Thanks, very much, Ms. Harnum. Any other issues, Mr. Antoine, since you were the last speaker?

Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. One of the other recommendations that was made last year, the last one, number 30, deals with the GNWT to assist non-governmental organizations and groups with developing and delivering services and programs to the public in official languages, both by assisting them with planning, interpreting, translating and such services, ensuring that all available funding is allocated for such community projects. The point I would like to emphasize is "all available funding." This one here is quite important to me because I speak my own language and I associate with other groups other than the Legislative Assembly in meetings in the Deh Cho Tribal Council meetings. Any time there is a gathering of aboriginal groups, we have elders who don't speak English very well, and they have to be full participants in all discussions. Therefore, there is a need for interpreting and translating. Many times, the meetings are regarded as very important, so these meetings are done in spite of the costs. In many cases, there are cost overruns in dealing with interpretation and translation. I know this is a fact.

When the Languages Commissioner reports that there are large sums of funds unexpended and have been returned to the federal government by the government, I know that organizations such as the Dene Nation have requested the government for funding to help them in their meetings and assemblies. Much of it, in cases of interpretation and translation, is refused. Then, we are told that the government has turned back huge sums of money, although the native groups are told that there is no money. That causes me much concern, whether this government is really committed as much as they say they are to helping aboriginal languages.

When this Language Act was first passed, it was a major support to aboriginal people in the north. Everyone who I am familiar with was very pleased with the fact that this government has recognized aboriginal languages as official languages. I think it is a great thing we have done to preserve our language. However, when funds are requested...For instance, I know that the Dene Cultural Institute is requesting funding to help further develop the Dene languages. They are still struggling and still looking for funds to help them do that. I know the government is spending much money with their own language bureau in translating policies and regulations. At the same time, the Dene language is a thorough language. Our language has helped our elders. Every year, our elders are passing on and we are losing it. Almost every day, we are losing this. At the same time, funds are turned back to the federal government. The majority of the money is focused on the application of the act in terms of interpreting policies and regulations. The focus is not on preserving the language. The focus seems to be on abiding by the act according to the regulations by interpreting the policies and regulations. The focus is not on capturing the oral history that we are losing every day. I would like to ask you a question about that recommendation, and about my comments are with regard to government assisting non-government organizations and groups. What is the intent of that in your recommendation? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Antoine. Ms. Harnum.

That particular recommendation was made to me by many non-government organizations. There is a perception by the public that the government monopolizes language services. They feel that the Official Languages Act is perceived to be a very good piece of legislation. People appreciate what it was meant to do. What has happened now is that so many human resources and dollars are used by government departments in trying to deliver services. For example, all of the written translation that is done for Dene languages, and nobody can read it, that those people who want to speak their language in the communities have no resources. The government has monopolized so much of that money. I am not saying that from my own point of view. This is what the public has told me to say. Those organizations are extremely frustrated. They feel that there are many things the GNWT is doing with official languages money that is not meeting a need. Some needs are being met and that is great. But we really have to look at how we are allocating the resources. I think that is what this whole issue is about. We have so many dollars and so many people. That is all. Are we really meeting the need?

Mr. Zoe asked me, we didn't seem to have a focus, he said, in the report in the first year. One of our major focuses was research. We wanted to find out what research had been done in all the languages and bringing it together. That is what chapter one is. That was about a year and a half worth of research. We didn't want to just say that languages are dying. We wanted to know what all the studies are that have been done. What information do we have? Since people have now seen this report, many other people have come forward to us and said, we did a study in our own community on fluency and literacy, or in our own region, would you like that information, too? It is more detailed. We did it just with our own people and we know who speaks and to what level. That sort of thing. Now, we know of more research. But, all of the information in chapter one says the languages are declining. We have all of these dollars, all of these human resources, we have an Official Languages Act and we are sliding backwards. That is what the native organizations have said to me. We have all of this money going into all of these official languages, but where are we heading? We are still losing it. That is why their concern is that the government really look closely at how they are using the resources and decide whether or not they are meeting the needs.

