Thank you.
Good afternoon.
[Witness spoke in Dakelh]
Today I want to share at least one indigenous language that comes from this continent, a language that belongs to my people. It's a Dene language. We call ourselves Dakelh. We come from the northern part of British Columbia in the west. We share that language with other Athabaskan Dene-speaking people in Alaska, the Yukon and the Northwest Territories; in the northern parts of all the provinces pretty much over to Manitoba; south to northern California, southern Oregon, with the Hoopa and the Yurok; and the southwest United States, with the Apache and Navajo. We share that same language family.
What I said is that this is a very big issue that we're talking about, the status of our languages. We have come before you to speak about it in the hopes that you will listen and help us with our languages. There's a plea in our hearts to you to reach out, as this country of Canada, to hold up our people with dignity and honour, and the well-being that we have, for the survival of our languages, as the original languages of this great land.
I am an elected member of the First Nations Summit executive, and have been for 30 years. I know both Cathy and Gordie Hogg—Gordie Hogg in particular, as a member of the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia. He and I shared the same Ministry of Children and Family Development as ministers.
The number of children in care.... Those children in care who are indigenous, even though it's recognized in the legislation that their cultural heritage is to be protected, there is no way the Government of British Columbia can provide the services for them to retain or learn their languages, even though it's a legislative requirement. So we can't fool ourselves simply because there's a legislative requirement that it will be done.
The resources, the planning.... I really appreciate the two ladies who were witnesses here before I was, and their presentations. They're dealing with these issues in our communities on the ground.
For me, I wanted to say that I'm hoping this bill is approved in this Parliament, that it's made into law. It has been long-awaited, as we said. I certainly support the tone and the direction of this bill. Our languages are in a very serious situation, so this bill is both welcome and urgent. This Parliament should not go into an election before this bill is approved, both in this House and in the Senate.
I wanted to acknowledge the Algonquin people on whose ancestral homelands we meet.
I wanted to say thank you to you, members of the committee, for the invitation. I think this is a pivotal year. The United Nations has declared this year the International Year of Indigenous Languages globally. There are 370 million indigenous peoples. Out of the 7,500 languages, some 4,000 are indigenous languages, and many of them are endangered. But there are others whose languages are doing relatively well.
On January 28, in Paris, UNESCO officially launched the International Year of Indigenous Languages. UNESCO has been given the mandate by the General Assembly to convene the year and to develop and implement plans in support of indigenous languages. That launch was on January 28 in Paris. UNESCO has established a steering committee of 14 members, including seven indigenous members from across the globe. I am one of the seven, from the North America region. I'm also the co-chair of the steering committee charged with the responsibility for the international year.
On February 1, the president of the General Assembly, Madam Espinosa, convened a one-day session of the General Assembly for state parties and indigenous peoples to speak to the issue of indigenous languages globally.
For example, the representative of the Government of Paraguay stated that Spanish and Guarani are official languages in that country, and that some 85% of all of the population speak Guarani—the indigenous language. To me, it was astounding to hear that there would be such a large uptake of learning, speaking and using Guarani as a language. It speaks to the political will of the country, the political will of the state to address this particular issue.
The presentation that was made by the First Peoples' Cultural Council is a submission that I certainly support. Our organization has been in close collaboration with the First Peoples' Cultural Council and the First Peoples' Cultural Foundation. We have to say thank you to the Government of British Columbia for setting aside some $50 million, which has been transferred to the First Peoples' Cultural Foundation to hold for the development, support and revitalization of indigenous languages.
That resource is fundamentally important. There is a drawback, though. Communities that require funding have to submit proposals on a year-to-year basis to be funded. I think a better approach to funding language development is to fund directly to the communities. The federal government already has a long pattern of working with communities and providing funding directly to the communities to provide services in education, in K to 12 as well as in post-secondary. Resources should be put directly into the communities for the communities to be able work and establish priorities. That is essentially one fundamental requirement that I see as important and should be reflected in commitments in the bill.
I provided a copy of my presentation to the clerk of this committee. I'm not sure whether you have received it, but I'm expecting that you have it or will soon have it. It was submitted yesterday.
I am a product of the residential schools era. As young children of four, five, six and seven, we were taken from our communities and sent to English immersion schools. You can call them residential schools, because essentially the language of instruction and communications in those institutions was English. In other cases, maybe in Quebec, it was French. In the province where I come from it was all English. We were not allowed to speak our own languages. Certainly, there was no way to learn our languages in these institutions.
We now see the intergenerational impact of that. In the three communities that I come from, those who are fluent in the language would be those who are elderly, from the age of 50 onward. They are making efforts for the young people to learn their language. In my three communities, we counted probably 65 people who can speak the language to various degrees of fluency. We think we're lucky because we have that small foundation to work from.
We developed a plan in our nation that the first priority for us now is going to be revitalizing our languages with our cultures and our traditions. We have something to build from.
It came about not as a result of the dire situation of our languages but as a result of the number of children and youth who were on a suicide watch. We were very concerned. Our elders and young people got together. We talked about what would help these youth to be strong Dakelh. What came up, to everyone's surprise, was language, culture, songs, our history, our way of life on the land, fishing, hunting and knowing the mountains and lakes through our own language. That's where we are now, and that's what we intend to do.
I fully welcome the measures included in this particular bill, dependent children and families—