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Bilingualism came to (Justin Trudeau) as a gift, with no effort. How lucky is that? In this country: very very very very very lucky.

But wait! Is Russell Brown fluently bilingual? The announcement by the PM did not specify. According to present requirements, it is considered desirable, but so far not absolutely necessary. For justices not up to snuff in either of the two official languages, courses are made available, and most justices end with a certain amount of fluency. All documents and official arguments are aided by translation of the highest quality, it should go without saying.

That is not good enough for Liberal leader Justin Trudeau, who has recently laid out his position, which is complete bilingualism as a prerequisite for appointment to the SCC. In a Global interview, Trudeau reasons thus:

It’s not just a question of symbolism of being a bilingual country and expecting that our prime minister and our most important adjudicators and judges be bilingual. It’s more than that. Imagine a situation in which those nine judges are in their chambers discussing a case as regularly happens, the fact is that if all of them are to be able to understand each other in their desired mother tongue, they have to be able to follow along that conversation without having to have the inference of translation and all that. I understand deeply how much when you’re in a room where everyone speaks English but nobody or only a few people speak French, how the French speakers end up having to use their second language and can be at a disadvantage. And we want to make sure that the message of Canada being a country in which French and English are truly the official equal languages that anyone can be reassured that all the arguments will be properly understood by everyone on the Supreme Court.

Never in my writing career have I found greater inspiration for the old cliché: “Easy for you to say!” And not only easy for Justin Trudeau to say, but to say with complete fluency in both official languages. And you know why? Because Justin was born with the linguistic equivalent of a silver spoon in his mouth (though he got that other one, too). Justin was raised by an anglophone mother and a father raised in a fully bilingual and indeed bicultural home. Bilingualism came to him as a gift, with no effort. How lucky is that? In this country: very very very very very lucky.

It means that Justin, without lifting his little finger, has always found easy entry into situations that – along with his name – permit him to leapfrog over thousands of Canadians who, linguistically unlucky in their geography and/or parentage, can’t even break out of the starting gate – for example, in getting civil-service jobs in Ottawa, let alone aspiring to leadership of a federal political party.