada responsible for examining issues of Francophone culture in Canada, especially in regard to the Official Languages Act. It is mandated to study, as the Senate may decide, bills, messages, petitions, inquiries, papers and other matters relating to Canada's official languages generally.
English as a second or foreign language
Teachers teaching adult ESL in Canada in the federally funded Language Instruction to Newcomers (LINC) program must be TESL certified. Most employers in Ontario encourage certification by TESL Ontario. Often this requires completing an eight-month graduate certificate program at an accredited university or college. See the TESL Ontario or TESL Canada websites for more information.
Languages of Canada
The sign languages of Canada share extremely limited rights within the country in large due to the general population's misinformation on the subject. Ontario is the only province or territory to formally make legal any sign language, enabling the use of American Sign Language, Quebec Sign Language (LSQ) and "First Nation Sign Language" (which could refer to Plains Sign Talk or any other language) in only the domains of education, legislation and judiciary proceedings. The only other language afforded any other rights is Inuiuuk which sees interpretation in the Legislative Assembly of Nunavut. There have been efforts to make LSQ an official language of Quebec, but all efforts have failed.
Canadian identity
Most of Canada's recent prime ministers have been from Quebec, and thus have tried to improve relations with the province with a number of tactics, notably official bilingualism which required the provision of a number of services in both official languages and, among other things, required that all commercial packaging in Canada be printed in French and English. Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau's first legislative push was to implement the Royal Commission on Bilingualism within the Official languages Act in 1969. Again, while this bilingualism is a notable feature to outsiders, the plan has been less than warmly embraced by many English Canadians some of whom resent the extra administrative costs and the requirement of many key federal public servants to be fluently bilingual. Despite the widespread introduction of French-language classes throughout Canada, very few anglophones are truly bilingual outside of Quebec. Pierre Trudeau in regards to uniformity stated:
Official bilingualism in Canada
Linguistic diversity existed in northern North America long before the arrival of the French and the English. Due to the widespread trade that occurred between many linguistic communities, indigenous linguistic knowledge across northern North America appears to have consisted of bilingualism in the mother language and a pidgin as a standard. The known Pidgins included:French has been a language of government in the part of Canada that is today Quebec, with limited interruptions, since the arrival of the first French settlers in Canada in 1604 (Acadians) and in 1608 in Quebec, and has been entrenched in the Constitution of Canada since 1867. English has been a language of government in each of the provinces since their inception as British colonies.
Language policies of Canada's provinces and territories
Nova Scotia has no legal requirement to provide any services in a language other than English, which was already well-established as the official language when the province joined Confederation in 1867. However the province has an Office of Gaelic Affairs whose mission is "to work with Nova Scotians in the renewal of Gaelic language and culture in the Province" and an Office of Acadian Affairs: The province also maintains a French-language web portal, gov.ns.ca/bonjour
Franco-Ontarian
The song "Notre Place" by Paul Demers and François Dubé, long considered an unofficial anthem of the Franco-Ontarian community after it was written for a gala to celebrate the passage of the French Language Services Act in 1986, was legally designated as the community's official anthem by the Legislative Assembly of Ontario in 2017.
Charter of the French Language
The Charter of the French Language (), also known as Bill 101 ("Law 101 or "), is a 1977 law in the province of Quebec in Canada defining French, the language of the majority of the population, as the official language of the provincial government. It is the central legislative piece in Quebec's language policy.
Language policies of Canada's provinces and territories
Since that time, Quebec has used provincial law to encourage the use of French (see Charter of the French Language) at the expense of other languages, while the other provinces have begun to offer more and more services in French and in other languages besides English, including Aboriginal languages and immigrant languages. The 1982 amendments to the Constitution of Canada included a right of minority-language education that has forced policy changes in all of the provinces. Quebec is unique in requiring private businesses to use French and requiring immigrants to send their children to French-language schools. In other provinces there is no requirement that businesses use a particular language, but English predominates, and immigrants may send their children to English, French or third-language schools.
Official multilingualism
In Canada English and French have special legal status over other languages in Canada’s courts, parliament and administration. 
At the provincial level, New Brunswick is the only official bilingual province, while Quebec is the only province where French is the sole official language. The remaining provinces have English as the only official language. In practice, all provinces, including Quebec, offer some bilingual services and some education in both official languages up to the high school level. English and French are official languages in all three territories (because they are federally administered). In addition, Inuktitut is also an official language in Nunavut, and nine aboriginal languages have official status in the Northwest Territories.
