EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
I want to remind you that we will not be working on this alone, we have to work together and also with different organizations such as NTI, so that different organizations can help us.
The Nunavut Social Development Council, the Inuit Heritage Trust, we have to use all of the available organizations to see how we are going to operate as a government.
If we work together we can achieve these goals.
Chairperson (interpretation): Sorry that was my fault.
Thank you for providing the proper response Mr. Havioyak.
I am sorry if I mispronounced your name as well, that does not hurt to have your name mispronounced.
I am not sure where to start from, but perhaps maybe I can give some background.
Culture, Language, Elders & Youth, when we are dealing with culture, younger people have to grab that knowledge, I think that should be the goal of Culture, Language, Elders & Youth.
I am not sure how, but our ancestors, are our history and our heritage and we have stemmed from them.
We have touched part of that traditional lifestyle.
For example, people of my age, I am around 50’s, we caught part of that traditional lifestyle.
I used to be very shy to go into a house which did not have lice because at that time we used to have a lot of lice, and I used to be embarrassed about that.
In this day and age I am happy to say that if it had not been for our heritage we would not be here.
They lived off the land and we smelled like the land, because we were Inuumarik.
For example the animals had different tastes and smells, and we did as well, the hunters would have lice and so would the children.
When we are dealing with culture and discussing it, I sometimes ask myself, maybe you are in the same situation, how can our youth in this day and age, how can we help them get that knowledge without just telling a story.
I am sure we can pass down our knowledge but how can we make them understand, because they never lived that lifestyle.
They know where their historical roots are but they never experienced the lifestyle as we did.
It is too far in the past already and they never caught any part of it.
Although that is the situation today I am sure that there are bridges we can build to bridge the gap.
If we get more funding, and if we could be assisted in other means, what process could we use to make them understand.
Just to cite an example, I am not really looking at funding but this is one of my highest priorities, dealing with elders and youth.
As Inuit in the different communities we have our distinct dialects as when the member from Clyde River was stating he would like to have his own interpreter.
But then again, those of us from Netsilik and the Keewatin region when you are dealing with your own community education requirements, if they could do their own research or collection of information the resources that could be useful for the students could be done in the communities.
I am not sure whether you have thought about these issues.
When I look at 8-7 Mr. Chairman, we are talking about grants and contributions.
If you are going to be raising the funding, because our goal is to strengthen our language and our culture, if we are trying to have our traditional language promoted, 86 thousand dollars is very limited funds.
If the Nunavut Government could add more to the amount, I am not sure whether you have thought of that either, to put more funding into the grants.
In respect to your historical comments, those of us who had to live a traditional life, we did smell like the land, because we came from that, that’s the truth.
Which of you would like to respond?
In response to the 86 thousand dollars which are the grants for cultural enhancements, I understood exactly what the member for Nattilik was referring to.
The promotion and protection for cultural enhancement, oral traditions, and cultural organizations.
In respect to cultural enhancements, there are different ways of writing.
For example in our Main Estimates, there are differences, some of them are crossovers from the GNWT and they were transferred and that is why they are there.
But when we are dealing with language enhancement we are going to look at more funding to the tune of about 700 thousand dollars to deal specifically with language in trying to enhance our language when we are dealing with the communities, that’s the only way I can respond at this time Mr. Chairman.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you Mr. Irniq.
I think we have to be aware of our agenda, we will reach the Main Estimates later and we will reach those pages, but perhaps for now we can focus on general comments.
Mr. Puqiqnak you are welcome to comment further.
Mr. Chairman, I believe that last week I made comments to the House in respect to the museum.
I know at this time we want to see these types of things, but again the lack of financial resources has been an obstacle.
Across the Atlantic, there are some artifacts in foreign countries.
How can we get a museum to repatriate our cultural items.
For example, around 1962 to 1966 there used to be researchers in our area, about 110 miles west, I grew up in that area on my grandfather’s and father’s lands.
From about 1922 they were taking pictures of my mother’s adopted son, who was my grandfather and finally in this year in 1998 I have seen it.
He went home to his grandchildren and you could tell that he felt at home, because he was going home to his grandchildren and this was filmed in 1926.
