NEWS FROM THE SECRETARIAT OF THE BLACK COMMUNITY FORUM (BCF)
We welcome the sound of the announcements in the media,
“Hey Quebec anglophones: the province wants you to apply for civil service jobs”,
but a long-term plan with support for community based collaborating organizations is needed.
The Secretariat of the Black Community Forum considers this to be great news, but is skeptical about the gains to the employment and employability of English speaking Blacks. At a meeting with William Floch , Secrétaire adjoint Ministère du Conseil exécutif Secrétariat aux relations avec les Québécois d’expression anglaise, held at 6767 Cote des Neiges Road, ten member organization of the BCF requested that the Government of Quebec work with the BCRC and the BCF to stop the brain drain of Black English speaking graduates from the Province and the community. The Black Community Resource Center has asked the Secretariat to increase resources to the the Black English speaking organizations with long standing track records, All organizations at the meeting vigorously supported the demand as essential to improving their capacity to work effectively with the Government on this and other development plans for the Black communities. In effect, the BCF organizations have been making these demands consistently and persistently since 1992 (Val Morin Forum 1992). It has intensified these demands over the years 2016-2018 with very little direct response from the Provincial government or Quebec parties. There can be no question that this announcement and its almost impossible deadline makes it essentially an election promise rather than an attempt to solve or rectify the systemic exclusion of Black English speaking job seekers and other non-French minorities from the Government employment. It is therefore to the broader long term plan announced by the Government to deal with growing labour shortage in the Province that we must turn our attention.
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