Well, the job has been done very differently than what had originally been perceived. The problem I have with the comments you are making is that, at some time, you have to make the decision between the two legal arguments. It is not simply a matter of you giving a legal opinion and saying, you believe in the researcher. You have to make the judgement about what has been presented to you, either from the government or from an individual who is laying a complaint, and your legal advisor. Then you should make a decision based on it.

My concern with your response is that you're listening only to those people who have given you legal advice in your office. I would really be careful about that. Well, I'm going to ask you the question, then. When have you disagreed with legal arguments? You are shaking your head, saying no. When have you disagreed with the lawyers providing advice to you on the matter of the interpretation of the law? When have you told them and written to them, advising them that their interpretation of the law is not according to what your interpretation is?

Thank you. Madam Commissioner.

I feel some obligation here that I can't breach confidentiality about things I talk to my lawyer about and the advice they give me. However, I have on a number of occasions, when they have given me an opinion, gone back to them and said I was not sure I was satisfied with their opinion and that they should do some more work on it. Or, I've taken that opinion -- as I've said -- and sat down with the deputy Minister and have said, from my point of view, and with my legal advice up to this point with the work we've done, this is how I see the interpretation of the act.

Sometimes the deputy minister has come back to me and said, we don't see it that way. This is the way we understand it. Then, I'll go back with that to my legal counsel and we'll look further into it. They may raise some other issues and we'll research those again. So, there's this play back and forth. But, I have, a number of times gone back to my legal counsel and said this is a preliminary opinion, now go further into this and look at this angle or this angle. I might say this department raised this point of view, based on their legal advice, let us consider that. There is dialogue back and forth between myself and my legal counsel and the deputy ministers and their legal counsel constantly. We trade opinions and determine that if we look at it one way, it comes out with this conclusion and if we look at it another way, it comes out with another conclusion.

In doing that, we learn from their advice and they learn from our advice and the end result is that we can, hopefully, come to some reasonable solution. There is one matter that is pending -- as I said -- where I feel, from my legal advice, that there is a breach of an act dealing with official languages. I have gone back to the Department of Justice a number of times with this. It has been going on for about a year and a half, back and forth. The last advice they gave was they think there may be an error in the act, so I'm going back to them again saying, if there's an error in the act, what are you going to do about it? There's that give and take all the time. So, as far as challenging the opinions that I'm receiving in my office, I think we do that constantly.

I don't simply say, this is the advice of my legal counsel and your legal counsel says differently and I'm going to take you to court to see who's right. That's not what we're trying to do. But, I have, as I said, gone back to my own legal counsel a number of times and said that I think there is more to look at in particular instances. I have said to look at it from other angles, consider the GNWT point of view and we're doing that all the time, back and forth.

Thank you. General comments on the Languages Commissioner's report. Mr. Gargan.

Maybe just to follow up a bit on Mr. Nerysoo's questions. Under the act, section 34 refers to any kind of disclosure with regard to client confidentiality. It doesn't refer to the actions you take. I don't know whether this is the legal opinion you got, but I see this as a situation where a complaint has been made and the section where the individual is involved is eliminated but the context of the complaint shouldn't be confidential.

You said that you couldn't discuss it because of confidentiality but do you see this as the interpretation? You don't expose an individual's name, but it certainly doesn't stop you from exposing the contents of the complaint, right? Am I correct?

Thank you. Madam Languages Commissioner.

In chapter five of the first annual report, we reported all of the complaints and inquiries that we had completely resolved. They are finished. We are not in the process of dealing with those any more and those are the ones I report each year, the ones that are complete because the other ones are still under investigation. We don't know whether they're actually valid yet or not. We don't know whether there's any violation. We don't know if we have all of the information and we're still looking into them, so I can't really report them.

But, for each one of those, the details are there. I think we wrote enough detail without going into so much detail that we would just bore everybody with every single step we took. It is volumes, every single step we've taken on every complaint and inquiry. But, there, we've revealed the details of the complaints and inquiries that we do get and we generalize them in such a way that sometimes two or three specific complaints will fit together under one particular subject area. So, we've put together some of the specific details there.

Normally, when I'm dealing with a complaint, I don't reveal the identify of the person who has made the complaint to me. I think that's one of the things that's really important about our office. However, there are a few times where we have had to because it was very specific. We had to make reference to a specific document that was used in court, of a specific person's job that was going to be moved or rumoured to be moved. Then, we had to look specifically at an individual. Those become much more delicate cases to deal with. It is better if I can deal with it and not reveal the identity of the complainant but there are a few times when I have to do that in dealing with the department, in order to rectify the situation. I only do that with the consent of the individual. They know I'm going to be discussing their particular case with the department.

Thank you. Mr. Gargan.

Just one final point and, again, it is with regard to a letter I wrote to you. I'm not going to keep this confidential. I would like to read it anyway, for the record, and it is with regard, again, to your invitation to speak with the law faculty of the University of Saskatchewan.