Francophone Assembly of Ontario
The organization continued to lobby for the improvement of French language services in the province. It was instrumental in the adoption of the French Language Services Act in 1986, and in the creation of Ontario's three francophone colleges: Collège La Cité in Ottawa, Collège Boréal in Sudbury and the defunct Collège des Grands-Lacs in Toronto. As well, ACFO lobbied against the provincial government's planned closure of Ottawa's Montfort Hospital.
Anti-Canadianism
Quebec, whose sole official language is French since 1974, has introduced and implemented laws since the 1970s, especially with the adoption of the comprehensive Charter of the French Language Law in 1977 that limits the visibility of English on non-official signs. Commercial signs in languages other than French (especially targeting those in English) have been permitted only if French is given marked prominence in size. This law has been the subject of periodic controversy since its inception. While the architects and advocates of the Charter of the French Language Law argue that it was adopted to promote and protect the French language, critics argue that it is anti-English Canadian in its purpose by rooting out the English language from all spheres in Quebec.
Languages of Canada
For example, in Alberta, English and French are both official languages of debate in the Legislative Assembly, but laws are drafted solely in English and there is no legal requirement that they be translated into French. French can be used in some lower courts and education is offered in both languages, but the bureaucracy functions almost solely in English. Therefore, although Alberta is not officially an English-only province, English has a higher "de facto" status than French. Ontario and Manitoba are similar but allow for more services in French at the local level.
Canada
The 1977 Charter of the French Language established French as the official language of Quebec. Although more than 85 percent of French-speaking Canadians live in Quebec, there are substantial Francophone populations in New Brunswick, Alberta, and Manitoba; Ontario has the largest French-speaking population outside Quebec. New Brunswick, the only officially bilingual province, has a French-speaking Acadian minority constituting 33 percent of the population. There are also clusters of Acadians in southwestern Nova Scotia, on Cape Breton Island, and through central and western Prince Edward Island.
French language in Canada
Manitoba also has a significant Franco-Manitoban community, centred especially in the St. Boniface area of Winnipeg, but also in numerous surrounding towns. The provincial government of Manitoba boasts the only bilingual website of the Prairies; the Canadian constitution makes French an official language in Manitoba for the legislature and courts. Saskatchewan also has a Fransaskois community, as does Alberta with its Franco-Albertans, and British Columbia hosts the Franco-Columbians.
Languages of Canada
Two of Canada's territories give official status to native languages. In Nunavut, Inuktitut and Inuinnaqtun, known collectively as the Inuit Language, are official languages alongside the national languages of English and French, and Inuktitut is a common vehicular language in territorial government. In the Northwest Territories, the Official Languages Act declares that there are eleven different languages: Chipewyan, Cree, English, French, Gwich’in, Inuinnaqtun, Inuktitut, Inuvialuktun, North Slavey, South Slavey, and Tłįchǫ. Besides English and French, these languages are not vehicular in government; official status entitles citizens to receive services in them on request and to deal with the government in them.
Ontario
A political stalemate between the French- and English-speaking legislators, as well as fear of aggression from the United States during and immediately after the American Civil War, led the political elite to hold a series of conferences in the 1860s to effect a broader federal union of all British North American colonies. The "British North America Act" took effect on July 1, 1867, establishing the Dominion of Canada, initially with four provinces: Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Quebec and Ontario. The Province of Canada was divided into Ontario and Quebec so that each linguistic group would have its own province. Both Quebec and Ontario were required by section 93 of the "British North America Act" to safeguard existing educational rights and privileges of Protestant and the Catholic minority. Thus, separate Catholic schools and school boards were permitted in Ontario. However, neither province had a constitutional requirement to protect its French- or English-speaking minority. Toronto was formally established as Ontario's provincial capital.
French Language Services Act
Historically, the Franco-Ontarian community had been ignored or treated with contempt by the government of Ontario, most notably with the adoption in 1912 of Regulation 17, which forbade the use of French as a language of school instruction in Ontario. Regulation 17 was challenged in court by the activist organization ACFÉO, and was never fully implemented before its repeal in 1927. However, it was not until 1968 that the provincial government amended the "Education Act" to officially recognize the existence of French language schools in the province.
