Caught in the midst of a linguistic storm, the Canadian National (CN) reiterated its intention to recruit a French-speaking administrator, but members of senior management did not comment on headlines reporting dissatisfaction with French -speaking company employees, at their annual meeting on Friday.
The rail carrier, whose headquarters are located in Montreal, has begun a process to find a French-speaking director on its board of directors, said its chief legal officer, Sean Finn. We plan to dedicate this person in the coming months.he said.
Former Quebec premier Jean Charest was appointed to the council of NC in January, but left office less than two months later to enter the Conservative Party of Canada leadership career.
If the language composition of the Board does not reflect the diversity of the Montreal and Canadian populations, the outgoing Chairman of the Board of Directors, Robert Pace, underlined the diversity of directors in other aspects. Half of our independent directors come from a diversity community and we exceed the gender equality benchmark.
In French, Mr. Finn said that the NC respects his heritage in Montreal. The head office of NC has been located in Montreal for over 100 years and the board, itself, respects the company’s rich history in Quebec where the official language is French and takes great pride in it..
Unconvinced critics
However, this respect was not felt by French -language advocacy groups and by French -speaking employees, who confessed to the media.
The Saint-Jean-Baptiste Society of Montreal deposited, on Friday, a statue with a lemon effigy in front of the company’s headquarters to denounce the absence of Francophones on the board of directors. The common and working language in Quebec is French and its total absence within the highest decision -making field of NC showing contempt for francophonessaid its president Marie-Anne Alepin.
The absence of French -speaking administrators created waves all the way to Ottawa, where Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he blown away in the situation, last April. The carrier was also summoned before the Standing Committee on Official Languages.
Many French-speaking employees and former employees also expressed their dissatisfaction with the company’s language practices on a daily basis. The Press. Although the company claims revise with its language skills, a French-speaking administrator in Edmonton will be forced to provide explanations for requesting French communications, according to a message obtained by the daily.
Company spokesman Jonathan Abecassis in Montreal said the daily NC initiated an internal review of its official language skills.
President and CEO Tracy Robinson declined the interview request. When announcing her appointment in January, Ms. Robinson to study French. During the meeting, he gave the first minute of his speech in French and spoke in Molière’s language for another segment of approximately thirty seconds.
Supply chain
At the end of April, the NC has lowered its forecast for the year 2022 due to poor logistical conditions. There was a big shock in the supply chain. And we work hard to get our groove backsaid Ms. Robinson to financial analysts in late April.
At the meeting, Ms. Robinson that the company should show up flexibility to manage supply chain challenges. He said he would give great importance to communicating with customers.
Some customers of NC was affected by supply chain disruptions. This was the case of Resolute Forest Products, which reported in early May that the company’s wagons had become less available in recent months in the Lac-Saint-Jean region.
The way it displays at home is a significant increase in our lumber inventoriesexplained its president and CEO, Rémi Lalonde, in an interview with The Canadian Press. Our inventories nearly doubled in the first three months of the year quarter to $ 43 million for finished lumber products.
The action of NCwhich did not announce financial results on the day of its meeting, gained 27 cents, or 0.19%, to $ 142.37 on the Toronto Stock Exchange around noon.
Source: Radio-Canada
