Liberal MP apologizes for calling witnesses on language committee ‘extremists’ and ‘full of s—’

Franco-Ontarian MP Francis Drouin apologized on Thursday for describing witnesses three days earlier as “extremists” and “full of s—.”

“Any witness who comes before this committee should feel free to have a conversation in a respectful environment. I didn’t do that on Monday, so I apologize again to Bourdon and Lacroix,” said Drouin at a meeting of the standing committee on official languages.

At the previous meeting on Monday, the MP for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell took vulgar exception to the comments made by researcher Frédéric Lacroix and CEGEP professor Nicolas Bourdon.

The MP withdrew his comments immediately after making them. He has since repeated that he would “of course” apologize “if the two witnesses feel offended.”

The two witnesses had explained, based on Statistics Canada data, that when a francophone or allophone attends an English-language university or CEGEP, this significantly increases the likelihood that he or she will subsequently lead his or her life in English.

The witnesses had been invited to speak to parliamentarians as part of a study into financing English-language post-secondary institutions in Quebec and French-language institutions elsewhere in the country.

–This report by La Presse Canadienne was translated by CityNews