Thank you for inviting us to appear before you today. I am here in my capacity as Director of the Santé en français au Nunavut network, but also as a representative of the Association des francophones du Nunavut. It is in the latter capacity that I making the presentation, because Mr. Belleau, the President of the Association, could not be here today.
We have prepared a PowerPoint presentation that deals with the main points, which I will now summarize.
In a 2 million square kilometre area there are just over 30,000 people, including 24,000 Inuit, 5,000 anglophones and 1,000 francophones. Like all of the North, this is a rich land: rich in oil, diamonds, gold, iron and uranium. However, in terms of the human development indicators, Canada ranks 5th in the world, and Nunavut 77th. That is no surprise given that the rate of tuberculosis is 10 times higher in Nunavut than in Canada and the percentage of students who graduate from grade 12 is only 35%. We do not expect to rank first in the world. So we have a lot of catching up to do in social and economic terms in Nunavut.
Nevertheless, government economic and social policy in Nunavut and the values and principles of development have been well established. They have been set out in a document entitled Pinasuaqtavut. These policies seek to improve living and working conditions in a situation where only 65% of the positions in the public service have been staffed. That means many positions are vacant. In addition, the unemployment rate among the Inuit is 30%, compared to 3% for the non-Inuit population.
The Pinasuaqtavut talks about five basic policy thrusts: healthy communities physically, socially and economically; unity and simplicity, in other words easy access to the government and to social programs; emphasis on autonomy, that is a concerted effort on the part of communities and the government to take care of people, particularly those in need; life-long learning so that all the Nunavummiut can achieve their full potential; and, finally, the introduction of the Inuit language as the language of the public service by 2020. This is a major issue for us.
Among francophones, most of whom live in Iqaluit, the political capital, the level education is high, as is job mobility. People stay on average about three years, and the unemployment rate is virtually zero. The emerging reality is one involving Inuit-francophone exogamous families. As a result, francophones in Nunavut are establishing some roots there and developing more and more cultural networks.
This year, 2007, is crucial for francophones in several regards: intense legislative activity within the Government of Nunavut, many administrative initiatives to provide service for francophones and possible significant progress on community projects. This includes three main areas of activity. This information was taken from the Overall Development Plan of the Association des francophones du Nunavut and the most recent decisions made at its general meeting, as well as a number of presentations made to interdepartmental committees in Ottawa.
Let us now turn to education and the management of our schools. We hope to add grade 10 to 12 to our high school education in French. At the moment, education in French is available from kindergarten to grade 9. We also hope that francophones will have full control of their school under the new education act which is currently being drafted. This is a key period in education for francophones.
I turn now to the official languages and the services that are well established. Two bills on the official languages in Nunavut are being tabled at the moment. One has to do with the protection and promotion of the Inuit language, and the other is on the official languages. This bill will eliminate the anachronism that occurred because Nunavut inherited the Northwest Territories official languages legislation when the territory was divided. Consequently, this updated legislation will be extremely important, because legal issues for francophones will arise, and in fact have already arisen.
As a corollary to this legislative decision, the Premier of Nunavut recently announced the establishment of a bipartite committee made up of government representatives and of the Association des francophones du Nunavut to report on services for francophones and to set the priorities and determine what needs to be done. At its general meeting, the Association voted to continue its efforts to get better front-line, high-quality services in French.
The issue of health services is well documented. There is a report in French, English and Inuktitut, which we will leave with you as a reference tool. The report is entitled Des services de santé en français dans un nord en mutation. Un défi intercommunautaire.
Why talk about intercommunity challenge? In a context of great poverty, the fact that francophones are demanding that a greater number of services be established and developed might appear selfish or like a grab for a larger share of the common good. We use the word “intercommunity” because francophone development has to go hand in hand with that of the other Nunavut communities. That is the challenge we have to meet if we want to be credible and achieve our objectives.
The last issue is the establishment of a carrefour de la francophonie, a new community centre that would allow us to merge existing Nunavut associations, organizations and institutions and increase their effectiveness tenfold. All documents will be available after the meeting.
Thank you for your attention.