Thank you very much. Good afternoon. Dánet’eh, dze nezì.
Thank you for inviting me here today.
The Northwest Territories is the only political region in Canada that recognizes 11 official languages. Of these languages, nine are indigenous: Dëne Sųłıné Yatıé, nēhiyawēwin, Dinjii Zhu’ Ginjik, Inuinnaqtun, Inuktitut, Inuvialuktun, Dene Kǝdǝ́, Dene Zhatié and Tłı̨chǫ Yatıı̀, with many different dialects throughout our 33 communities.
The NWT Official Languages Act sets out the roles and responsibilities of the ministerially appointed language boards that represent the 11 official language communities, the Languages Commissioner and the Government of the Northwest Territories, and it provides legal protection to assist in preserving culture as expressed through language. The act states that everyone has a right to receive government services in the languages they speak.
Each of our indigenous languages articulates the ways of knowing, being, doing and believing that are unique to their own communities and histories. This is why it is so important to work to ensure that our children and youth retain a strong connection to their language and who they are. It is our responsibility, as a government and as individual citizens, to protect, strengthen and promote our languages to ensure that we are a territory in which indigenous languages are supported, respected and thriving.
The Government of the Northwest Territories provides approximately $15 million per year to indigenous governments in the NWT—communities and education bodies. Combined with the $5.9 million from the 2021-24 Canada-Northwest Territories Agreement on Indigenous Languages, the GNWT distributes approximately $21 million towards the promotion, preservation and revitalization of indigenous languages each year.
Funding provided through the GNWT is used to support language revitalization programs for individuals and communities, and is also distributed directly to governments, communities and education bodies to develop and provide their own language revitalization programs.
Our work is guided by input from our language partners, and over the years, we have learned that this coordination is essential to the success of achieving our shared vision. We have built relationships based on trust and transparency to find solutions that work within the unique context of the Northwest Territories.
The federal Indigenous Languages Act provides room for a variety of indigenous language revitalization and protection efforts, and, from a legislative perspective, aligns well with the NWT's Official Languages Act. However, the GNWT would like to see improved coordination of funding for language revitalization and service delivery initiatives to improve efficiency and better support strategic objectives in our territory.
Although additional support for language revitalization is welcome, the current disparate approach to program funding has contributed to issues of duplication and persistent capacity issues that limit revitalization work. To be clear, I am not advocating for the redirection of funds from indigenous governments to the Government of Northwest Territories, but for enhanced coordination. The Government of Northwest Territories would like to work more closely with Canada and indigenous government partners to support strategic objectives, create efficiencies and help address the lack of capacity across our language communities.
Although we see general alignment with our legislation, several areas of the Indigenous Languages Act at this time are not clearly defined, such as the use of the terms such as “support”, “access to services”, “sufficient demand” and “capacity”. Not having these terms properly defined makes the impact of these requirements hard to judge.
The Government of Northwest Territories understands that our indigenous languages need support, particularly those spoken in rural indigenous communities. Beyond dollars, capacity issues must be strategically addressed for revitalization funding to be effectively spent. For instance, currently only two out of our seven regional indigenous language coordinator positions are filled across indigenous governments in the Northwest Territories, which poses significant challenges to implementing revitalization programs across our territory. Greater coordination between Canada, the GNWT and indigenous governments could help identify and target such issues in a more systematic and strategic way.
I would like to thank the committee for inviting me to provide feedback on this important initiative, and I look forward to continued coordination of funding for language revitalization and service delivery initiatives with the Government of Canada.
Thank you.