It sadly comes as no surprise to learn that people with foreign-sounding names have significantly less chance of getting even a job interview, never mind the job, than those with typically Québécois monikers.
A study released this week by the Quebec Human Rights and Youth Rights Commission found that Quebecers with “Québécois-de-souche” names such as Tremblay or Bouchard are 64 per cent more likely to get invited to a job interview than those with names like Traoré or Ben Amin, even if their qualifications are identical.
Over a recent six-month period, a researcher applied for just short of 600 offered jobs under false names. Half the names had a foreign ring and the rest sounded typically Québécois. In both cases, equivalent qualifications were offered in the applications, and all said the applicant had been educated in Quebec. But where 40 per cent of candidates with the homegrown aliases were offered job interviews, only 22.5 per cent of those with ethnic-sounding names were invited.
Applications from persons with names that sounded of African origin were the most likely to be overlooked, followed by those of Arabic origin and to a lesser extent Hispanic. As such, the commission rightly concluded that it demonstrates a prevailing bias against ethnic minorities in the Quebec job market that has nothing to do with an individual’s qualifications.
If the result was not surprising, it is because ethnic bias against immigrants is suggested by provincial employment figures. Most recent available numbers show that 11.1 per cent of newcomers to Quebec were unemployed in 2008 as opposed to 6.6 per cent of people born in the province. It should be recognized that such bias is not confined to Quebec, but it is markedly more prevalent here than in some other parts of the country. Where the employment gap between immigrants and non-immigrants is 4.5 percentage points in Quebec, it is only 1.4 percentage points in neighbouring Ontario and a comparatively minuscule 0.4 in British Columbia.
This is understandable to some degree, if not excusable. Francophone Quebecers tend to regard themselves as a culturally threatened minority and are more concerned with the preservation of their collective identity than anglophone Canadians. And until fairly recently, barely a few decades ago, French Quebec was very much a closed society that resisted accommodating newcomers. Certainly much more than English-Canadian society, which harboured its own prejudices, but integrated immigrants more readily.
It is something Quebec is having to learn to do, not so much out of human kindness as out of necessity. Legal sanctions against job-market discrimination have been suggested by rights advocates, but these would be difficult and costly to apply. What would be more effective in the long run, even if it takes longer to come about, is an evolution of attitudes toward newcomers, particularly visible-minority immigrants, based not just on decency, but recognition of self-interest.
The hard fact, as the latest census figures show, is that Quebec’s population growth is becoming increasingly driven by and dependent on immigration. It is in the old-stock society’s self-interest that these newcomers be readily accepted into workplaces so that they become contributors to the provincial economy and the provincial treasury, which is increasingly being strained by the growing needs of an aging old-stock population in retirement.
Happily, there are some bright spots in the picture that the study presents. One is that it found the public sector equally receptive to at least granting minority candidates job interviews as to those with francophone names. This is encouraging since ethnic minorities have been chronically under-represented in Quebec’s public service, and the public sector should rightly be setting an example for the rest.
As well, it found immigrants have a better chance of landing jobs outside the Montreal area where francophone society has traditionally been more close-knit than in the metropolis. This is perhaps because the Montreal job market is overly saturated, but it also suggests that need for workers can overcome inherent ethnic bias.
The recognition of it may be slow in coming, but the need is there for equal workplace opportunity for all Quebecers, no matter what the colour of their skin or the sound of their name.