Radio-Canada's Count Puts Nearly 55% French in Carney's Quebec Speeches
Radio-Canada's new analysis puts Mark Carney's French at nearly 55 per cent of the time across his speeches in Quebec over the past 12 months. That comes from a different slice of his speaking than the outlet's earlier count, which covered his addresses from April 29 to Sept. 14, 2025 and found French used 17 per cent of the time.
The Prime Minister's Office now sets targets for French content depending on where Carney is located, in Canada or abroad, sources told Radio-Canada. A University of Ottawa professor's verdict on the numbers: the proportion should be higher. A bar that moves with the venue is a curious thing to grade against, since it may describe the audience as much as the speaker.
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Location-based targets make French sound less like one standard and more like a rate card, with the same prime minister graded on a different curve depending on which province he is standing in.
Different rooms having different expectations is arguably just realism about who is listening, and the complaint that the share should be higher lands on the whole, not on this or that venue.