Official Languages Committee on Feb. 9th, 2011

[Benoît Boutin]

The Department of Education of the Northwest Territories was created in 1969. Prior to 1969, education came under federal jurisdiction.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

I see, that’s what I was getting at. So, prior to 1969, schools in the Northwest Territories were federally regulated. There was an official languages Act. The federal government had jurisdiction. In 1969, the Territories became independent and passed their own laws on education. From that point on, the Official Languages Act disappeared for some time and the Territories had no such legislation until 1984. The federal government no longer has any jurisdiction over education in the Northwest Territories. There was a gap from 1969 to 1984, then?

[Benoît Boutin]

That’s right, there was no legislation.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

But you said that there was federal legislation.

[Benoît Boutin]

That’s right, but it applied to federal institutions.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

But prior to 1969, schools were federally regulated.

[Benoît Boutin]

Education and official languages are two completely separate issues.

Education is one thing. The federal legislation was passed in 1969.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

What I’m trying to say is that at that time there was federal legislation regulating schools. The federal government was also responsible for promoting official languages, and to do this, you need schools. I’m not saying that it complied with the legislation, but it did have an obligation. Having legislation is one thing and abiding by it is another. So schools were subject to federal legislation at that time.

[Benoît Boutin]

We’re going to need a historian.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

We’ll bring one in.

There is the Official Languages Act, and the territories run the schools.

For the last 10 years the agreement has been signed ,with minimal or no success in obtaining additional funding. I mean, the money is not coming in as you would like to see, right?

[Jackson Lafferty]

Mahsi, Mr. Chair.

Obviously we are receiving funds to operate and provide services in our 11 official languages: nine aboriginal languages, French, and English. Of course, we'd like to see more. That's our dream, and that's our hope. That's what I've been pushing for. We appreciate the funding we are currently receiving. But we have to serve 33 communities. Some are very remote communities and some are fly-in communities.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

I understand that. It's nice to have dreams, but we have laws, too, and the government, under part VII of the law, sections 41 and 43, is responsible for the promotion. And with promotion comes money.

For example, the French school doesn't have a gym. There are certain things they don't have. Has your government made a request to the government saying that you want the same quality of school for the French as you have for the English? Has that been asked for and refused?

[Jackson Lafferty]

Mr. Chair, that particular question has been addressed to the heritage minister. We work closely with the office. The request has been made. We are still working with the federal government.

When it comes to infrastructure in the Northwest Territories, we have to involve the federal government. Also, the territorial government receives funding. We have our own infrastructure funds as well, but we need to have a partnership in place too.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

I understand that. You need to have a partnership, but you need the money too.

The government, in part VII of the Official Languages Act, has a responsibility to transfer money. That's not a dream. I hope the federal government isn't saying, “Have a good dream, and continue dreaming”. Because in reality, it has a responsibility to give you the opportunity to have those schools. Outside of that, the community is not being treated as equal to the other communities. Do you agree?

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Thank you very much, Mr. Godin.

If you want to comment....

[Jackson Lafferty]

Mr. Chair, this is an area that has been a challenge for us. But I can say today that we continue to work with the federal government. I'm certainly hoping that they'll be our true partner as we move forward. That's the plan we've had in the past, and we'll continue to strengthen it with the federal government.

Mahsi.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Thank you very much, Mr. Godin.

We’ll now hand the floor over to Mr. Lauzon, and since the Minister had committed to being here until 12:15am, this will wrap things up.

Mr. Lauzon, the floor is yours.

[Guy Lauzon, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much, Minister, for being here.

Thank you to our other guests.

I have some questions here and there, and limited time, so I'm going to push right on.

Minister, you mentioned a strategic plan. You already have a couple of meetings started. I understand that there's another meeting in April. When do you see the plan being in place and ready to put into action? Is that soon or...?

[Dan Daniels]

Thank you, Mr. Lauzon.

We are working on the development of a strategic planning framework. We have a collaboration and cooperation committee that we've established, with membership from the Fédération franco-ténoise. There are three deputy ministers from the Government of the Northwest Territories who sit on that committee: me, the deputy minister from health and social services, and the deputy minister from human resources.

We've had a couple of meetings. We have one coming up in April for which we've presented a framework of a plan to the committee. We have some further discussions to undertake. We're hoping that with the April meeting we will have the framework pretty much finalized. I want to clarify that it's a framework. From there, once we have the framework in place, there will be a need to develop more specific plans on a department-by-department basis.

[Guy Lauzon, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Would you say within 12 months that would be realistic?

[Dan Daniels]

That would be a realistic target, I would think.

[Guy Lauzon, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

We won't hold you to that.

It's very interesting. One of the principles of the strategic plan is that you will have an active offer in French when a person comes for service. Is that when a person comes for service to a territorial government official? Where is there going to be an active offer in both official languages? At your territorial government offices?

[Dan Daniels]

Yes, the strategic plan we're working on is aimed at government services, so we will be focusing on government offices to make those active offers available.

[Guy Lauzon, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

That's quite a challenge, by the way, because we just had our commissioner do a review of some of our major federal departments, and 100% active service is quite a challenge.

Anyhow, just as an aside here, Ms. Gareau, I believe you're in municipal affairs?

[Laura Gareau, Director, Department of Municipal and Community Affairs, Government of the Northwest Territories]

Yes.