Bilingual public services and public service workplaces - like bilingual road signs - are business as usual around the world.
In Canada, here's what the government says to public servants about their official languages:
"Why not take full advantage of your language rights and encourage others to do so as well? We can create a dynamic and respectful bilingual workplace where we all feel included and free to express ourselves in the official language of our choice.
The employer provides, in your preferred official language:
- work tools (such as manuals, handbooks, documentation needed to deliver services to the public or to employees) and electronic systems
training and professional development
- personnel and central services such as pay and benefits, finance, administration, security, computer services, staffing and classification, health care services. (Did you know that you can choose the official language set-up of your computer?).
The employer also provides:
- supervision in the official language of your choice if you are in a bilingual position
- means to ensure meetings are bilingual and
- A management team that communicates effectively in both official languages with its employees, and provides leadership in creating and maintaining a work environment conducive to the effective use of both official languages.
- If you compete for a position in a department, you have the right to do so in the official language of your choice, regardless of the language requirements of the position.
The public's rights first:
Although you have the right to work in the official language of your choice, the public's right to be served in the official language of their choice comes first." https://lnkd.in/guz-TKSz
In Wales, agencies have a duty not to treat Welsh any less favourably than English and they all have language skills strategies to ensure public servants can deliver services bilingually. https://lnkd.in/gg-VZzxk
Director, Indigenous Language Policy Taskforce, Office of the Arts
4moThanks for sharing Britt!!