A/HRC/13/23/Add.2 83. Elections Canada has specific initiatives to promote minority participation including multilanguage advertising and information campaigns in over 25 languages; website-based voter information; targeted information communications (made available to 573 ethnocultural associations); and community relations officers to disseminate voter information to ethno-cultural communities. VII. Conclusions and recommendations of the independent expert 84. Canada is rightly proud of its richly diverse society including citizens with many ethnic backgrounds, numerous languages, religions and cultural practices. Many identify themselves as African or black Canadians, Arab and Asian Canadians, people of colour and religious minorities. Persons belonging to minorities generally described Canada as a society where they can express their identities, speak their languages and practise their faiths freely and without hindrance. Canada has an impressive constitutional and legislative framework at the federal, provincial and territorial levels that requires adherence to the core principles of equality and nondiscrimination for all. Canada was a leader in fashioning a State policy of multiculturalism and has invested considerable resources into meeting the expectations of its Constitution and legislation. 85. Achieving a truly inclusive society requires constant vigilance. Significant and persistent problems face individuals and communities belonging to certain ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities. Many of those consulted believe that federal, provincial and territorial governments have not adequately implemented the impressive legislative and policy framework that exists. They have failed to respond adequately to their problems or to devise meaningful and enforceable solutions, leaving them and their communities feeling discriminated against and neglected. The following recommendations are proposed. Take robust actions to achieve equality in employment 86. At all levels of Government and within the work of all relevant ministries it is essential that efforts to fully implement non-discrimination and equality guarantees be intensified. Appropriate penalties should be applied to those entities that fail to fully comply with standards for non-discrimination and equality as measured by a “results test”. Where current best efforts fail to achieve the equality objectives, robust affirmative action programmes should be implemented. 87. Federal, provincial and territorial Governments have useful legislation and policies in the field of employment equity. However there is a substantial implementation gap. Standards and requirements must be better enforced and penalties must be imposed to ensure that Canada’s workplaces, both public and private, truly reflect the diversity present in society and live up to the promise of equality. 88. Government must lead by example with robust efforts and measurable achievements in recruiting, retaining and promoting minorities to senior roles in the public service, ministries and departments. Government workplaces should be examples of enabling environments for the advancement of minorities. In this respect, the Perinbam Task Force on the Participation of Visible Minorities in the Federal Public Service established by the federal Government in 2000 provided a valuable action plan and recommendations that remain extremely relevant today. A decade later, its objectives remain unfulfilled. Those recommendations should be implemented fully at both federal and provincial or territorial levels. GE.10-11860 19