Just looking at films and pictures, it can really effect you, it stirs up strong feelings, I am wondering how we can repatriate these types of items.
I think that they already know most of the reasons for these types of comments, but perhaps if you could actually make a progressive comment or question, maybe that will speed up our meeting, because again our clock is ticking.
Which of you want to answer.
Mr. Havioyak or your Deputy.
Very briefly Mr. Chairman, if you remember what I stated a couple of days ago that we are preparing to look into a museum in Nunavut and we will be working quite closely with NTI and the Heritage Trust.
We are starting to organize and prepare for this, but I will always keep you up to date on what is going on.
The old photographs and artifacts that you talked about that are overseas and elsewhere around Canada, like I said we are new and just starting to work quite closely with Heritage Trust and NTI.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you Mr. Havioyak.
Mr. Puqiqnak do you have any further comments.
I wasn’t expecting to be called so fast.
In respect to the community elders’ committees, I believe they will be utilized by the department where there are existing committees.
Will they be given responsibility or duties to ensure that knowledge is garnered by the department?
Either of you may respond, either Mr. Irniq or the Minister.
In response to the questions, we are going to show two, especially right now, we have dealt with the things that the Minister has alluded to in dealing to in dealing with the youth and it will be established in Igloolik when our department is up and running.
Some of the duties under our mandate in respect to the elders we are looking into that, it is under review.
Mr. Nutarak do you want to add further questions.
Thank you Mr. Nutarak.
Perhaps for the younger generation I will be asking about the youth.
The youth constitute the largest percentage of our population in Nunavut.
Is there a better way of ensuring that life is easier. Are you looking into those types of options?
That is my question about the youth.
Chairperson: Thank you Mr. Akesuk. Mr. Irniq.
Mr. Irniq: Mr. Chairman, yes, we are conducting a review as to how we are dealing with the future government.
I keep referring back to the conference that we had in Cambridge.
That seems like the first step for both the youth as well as the kinds of directives that we are looking at.
Mr. Chairman, we have been told the direction for which we are to undertake.
For example, we will concentrate a lot on assisting our youth in Nunavut because they are our future.
This is one of the issues that the department is passionate about.
We are trying to deal with it by looking at the different options in respect to the youth.
There are different types of organizations.
For example, in Baffin, Keewatin, and in Nunavut as well as in the west.
We have worked with those organizations to try and develop new initiatives.
It is a brand new department and we are still behind on some of our duties.
When this was given to us last year I thought it would be like catching your first walrus.
It was like trying to connect or build a walrus and it took a lot of thinking and planning.
We have had a lot of co-operation especially in trying to deal with the youth.
We are trying to work with the youth.
We are trying to be of assistance to the youth.
Thank you Mr. Akesuk. Thank you Mr. Tootoo.
Mr. Chairman I have some questions.
My first one relates to the comments that were made in the Ministers opening address.
It indicated that the department is developing a language policy.
I am also a member of a new standing committee which has the mandate to appoint positions by statutory authority that are made by the legislative assembly.
One of those positions is the official languages commissioner.
Mr. Chairman I would like to know if the department will be looking to work in conjunction with the standing committee in the development of the policy as well as any other changes to the act.
Those will directly effect the role of the official languages commissioner, which is something that our standing committee is mandated to look at.
I am wondering if there is a willingness to work together in order to develop that.
Chairperson ( interpretation): Thank you Mr. Tootoo.
Either one of you can respond to his question Mr. Havioyak
Hon. Donald Havioyak: I would like to work closely with everybody because it involves everybody.
We all have to team up together and work together and whoever is willing to help out is welcome. Also like I said, we have to work together to regain our past.
Peter has more to say.
Mr. Irniq do you want to give a supplementary?
I would just like to supplement my Ministers comments in regard to this issue.
Language in the past, language services when we were growing up it did not seem to be very important but today it is very important and it effects all of Nunavut.
I would also like to thank the member for asking a question in regards to the official language commissioner.
One of our first priorities in languages and one of our goals for language, the Inuktitut language is that we protect it as well as promote the Inuktitut language in a vibrant society governed by a responsible government.
With our rating system we keep talking about how we can improve the use of language.
