Rethinking arts and media funding – A new vision for Canada: Peter Menzies
After a decade of shaming and denigrating Canada, we have a chance to re-instill nationwide pride in the history and purpose of Canada.
It has been 75 years since the Massey Commission wrote the guidebook for Canada’s cultural policies.
Back then, 29 per cent of Canadians spoke French as their mother tongue. Overall, 32 per cent could speak French, despite it not being recognized as an official language. Slightly more than 59 per cent of Canadians spoke English as their mother tongue. Today, only 20 per cent claim French as their mother tongue while slightly less than 57 per cent claim English as their heritage language. Both of these numbers have been in decline since 1986, while the number of Canadians who speak neither official language has grown to close to one in eight, or 12.7 per cent. That’s 4.6 million people.
When the Massey Commission was doing its work, there were only 13.7 million people in Canada. There were fewer than a million in Alberta, where the Leduc oil fields had just been discovered, and the entire population of Ontario – 4.6 million people – would have fit comfortably into today’s Greater Toronto Area (GTA), where 6.7 million people currently reside.