Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am very pleased to support the motion to establish a special committee to review the Official Languages Act of the Northwest Territories. As we know, the Northwest Territories has eight official languages, Mr. Speaker, and the government places high priority on all of these languages. The Department of Education, Culture and Employment has direct responsibility for official languages and has done so since 1992 when the amalgamation of various departments, including Culture and Communications, were brought into one department and brought the Language Bureau within the department.
More recently in 1997, following the dissolution of the official languages unit of the Department of Executive, responsibilities for the official languages policy and guidelines were delegated to the Minister of Culture and Employment.
Currently, within Education, Culture and Employment, we have a broad range of programs and services in support of the North's languages. We support the schools to develop and deliver aboriginal and French language programs. We negotiate and administer funding agreements with the federal government to support the use of all official languages in the schools and in many other situations. We have developed a GNWT-wide strategy to support the aboriginal languages here in the Territories and we are coordinating the development of the GNWT-wide implementation plans to ensure that the obligations of the official languages policies and guidelines are being met.
From this broad perspective, Mr. Speaker, I am aware that there are many issues confronting languages in the Northwest Territories that are contributing to the decline of those languages. We are no longer in an era when we, as government, feel that we must call all the shots. Many of our programs and services have been reconfigured in recent years from being directive to being supportive of community-based initiatives and establishing a special committee to review the Official Languages Act of the Northwest Territories will provide a forum for the voices of the communities, as well as government departments, to be heard. I have spoken to representatives of some of the language communities and I have previously given a commitment that my department will support this process to the fullest. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
-- Applause