The letter goes on to refer to the section of Official Languages Act, which you referred to, which provides that you cannot disclose information that comes to your knowledge in the performance of your duties and function.

I also went on to say that I have some difficulty, and this is where - again, I had legal advice, so this was done on the basis of advice from a lawyer - I had asked you a question, and today is the 16, too, one month later, because I have some difficulty with this explanation and would ask, what duty or function were you performing at the relevant time, given that our Official Languages Act cannot purport to bind the province of Saskatchewan or the University of Saskatchewan? Since you keep referring to lawyers giving you advice, why is it that you haven't responded to my particular letter?

Not only that, but have you, in fact, sought legal advice as to whether or not you really have jurisdiction to go into those areas such as Saskatoon?

Thank you. Madam Languages Commissioner.

With regard to the letter I received from the honourable Member just before the last appearance, I believed that when I appeared in the Assembly last time that I answered the same questions that were in the letter. So, if the Member would like a written reply, I can provide that, but I thought that I had answered those same questions when I appeared before. That is why I didn't send a written reply.

It does say, "To take all actions and measures within the authority of the Languages Commissioner with a view to ensuring recognition of the rights, status and privileges of each of the official languages and compliance with the spirit and intent of this act in the administration of the affairs of government institutions, including any of their activities relating to the advancement of aboriginal languages." So I felt that in this case it was my role to assist in advancing an understanding about aboriginal languages in this particular case as this university, because it has an agreement with the GNWT Department of Education because we don't have university education here, therefore, these students are there as NWT students, is almost as an extension of our own education system. If I could play a role in promoting an understanding about languages there, then I felt that this was a role that I should play and that I should at least try to make a contribution to that particular situation.

Thank you. General comments. Mr. Gargan and Mr. Patterson. Mr. Gargan.

Yes, Mr. Chairman, without violating the confidentiality of the individual, what section of the act has been violated that you felt that you should go to Saskatoon to address it?

Thank you. Languages Commissioner.

There is no particular section that I would point to and say, this is a violation of this particular section. What I also deal with are inquiries for information, and, in this case, it was information that would help students from the NWT to perhaps perform better, or whatever, in a particular setting where they were being dealt with by an outside institution who didn't understand the situation. They were asking for my

advice. Is there anything that we can do to improve this particular situation?

So, in that capacity, it was not necessarily a complaint that there was a breach of an act, except maybe you could say, students who speak all official languages should have equal opportunity for education in all government institutions, equality in all the government institutions. Just because you speak another official language as your first language doesn't mean that you should be put at a disadvantage. If there is another institution that is having a difficult time understanding what that disadvantage might be and they ask me to try to explain, then I feel that it is part of my role to do that, just as a matter of promotion for understanding to help people understand the situation.

General comments. Mr. Patterson. (Microphone turned off)

(Microphone turned off)

Mr. Gargan, go ahead.

...in Edmonton. Mr. Chairman, I have students who go to school in Edmonton. I have students who go to school in Saskatoon, too. I deal with them all the time through the phones, and I was always able, by talking with them and talking with the appropriate Minister with maybe six dollars worth of phone calls, to do that. I mean, what makes it so different, because I know the number of students, and we don't have that many in Saskatoon, either. So I really find it difficult that we would be put in a situation of covering a cost to have you address people in Saskatoon, let alone students in Halifax and the States. But where do you draw the line with regard to the amount of money that you are going to spend on individuals or several people at the exorbitant cost that it is going to cost you to do that? Because I feel that, as important as it is for myself to address my own constituents' concerns, I have always been able to resolve it. I really find it hard to support or even justify how it is possible for you to sit there and say that what you did was right and that it doesn't matter how we look at it, that maybe we are talking from both sides of our mouths, if you want to call it that. But I find it very difficult, Mr. Chairman, to look at a situation in which - under what section have you been saying that you have been travelling? You have interpreted a section. Which section was that?

Thank you. Madam Languages Commissioner.

There are a couple of things. First, I would just like to say that when I did accept the invitation to go to Saskatoon, I was not making a special trip just for that. I was on my way back from another trip, and I would have been passing through Edmonton so it would simply have been the expense from Edmonton to Saskatoon and back. That would have been the only additional expense to deal with that particular one. That was one of the reasons I cancelled the engagement here, I didn't want to come all the way back here and then get another ticket to go back down there if they wanted me to come and speak to them. I thought it was more financially responsible to not come all the way back here and then buy another ticket to go back down. Whether I should go back down, is another question. I made reference to section

I have one final question then. Since there was a speaking engagement, I would presume then whether it was that day, a month from now, would not have made a difference. It is a question that when you passed by, you probably could go in and talk to the classroom. Since it was on the weekend, how did you manage to receive the message of cancellation or did you actually miss your engagement?