Last year when we first started working on the future Government of Nunavut the language issue was one of our priorities when we were planning to set up the department, the department of Culture Education Languages and Youth.
At this time we do have a language director, Atima Hadlari who is sitting in the gallery at this time.
We are now working on the language services to assist the Government of Nunavut on the Inuktitut language as the working language.
We have all the translation services for both the public service people of Nunavut, Inuktitut and Inuinnaqtun.
We are to work with the Department of Education from kindergarten to grade twelve in making the Inuktitut language the instruction curriculum.
In all the communities of Nunavut we are working with all the communities to see how we can serve the Inuktitut language as the working language and the way we use the Inuktitut and Inuinnaqtun language.
In 1998 MIC had a conference on language and motions were brought forth were utilized from there .One of the questions that was posed was that the department will have an official languages commission and that we will support and assist in any way that we can.
We will work with your standing committee.
Chairperson: Mr. Tootoo do you have any further comments?
I will let you know that I will inform our staff from our committee of this and you will more than likely be hearing from them.
I look forward to working together to develop this policy.
Mr. Chairman the Deputy Minister touched on another issue that is important for providing all the documents in Inuktitut and also in English.
Is the department looking at starting up the interpreter corp, which was a division in the old Department of Education.
Is the department looking at setting up similar type services in the department.
Mr. Havioyak or his deputy can respond.
Thank you for the question.
I think that it is going to be a bit different from the G.N.W.T. The language service is quite different then G.N.W.T. In the past the G.N.W.T. had an interpreter corp and later on a language bureau was established.
Once the language bureau was done away with we had taken the language bureau department back to the departments when it was with G.N.W.T. I think that this department will be a little bit different.
When we come to the language bureau they will provide interpreting and translation services, but mainly we will be focusing on the three interpretative translators which will be the Inuit language specialists.
It will be a bit different then being an interpreter.
They will be the people to protect and to preserve the Inuktitut language.
Also, while they are working on the language system they will also work with NTI, regional communities such as QIA and Nunavut Social Development Council.
While we are working with these other organizations we would also like to preserve our Inuktitut language.
Mr. Tootoo, do you have any further questions?
Again, going back to the Ministers comments where he mentioned the youth division and that there is a key link between the government and youth.
Mr. Chairman I am wondering if the department has any specific plans in providing for any assistance for youth facilities and programs geared specifically towards youth.
I know that here in Iqaluit in the last year we have had a number of fires which have caused millions of dollars in damage due to our youth not having a proper place to go and spend their time.
They are getting into mischief and causing problems.
I was wondering if the department has taken any specific initiatives targeted towards this area.
Either the Minister or the Deputy can respond.
Hon. Donald Havioyak: Your comments are very interesting.
In all the communities from Kugluktuk to Iqaluit to Sanikiluaq we have problems with the youth.
We also realize that the youths create a lot of problems when they have nothing to do.
They are getting into a lot of mischief because they have no places to go.
We also know that this affects everyone in the communities.
I think that eventually once we have the capital plans and when they are in place.
We need assistance so we can create these programs for our youth.
I think that if we can all help each other we can eventually create some places for these kids to go.
I will be working on this.
We would like to make these programs available for the youth.
If my Deputy Minister can add a supplementary to it.
Chairperson (interpretation): Mr. Irniq would you like to make a supplementary response?
Mr. Irniq (interpretation): Please, just a short supplementary response.
In Nunavut we would like to work with the youth in respect to the fact that the youth do not have any place to go or anything to do.
We will be working with the communities and working with the youth.
We are urging the youth to work with us.
Their needs are great so there are youth programs in each region and we would like to work with youth and youth programs in the future and today.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you Mr. Minister and Peter.
Mr. you may ask your question again.
Mr. Tootoo: Mr. Chairman, from the response I got, the Minister would like to work with us to get some funding in order to offer these sort of programs for the youth.
The Minister has stated that there is no funding available for these types of programs.
Hon. Donald Havioyak: You are correct.
We do not have any funding but we will still be working on these issues.
Right now we are working on the process of hiring a senior advisor for youth.
We are also in the process of hiring a youth co-ordinator.
