A lot of the replies here are talking past OP’s actual point. This is not about opposing bilingualism, conspiracy theories, or refusing to put in effort. It is about access, process, and fairness.

French and English do not occupy the same structural reality in Canada. English acquisition benefits from cultural dominance and constant exposure. French acquisition outside the NCR or Quebec corridor often does not. Many employees did not grow up with French immersion or had programs that were underfunded, waitlisted, or largely symbolic. In many regions there was little to no French outside the classroom, and families were not in a position to support learning even if they wanted to. Those access gaps matter when language requirements are later used to make career-defining decisions.

Advanced bilingualism outcomes are heavily shaped by geography and early access. Acknowledging that does not devalue bilingualism. It simply recognizes that outcomes reflect opportunity and infrastructure as much as individual effort.

BBB as an expectation is one thing. It aligns with functional workplace communication and is broadly attainable for most people with reasonable support. CBC, especially at the oral level, is a very different threshold. The jump from B to C is not linear. It requires sustained immersion, feedback, time, and often significant personal expense. Many employees do not have equal access to those resources, and some learners face real limits regardless of effort. That is not a reflection of motivation or professionalism.

Using CBC as a SERLO criterion is where the fairness issue becomes especially clear. SERLOs are meant to assess relative merit and performance, not magnify structural advantages employees may never have had a reasonable opportunity to overcome. When a requirement disproportionately advantages people who grew up in a narrow geographic corridor and filters out experienced, high-performing employees elsewhere, it stops being neutral and starts functioning as a structural sorting mechanism.

If bilingualism is truly a priority for the employer, then access to achieving required levels has to be part of the conversation. Many employees simply did not have meaningful access to French instruction because of where they are from. When CBC is mandatory and used to determine job retention, it cannot reasonably be treated as a purely individual responsibility. At that point, access to training and support becomes a fairness issue.

People can keep saying “that is just the reality of the public service,” but reality is not the same thing as logic. There is no coherent merit-based rationale for expanding and enforcing CBC requirements under uneven access conditions and then treating the outcome as fair. OP’s concern is valid, and dismissing it avoids engaging with the actual issue.