Canadian French Canadian French Canadian French () refers to a variety of dialects of the French language generally spoken in Canada. In 2011, the total number of native French speakers in Canada was around 7.3 million (22% of the entire population), while another 2 million spoke it as a second language. At the federal level, it has official status alongside English. At the provincial level, French is the sole official language of Quebec as well as one of two official languages of New Brunswick, and jointly official (derived from its federal legal status) in Nunavut, Yukon, and the Northwest Territories. Government services
Section 16 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms itself to be officially bilingual, New Brunswick is the only province to have its bilingualism guaranteed by section 16. When Manitoba's laws declaring English to be the only official language of the province were found to be invalid in "Re Manitoba Language Rights" (1985), this was due to its contradictions with the "Manitoba Act". Subsection 16(3) provides that a Parliament or provincial government may strive for progress in official bilingualism. This reflects a 1975 court decision, "Jones v. Attorney General of New Brunswick", in which it was found governments may do this. Thus, the Supreme Court in "Société des Acadiens"