[Witness spoke in Inuktitut as follows:]
ᖁᔭᓐᓇᒦᒃ ᐊᐱᕆᒐᕕᑦ
[Inuktitut text translated as follows:]
Thank you for the question.
[English]
I was actually going to echo Commissioner Aariak's comments about Inuit expecting it to be on ballots. It's always been a given, particularly for Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated and the regional Inuit associations as organizations representing Inuit, that the information would be available in Inuit languages and that the ballot would incorporate Inuit languages. To do otherwise would be quite shocking, I think, for many Inuit.
I know there had been a comment made earlier in terms of Elections Canada and their mandate to serve the whole country of Canada. I think with public institutions, the mandate is to serve the public majority. One thing that I've continued to convey—and it's obvious to me often that I'm not articulate enough—is that, for instance, Canada recognizes officially two languages through the Official Languages Act of Canada that was enacted in 1969. When they were working on modernizing it, I was trying to convey that the political landscape of Canada had changed. There is now a jurisdiction where the official languages of Canada are not a majority public language. Public institutions trying to serve the public need to keep that in mind and make sure that they are meeting the needs of the public majority of the jurisdiction of Nunavut.
I think it's crucially important that all public institutions keep that in mind. I also think that it is not helpful for us to have a discussion about whether resources should be allocated to something else other than ballots. In my view, and I think in the view of many Nunavut Inuit, the expectation is that Inuktitut is available in all aspects of our lives, in all public essential services. That includes being able to vote.
Qujannamiik.