History of education in Canada
Over time, the originally Protestant school boards of English Canada, known as the public schools, became increasingly secularized as Canadians came to believe in the separation of Church and state, and the main boards became secular ones. In Ontario all overt religiosity was removed from the public school system in 1990. In two provinces the sectarian education systems have recently been eliminated through constitutional change. Newfoundland and Labrador eliminated its tri-denominational Catholic-Protestant-Pentecostal system after two referendums. In Quebec the Catholic/Protestant divide was replaced with a French language/English language one.
Official bilingualism in Canada
For example, under the terms of Ontario's 1986 "French Language Services Act", Francophones in 25 designated areas across the province—but not in other parts of the province—are guaranteed access to provincial government services in French. Similarly, since 2005, the City of Ottawa has been officially required under Ontario law, to set a municipal policy on English and French.
French language in Canada
The term Franco-Ontarian accepts two interpretations. According to the first one, it includes all French speakers of Ontario, wherever they come from. According to second one, it includes all French Canadians born in Ontario, whatever their level of French is.
Bilingualism in Ottawa
In 2003, the Ontario Liberal Party returned to power at the provincial level, and the new Premier, Dalton McGuinty, publicly stated that the city should be designated bilingual in the Act. Rather than reignite the controversy through a designation, however, the province ultimately announced amendments to the Act in 2004 (which came into force in 2005) to require the city of Ottawa to have a policy respecting its use of French and English. City council revised its bilingualism policy in 2004, offering all its municipal services in both French and English.
Northeastern Ontario
Northeastern Ontario and Northwestern Ontario may also be grouped together as Northern Ontario. An important difference between the two sub-regions is that Northeastern Ontario has a sizeable Franco-Ontarian population — approximately 25 per cent of the region's population speaks French as a first language, compared with just 3.2 per cent in the northwest. Virtually the entire region, excepting only the Manitoulin District, is designated as a French-language service area under Ontario's French Language Services Act, unlike in the northwest where only a few standalone municipalities are so designated.
Language policies of Canada's provinces and territories
The Northwest Territories Act of 1891 made English and French official languages in the rest of the Canadian West. But in 1892 the Legislature of the Northwest Territories declared itself English-only.
Official Languages Act (Canada)
In January 2017, the Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages had received 14 complaints related to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's use of English and French during public town hall meetings. Eleven of the reports came following a session in Sherbrooke, Quebec, where Trudeau, whose father had enacted the "Official Languages Act" fifty years prior, answered in French when he was asked in English to address a lack of government-provided mental health services for English-speaking persons. The remaining three were attributed to Trudeau answering in English to a question asked in French while in Peterborough, Ontario.
Timeline of official languages policy in Canada
Official languages policies, in one form or another, have been in existence since the beginning of the European colonization of North America. In the early years, French was the sole language used in France's North American colonial possessions, English had been the sole language of Britain's colonies in the New World. The First Nations continued to use their indigenous languages in their own affairs. There were a limited number of people who knew both a European and a native North American language, often Christian missionaries the “black robes” and the children of natives they ministered to. These bilinguals were called on in diplomacy, but otherwise the linguistic worlds of the settlers and the natives were largely separate. Without being fluent, natives and settlers often learned very rudimentary forms of each other's languages called “pidgins”. Pidgins, such as the Algonquian–Basque pidgin, Labrador Inuit Pidgin French, American Indian Pidgin English, and Pidgin Delaware were initially important languages of trade and diplomacy, but none of them was ever prestigious enough to be used in any other governmental context.
Constitution Act, 1867
Although the 1867 "Act" did not establish English and French as Canada's official languages, it did provide some rights for the users of both languages in respect of some institutions of the federal and Quebec governments.
Section 21 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
Section 21 of the "Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms" is one of several sections of the "Charter" relating to the official languages of Canada. The official languages, under section 16 of the "Charter", are English and French. Sections 16 to 20 guarantee a number of rights in regard to the use of these languages in the federal and New Brunswick courts and other government institutions. Thus, section 21 clarifies that language rights regarding English and French in the Constitution of Canada, outside the "Charter", remain valid and are not limited by the language rights within the "Charter".
Education in Ontario
Article 28 and 29 mandate free, compulsory primary education, including:Ontario operates four publicly funded school systems: An English-language public school system, a French-language public school system, an English- language separate school system and a French-language separate school system. The public school system was originally Protestant but is now secular. The Separate School system is Roman Catholic (open to students of all faiths at secondary level, they have the option of refusing non-Catholics at the elementary level) with the exception of the Penetanguishene Protestant Separate School Board which runs a single Protestant school.