Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I do want to thank the Minister responsible for bringing this bill forward in terms of making sure that we actually uphold and protect the rights and the laws of our residents of the Northwest Territories. I think this really strengthens the bill as we have it right now in terms of the bill before us, the Jury Act, so that
there are no loopholes that result in mistrials and we protect the rights of residents, possible victims and the general public.
I just want to say that I’m glad to see this and we are unique in the Northwest Territories in that we do have a small population, but then you go further and our French-speaking population is even smaller. We don’t want to put a burden on the amount of times that our French-speaking population would be called to jury. I think that we’ve gone through that and we’ve worked out all the issues there, and I think that this bill is going to reflect that and ensure that our French-speaking population is not being called more times than not.
Also, I just want to make the comment from the executive director for the Federation Franco-Tenoise. He made a really good comment when he was presenting to committee in that he did say that not only for this bill or this department that they’d want to give input into but all departments within the government should go and seek the advice and support from the French-speaking community in terms of these kinds of things. I think that went well and I think committee heard him and want to utilize all our resources when we’re trying to make legislation.
I do agree with the Minister that such jury requests for a French-speaking jury for any trial are very rare, and I think that moving forward we’ve really strengthened the Jury Act and that’s going to be something that’s going to help protect our residents.
I want to thank committee, as well, who asked a lot of questions as we were pushing this forward. I’m glad to see it here in Committee of the Whole. Thank you.