From 2016 to 2021, the number of Canadians whose first official language spoken is French rose from 7.7 million to 7.8 million, an increase of 1.6% over five years.
However, this growth is lower than that of the Canadian population, which stands at 5.2%. The weight of French has therefore diminished in Canada. The proportion of Canadians for whom it is the first official language spoken has actually decreased, from 22.2% in 2016 to 21.4% in 2021.
This downward trend is not new. Since 1971, the first census year for which information was collected on the first official language spoken, the demographic weight of French in Canada has been declining. That year, French was the first official language spoken by 27.2% of Canadians.
« Most of the indicators of the evolution of French in Canada follow this same trend: increase in absolute numbers and decrease as a percentage of the population, the number of speakers of other languages increasing proportionally more quickly. »
And Quebec is no exception. While the number of people using French has increased there, from 6.4 million to 6.5 million, their demographic weight has also decreased, from 79% to 77.5%.
This downward trend has been observed since 2001 in Quebec, according to Statistics Canada.
The data also show that the proportion of people whose first official language spoken is French has fallen in all regions of Quebec, except Gaspésie–Îles-de-la-Madeleine. The decline is more marked in Nord-du-Québec (-3.6 percentage points), Laval (-3 percentage points), Montreal (-2.4 percentage points) and Outaouais (-2.4 percentage points).
The number of people for whom English is the first official language spoken also passed the milestone of one million speakers in Quebec for the first time in the census. The proportion of the population that these speakers represent has increased from 12% in 2016 to 13% in 2021.
Of these speakers, more than 7 out of 10 were in Montreal or Montérégie.
In general, Statistics Canada explains this growth by the fact that English speakers are on average younger and therefore have a lower death rate. Migration, particularly from other provinces, also has an impact, the report notes.
The census release comes as Quebec steps up its efforts to protect French in the province, its latest language law passed this year restricting the use of English in government services.
In 2021, Statistics Canada counted 189,000 people with at least one Indigenous mother tongue and 183,000 who speak one at home at least regularly. The Cree languages and Inuktitut are the main Aboriginal languages spoken in Canada.
English, language of choice for immigrants
Conversely, the weight of English as the first official language spoken has been increasing across Canada since 1971. From 2016 to 2021, it rose from 74.8% to 75.5%.
« As in the past, immigration has contributed to this trend, since it is towards English that a majority of immigrants turn after their arrival in the country. »
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In addition, the number of Canadians who speak a language other than English or French predominantly at home is also on the rise, from 4 million in 2016 to 4.6 million in 2021.
These people represent 12.7% of the Canadian population, a proportion that has been increasing for 30 years; it was 7.7% in 1991, when immigration levels were increasing.
Apart from French and English, Mandarin and Punjabi were the most widely spoken languages in the country in 2021. The languages that experienced the strongest growth spurt between 2016 and 2021 are those native to South Asia, including Punjabi.