Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment Programs. Mr. Speaker, last March a motion was introduced in this House, regarding the Assembly's concern with the federal government's cuts to the Canada/NWT cooperation agreement for French and aboriginal languages in the NWT. This motion addressed the ten per cent reduction in this contribution program, which meant a reduction of about $1 million.

Many Members of this House, both Cabinet Ministers and ordinary Members spoke in support of the motion. In fact, the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment Programs spoke very passionately in support of the motion, calling the federal cuts, an insult and totally irresponsible. Mr. Speaker, in light of the information provided in the report of the Languages Commissioner tabled yesterday, the federal government must have wondered why we were making such an issue over the cuts when we were lapsing more than the proposed cuts from the funding that we already had. Therefore, Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Minister, when this discussion took place in March, was he aware of the large amount of funding which was being lapsed in this program?