Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to ask the Premier a question about official languages. Mr. Speaker, I won't say wasted, but we took most of question period yesterday trying to get the Minister of Justice to agree that the cuts of half the person years in the vital legal interpreters program in his department would cripple court interpreting services, would jeopardize the right of the accused to a fair trial and would also probably be contrary to the Charter of Rights and would probably jeopardize the amendment to the Jury Act allowing for unilingual juries. Mr. Kakfwi basically said he had no option. He had to cut. So I would like to ask the Premier, who is responsible for official languages if anyone in the Government of the Northwest Territories has taken a look at the money being spent on official languages in all areas of the government's services and tried to set priorities so that vital programs like legal interpreting can be preserved over lesser priorities. Has that assessment and priority-setting exercise been done by the official languages unit? Thank you.
Dennis Patterson on Question 438-12(7): Review Of Impact Of Funding Cuts To Languages Services
In the Legislative Assembly on April 7th, 1995. See this statement in context.
Question 438-12(7): Review Of Impact Of Funding Cuts To Languages Services
Item 6: Oral Questions
April 6th, 1995
Page 891
Dennis Patterson Iqaluit
See context to find out what was said next.