Mr. Chairman, with regard to the situation with the trip to Saskatoon, I am not too clear whether the trip was necessary or justifiable until I am able to determine what the trip was for. Under the Official Languages Act, there is a section with regard to the kind of information you could devolve. I would have to look at the broad way of asking you this. Was your trip necessary because a student had a complaint against a certain government department, or was it by virtue of this student being funded by this government that you had to make a trip? I am wondering if those are some of the reasons you decided to go to Saskatchewan, rather than attend this gathering of Francophone Parliament, and I guess why you accepted their invitation in the first place.

I should make it clear that I didn't travel to Saskatoon. I never did make it to Saskatoon, but I didn't travel down to Edmonton on my way to Saskatoon just for that particular issue. I was on my way back from Ottawa and Toronto, from the linguistics rights conference and the ombudsmen's conference, which I had attended. I was on my way back and I stopped in Edmonton, instead of coming back to Yellowknife for this other ten minute reading. If I had done that, I would have had to buy another ticket to go down to Saskatoon and back, which I didn't think was really worth it. But if I could do it while I was down there, I felt it would be better. I would have saved having to buy another ticket from here to Saskatoon and back. So that was part of my decision, looking at whether I should buy another ticket to go there to discuss this problem. So I didn't make a special trip just for that.

I am not questioning the trip itself, I'm just trying to find the justification for making that special effort to get there. In order to determine whether tax dollars are being spent appropriately, we should be able to at least get some kind of picture on this trip. I'm just asking whether it was because a student had a complaint against certain government departments up here, or because students were funded by this government.

It wasn't the student who complained. I have a problem at this point now. I cannot talk about this in any more detail in the Assembly. We're getting into details of a complaint or an inquiry that I'm dealing with, or a problem, and I can't reveal individual identities of people. I have a problem in discussing this in much more detail at this point. All I can say is, no, the student didn't complain or the students didn't complain. It was a request from the university to speak. It was a speaking engagement. The other one was not. This one was to address a problem, the other one was not.

Thank you. I thought it was a specific concern you were referring to, but I guess it isn't. The Languages Commissioner did say it was a speaking engagement. I put the question to the Languages Commissioner, you had two speaking engagements, and because of your broad definition of your mandate you chose to go to Saskatoon as opposed to addressing the Francophone Parliament.

Thanks, Mr. Chairman. First of all, I would like to congratulate the Commissioner on having spoken Inuktitut fluently, and impressed the interpreters by going at a speed that they could handle very well. But on the other hand, I should also tell her -- and she picked it up very quickly -- that when you use unusual expressions like Pandora's box you have to very quickly correct yourself because that's not something that's very easy to translate or interpret.

My comments are about the problem of independence and accountability. The boss for the Languages Commissioner is the act. That is the authority, the act. For us as legislators, if there are problems with the act, then we have to fix it. If the act isn't clear enough, then that's our job to make sure it is clear enough so it isn't open to so many interpretations that it poses difficulty for the person who has to uphold it.

But I can see the problem, also, of an individual...Really, it's a lonely kind of life. You're on your own and you don't know where you belong. Everybody likes the idea of being sovereign and independent until they taste it. You realize then that you don't have that many points of reference. But what you bring to us is what you have had given to you, Mr.

Chairman, as a Commissioner, from the public, and the biggest problem is the disposition of that. When you have all this stuff, all these issues that have to be resolved, what happens to it? It seems to me -- and I agree that in this kind of forum it's very, very difficult to sort through all the details so that you can give clear direction for the Assembly and for the government as to how we should proceed with a lot of these items and issues.

