Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As other Members have mentioned, a lot of work has gone into this bill to get to this stage, where the committee has reviewed the proposed bill under consultation. This is after several years of work by the department after their consultation. Once we finish dealing with the committee report, we will be getting into the bill, itself. There are a lot of clauses in the bill and each raise different issues.
I've been very supportive, in terms of working on the new act, and have followed the progress through all the different documents that have been prepared by the department that have gone out for people's input and comments. I would have to say that I think the review process has gone fairly well. It has not been perfect; any consultation process we have in the north takes a lot of effort and work to ensure that people have access to the documentation and are able to have a mechanism to voice their concerns on new proposed legislation.
It's not the sexiest thing to read. When you're in a community and get a piece of legislation, people tend to put it aside and not pay much attention to it. I find that this is the case now. The act is a fairly thick document, there are 160 some odd clauses in it. People tend to leave it to somebody else and we're the "somebody elses" because it is now up to us to deliberate and ensure that what we approve in this Assembly is going to be appropriate for all the residents of the north and for an education system that people have been saying they want.
I think the whole education system has been criticized in terms of excellence in education, the quality of education, the types of schools, the hours, everything that's in the act, the teachers, the roles of parents, teachers, students, principals, superintendents, community councils and boards. All of these have been addressed in this new act.
The committee went across the north and heard a lot of presentations. I was pleased with the committee meetings that followed where a lot of the changes, I think over 40 new amendments, were made, adopting a lot of the concerns raised by people across the Northwest Territories.
There are still issues that the committee raised in their report, and issues that I, and I assume other Members, will be bringing up when we get into the details of the bill. But at this time, I would like to just comment on some of the issues so that people are aware where the concerns I will be raising are going to come up when we deal with the particular clauses.
In the preamble, the whole issue of recognizing rights and freedoms of aboriginal people, and the treaty rights and aboriginal rights is an area that still has to be addressed. I know that this act is not the vehicle to address and define what these are, but education is one aspect that treaty people, particularly in the new land claims agreement, are very concerned about. It is one that we still feel that there's a fiduciary responsibility from the federal government to provide for the right of education for status Indians and Inuit people; a right to have free education, not only up to grade 12, but post-secondary education.
When we get the particular sections, the issue is going to be do the clauses in the preamble cover the new land claim agreements and any land claim agreements that are to follow. Does section 35 of the Constitution Act cover the Gwich'in claim, does it cover the Inuvialuit claim, does it cover the Nunavut Act, does it cover the Sahtu claim and the respective provisions in those acts? They have to be protected and recognized somewhere, and the only place I feel that it should be is in the preamble. So when it comes to discussing that particular section of the act, I'll be raising that particular issue.
Quality in standards; we put a lot of people in our schools, we're graduating a lot of people, but you have to raise the question of the whole principle of excellence and quality. Where are our people going once they come out of our school systems and what are they doing? These are things that are of concern.
The issue of equal rights; the report makes mention of it and it makes mention of section 15, but the Native Women's Society of the NWT raised the issue in their presentation that it has to be front and centre in the act and has to be a theme that overrides the act. It's the same with the issue of violence in our society.
The issue that the committee mentioned on hours or days of instruction; we'll get into some discussion when we talk about the recommendation. I'm of the opinion that we should quantify the number of instructional hours that we expect our schools to provide, and it's up to each education district to convert that to numbers of days or numbers of hours in a day; whether it be four and a half, five, five and a quarter, or whatever, to fit their program.
One more comment on the whole issue of treaty rights and choice of education. The committee report made mention of it on page 10, that it was difficult, and I know the dilemma that the Minister has in trying to define these treaty rights or aboriginal rights in this act. To try to include it would imply a resolution and definition of these rights, which is not the case because every day there are different negotiations that take place; different definitions and different arrangements or agreements are made. I guess the point is that it's incumbent on this government and the federal government to try to get those resolved. I guess that's the issue. We have to keep bringing it out on the table so that it gets addressed and that we are able to facilitate discussions between the groups so we can get appropriate definitions of these issues.
The area of parents' responsibilities; again, the committee is making a recommendation of parent advisory committees. I agree with that, but the comment I would like to make is that we're finally putting in the act a section on rules and responsibilities of parents. I think we've just touched the surface of that area, and I'm not sure how we can make it stronger. But the whole area of parents' involvement in the schools is key. Not only in the schools, but in all the school activities, camp-outs, sports activities, tutoring and whatever activities go on in school, I think the parents have a responsibility to get back into that area where I think they've moved away from. Years ago, the teachers and the parents used to share a lot of these responsibilities and chaperone dances and chaperone sport trips and other activities, coach teams and do all the dancing clubs, debating clubs, chess clubs, things like that. So we have to somehow encourage people to get involved into our schools again.
The area of education staff is an issue my colleague from Yellowknife Centre raised; the recertification of teachers. Again, the act is very clear, and the committee heard clearly that if we're going to strive for excellence in our schools, then we have to strive for excellence in our instructors, in our teachers. The way to do that is to ensure that they are qualified, ensure that they are certified to teach, and that they have to keep up to date with the changing times and the changing materials that they use for teaching. I think the phrase today is "active learning," and there are new teaching mechanisms for doing those things. I think the act has now touched that, and I fully support that.
The whole area of culture and language and spirituality and religion is another area that is quite contentious and I think the majority of the comments we heard across the north were related to these areas. We have to protect, encourage and enhance our aboriginal languages, all our official languages in the Northwest Territories. We have to encourage as much as possible the development of the curriculums, use of these curriculums and use of the materials -- develop materials so people can use them. One of the recommendations that's been made, again, I fully support.
The whole area of spirituality and religion, I know there's concerns about the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the limitations that puts on but I truly believe that we have to have the option of being able to teach religion in our schools. However that's provided for, I think we have to leave that option open. I fully support not only religion but spirituality, native spirituality in particular, where people have to have the freedom to believe and practice spiritual beliefs and values.
The other area of concern, and one that I'll be making comments on when we get to the particular clauses is the areas which define the powers, responsibilities and authorities of the education bodies, the district education authorities and the divisional education councils, so that once the act is passed -- and I know there's a lot of work to be done, but the regulations which I assume will set some guidelines in how this is done; that whole process of negotiating the division of powers and responsibilities between the various councils and education bodies -- people will have to understand and know what their authorities are in terms of how it's done and we don't want to have to always talk about who does what and have a big argument...We don't want a series of court challenges over these things. People in communities have to have the authorities and powers and they give that to their district education authority who represents them. We have to know what and how they're able to negotiate in a bigger arena which is the divisional education council.
In line with that also, division of powers and responsibilities and authorities of the Minister. I know there have been considerable adjustments made on the roles of the Minister in the act; a lot of amendments to reduce that but it's still an area that has a lot of impact in a lot of the clauses in the act. The Minister, in terms of dealing with regulations, has made a commitment and it's in the act that consultation will happen in terms of developing the regulations. I just want to say that I'm pleased that's in there but we have to ensure that it happens. We just can't put it in the act and say, yes, the Minister's agreed and then that's it. It's incumbent on all of us and all the education authorities across the north to ensure that they participate actively in developing the regulations.
With that, I want to thank the committee for the work that they've done and thank the committee for allowing me, as an alternate Member, to participate in the activities dealing with the act. It's a good one, there's been a lot of work done, but in the next several days I hope we consider very carefully the provisions that we're looking at approving because it's going to be for however long -- 10, 15, 20 years -- the act has to be in place, so we've got to ensure that what we approve, what we agree on this week, is going to stand the test of time. Thank you very much.