Bookworm wrote: ↑Fri Oct 05, 2018 10:32 amI don't want an "English only" language dictum, similar to what they do in Quebec and French. I simply want 'All official government communications are to be in English'. Basically, stop having to provide free translations for everyone who has been here for years and doesn't see a reason to learn English.
Well, that's not quite true... All government services are given in both languages (English and French), and people are allowed to put bilingual signs (of whatever language) on their stores, walls, whatever, as long as the French portion is the predominant one. (Although the law actually goes as far as to state how much more prominent the French portion is to be, I think, which may be taking it a bit far...) But as far as private businesses, you are more likely to encounter people speaking English in larger centers, like Montreal. The farther you go into the countryside, the less likely you are to find people who speak English, and the more "degraded" their English risks being...
Bookworm wrote: ↑Fri Oct 05, 2018 10:32 amOne of the immigrant groups decided to help their older folks, got the money together, paid for the signs, and paid for them to put them in. The original English signs are fully intact, and are what the city maintains. (This is different from Quebec, where those sons-of-.. pulled down all the English signs in the early 90's, despite them being mandated by law at the time. Luckily I knew French. Very much not tourist friendly, when you're talking about Hull, across the river from Ottawa - the capital)
Indeed, all our road signs are now in French. Except in a few spots, where no one seems to have noticed the "Stop" signs, instead of the "Arrêt" that have replaced most of them. I have heard of cases in the news, over the years, where complaints were made to the Office de la Langue Française (essentially the French Language Police...) when someone would spot signs in English, or signs where the French was not predominant, and whoever had those signs were forced to modify or change them!
Growing up, we were so used to seeing both languages on some signs, that we actually called stop signs "Arrêt-Stop", while speaking in French. (As in: "
Tu vas jusqu'à l'Arrêt-Stop, puis tu tourne à gauche." - "You go to the Arrêt-Stop sign, then you turn left.")