One of the attractive features, of course, of our kind of parliamentary system is that we do have committees. These committees perform the function of being a kind of sounding board or a screen, if you like, in order to guide what we do. You're not going to just simply take a report and say, okay, we're going to do all this. There has to be some process for sorting it out, setting priorities and so on. There are several committees that we have, so I really don't feel too happy about creating one more standing committee.

Lonely though the Commissioner may be, we don't have to create more interested people in the work that the Commissioner is doing, Mr. Chairman. I would hope we would find some method by which this report -- which has a lot of very important information in it -- can be referred to a committee that has a mandate to look at these kinds of issues, and to refine it so that the government has a sense of priority and a sense of urgency about some issues, because you can't be everything to all people. You have to decide where you're going to put your efforts so that you handle the vast majority of things within a reasonable time frame and at a reasonable cost.

I do take seriously, though, the main observation that other Members have made about a broad interpretation of...Maybe there is no other approach to take at the beginning. You could have taken a narrow one, I suppose, Mr. Chairman, as a Commissioner and just say I'm going to begin small and gradually do more things. But then, of course, when you do that, immediately you are open to the criticism, you are ignoring this, you are ignoring that, so you can't win in a sense. By taking the position that you have a broad mandate under this act, and doing the best you can with the resources that you have, then perhaps as a result of meetings like this and maybe with refinements to the act or with work from our standing committees, then we would be able to refine, focus and get the office doing the work in as efficient a manner as possible dealing with the issues that are uppermost and that need most urgently to be dealt with.

I have been interested in languages nearly all my life. I fully understand the very difficult job that the Languages Commissioner has to do. It is a complex issue and is not very easy to satisfy everyone even though you try. Now that we have had a sense from this Assembly that, perhaps, we are being too broad, then obviously the Languages Commissioner has some kind of direction, even at this stage, because this is an accountability session too. Perhaps it is time to narrow it in a little bit and see what things are reasonable to accomplish within the mandate of that office.

The first year or two, obviously, you are going to find that many issues are raised. As the Languages Commissioner said, Mr. Chairman, it is a question of sorting through the mess, understanding the job and getting the public to understand what the Languages Commissioner's job is. I expect it to be confusing. Anything you take on that is new in the jurisdiction like ours with this many official languages is a huge job. It is a mighty challenge. So, I think we should have some patience that you are not going to be able to get it all right, right away. There will be a process by which we can improve. My guess is that process will belong with one of our standing committees and then the Languages Commissioner won't be so lonely, Mr. Chairman. The person will have a chance to spend more time with people who will spend the time needed to look at her work, her report and her problems. Thank you very much.

That is correct. The meeting in Saskatoon was cancelled. It was scheduled to be for the Monday, and it was cancelled on the Friday. My engagement to be in Yellowknife to read a speech that had nothing to do with official languages was on the Thursday. It was on a holiday and I was going to be coming back to speak for ten minutes on my holiday. Part of the problem is I have many speaking engagements. There are times when I am asked to do two or three things at the same time. I have to make a choice. This is not the first time that I have said that I will do something, and then something else has come up and I couldn't go.

For example, last December I was supposed to meet with the Dene Cultural Institute and I had to cancel because the Assembly called me. There are times when other things arise and I go because I think it is more important, or because I know it is more important. I don't make a habit of it. As I said, if you look at the document that I tabled in December, you will see that I did attend many other speaking engagements. This particular one is not a big concern to the Federation Francophone Tenoise either. I don't know if you even asked anybody who was involved, but it is not a concern to them.

They understand perfectly well what happened. Once I explained to them what it was all about, they said that is fine. It is not even an issue for them. I don't know why the Members are worried about it, other than perhaps wondering why I might have to travel specifically for that issue. I decided that I would not come back to Yellowknife and read the speech for ten minutes because then I would have had to travel specifically back to Saskatoon to deal with that one problem. I didn't think that I should do that. Once it was cancelled, they said they would get back to me, as soon as they could, to rearrange the meeting. I have, since then, talked to them a number of times on the phone.