Ex-minister Dominic Cardy says he worries about future of French in N.B. schools

FREDERICTON -

Dominic Cardy says he resigned as Blaine Higgs's education minister because the New Brunswick premier's policy on the French immersion program in schools is damaging to anglophone children.

Cardy, who issued a blistering resignation letter calling out Higgs's leadership style and values, said in an interview on Friday that he couldn't accept the premier's desire to "dangerously accelerate" the end of French immersion in schools across the province.

"My concern is over the efforts by the premier to create political pressure to accelerate a reform in French-language instruction -- way, way beyond what the system says is possible or is going to work," he said.

"So I think that the biggest risk is, sadly, that the system will end up by staying closer to the way it is today because efforts of political interference will just cause political controversy."

Higgs, however, says he told Cardy to have the reform ready for next fall but that the ex-minister wanted to push it to 2024 -- an election year.

"Well, we all know that in an election year, if you think you're going to implement something significant -- it's not going to happen," the premier told reporters Thursday.

On Friday, Higgs responded to the former education minister with a letter of his own.

"This letter is to inform you that the Progressive Conservative caucus supported my recommendation to expel you," Higgs wrote to Cardy. "As a group we found your conduct and your actions, most notably, over the last few days to be inexcusable."

In his resignation letter, Cardy accused Higgs of wanting to take a "wrecking ball" to the education system and that the premier was steadily consolidating power over the past 14 months. Higgs, he continued, created a disrespectful work atmosphere for public servants and delayed or undermined work on reconciliation with cultural communities and First Nations.

Shortly after Cardy published his resignation letter, Higgs made a cabinet shuffle. He replaced Cardy in the education portfolio with former public safety minister Bill Hogan and named Kris Austin at the Public Safety Department.

Cardy on Friday questioned Higgs's decision to name Austin, the former leader of the now-deregistered People's Alliance of New Brunswick, which had been vocally opposed to certain bilingualism requirements in the province.

"I think that kind of speaks for itself," Cardy said, "given Mr. Austin's past comments on bilingualism and other subjects; you can see the reaction of francophone New Brunswickers since that announcement."

Judy Desalliers, spokeswoman for the Ministry of Public Safety, said Austin was unavailable for an interview.

Austin's appointment was denounced Friday by the Societe de l'Acadie du Nouveau-Brunswick, which accused him of having an "anti-francophone bias."

"Well, as an Acadian community we see an individual like Austin, who is now a cabinet minister, someone who was explicitly against the individual and collective rights of our community," said Alexandre Cedric Doucet, the organization's president.

"We're pretty pissed off. It (shows) lack of respect to our community, and right now the government is a mess."

Doucet called Cardy -- who speaks French -- an ally, and he said the francophone society's relationship with the government was "good yesterday and Tuesday."

"But now, I don't know."

Cardy said the Education Department did some "great things" while he was minister and called his successor, Hogan, a "strong and principled man."

Austin, however, comes with "some baggage," Cardy said.

"We're still waiting for the premier's office to respond to the reports recommending revisions to the Official Languages Act. And I think the francophone New Brunswickers look with concern at that delay."

When asked if he would have accepted another cabinet position, Cardy said education is his passion and he didn't want any other portfolio. It's not a question about portfolios but about leadership style, he said.

"There's no other file that I felt that I could make the sort of difference that I could in education," he said.

"And again, the same problems around a lack of evidence-based decision-making that I ran into with the premier in education -- it was pretty clear I would run into those in other departments as well."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 14, 2022.