Chairperson: Thank you Mr. Havioyak
Mr. Tootoo: Mr Chairman, I suppose I received my response.
There is no funding.
As for supplementary comments I am just surprised Mr. Chairman that a territory with such a large youth population that there have been no dollars allocated for youth programs.
This really surprises me Mr. Chairman.
Thank you Mr, Chairman.
Hon. Donald Havioyak (interpretation): We are only 50 days old and of course we could not jump in and get things going right away.
You must keep in mind that we are a very young government.
Chairperson (interpretation): Mr. O'Brien.  Mr. O'Brien: Thank you Mr. Chairman.
I realize that most of the questions  and the comments that we have heard this afternoon relate to IQ however, I was wondering if the Minister could spend some time on the general direction in which they are going right now and the kind of plans that they have.
Mr. Minister
Hon. Donald Havioyak: We do know where IQ is going and we are going to work with the Nunavut Social Development Council to develop topics on IQ. We want to include IQ within the government responsibilities. But, we have to work closely with our Nunavut partners, especially the Nunavut Social Development Council.
Perhaps Mr. Irniq may be able to add something to this.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you Mr. Minister. Mr. Irniq.
Mr. Irniq (interpretation): That is a very excellent question regarding Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit and where we are going to go today and where we will be going.
The Government of the N.W.T used to practice traditional knowledge in their schools such as in Rankin Inlet.
In regards to IQ Rankin Inlet had midwifery.
I believe that they practice midwifery today. I am not sure if they are still practicing that today however, they practised midwifery using Inuit traditional knowledge.
I do know quite a bit about caribou and what their migration patterns are.
With the elders and the Renewable Resources working together then we can begin to see a community that is practicing traditional knowledge.
Our hunting rights and the licenses that we use presently should be using traditional Inuit knowledge.
The Governments call this the cultural inclusion programs.
Inuit Traditional knowledge is an old term, which we finally started using in Igloolik this past summer at a conference.
The Development Council set up this conference with us and last year in March of 1998 we had a work shop.
We invited all the elders from all over the Nunavut area They went to this conference in Igloolik to talk about Inuit traditional knowledge.
While we were there in Igloolik we discussed various cultural issues in regards to Inuit lifestyles, Shamanism and traditional loss, for example, traditional adoption, which we still utilize today.
We also covered survival skills, land skills hunting, the environment, health, education and languages.
We covered all these topics at our meetings when we were having our meeting.
In August, the documents were translated from the Inuit traditional knowledge.
The paper that will be given to the Nunavut Social Development Council and following the Land Claims Articles, we had to be one of these Parties and once this was then, we started asking ourselves, how we’re going to Implement the Inuit Traditional Knowledge in the Nunavut Government.
That’s the question that we asked ourselves for example the Social Services, the Justice Department, Educators, Ourselves and Employment, Agencies got together and we put together a Statement that would be used as a Guideline by the Nunavut Government.
In regards to Inuit Traditional Knowledge, that’s what we did when we were preparing for the Nunavut Government.
To date we still have dialogue on how we can implement the Inuit Traditional Knowledge, in regards to various Issues that I mentioned, how we could instil more of the Inuit Traditional Knowledge into the Government System.
To date IQ, Inuit Traditions have been discussed and we have also talked about how we can use the Elder’s more and Languages.
In regards to the Justice System, the Education System, and for our own Department that’s been our dialogue to date and I keep hearing more and more about Inuit Qau-ji-ma-ja-tu-qa-ngit in the Communities, so it’s a very big issue to date.
Chairperson: (interpretation): Thank you Mr. Irniq.
Mr. O’Brien do you have any further comments.
Mr. O’Brien: That’s fine Mr. Chairman, Thank you Mr. Minister and the Deputy for those comments
Chairperson: (interpretation): I have no more names on my list.
I think it’s been 3 years now that I have been a Member of the Nunavut Wildlife Board.
I hope to make myself very clear with my statements, there has been various studies done by Scientists using the present technology and there has been a lot of studies done and only time that they come up here the Scientist come up here when it’s warming up outside like in the spring and they do studies on the environment and the weather.
Because they only come into spring they never get the true picture or what happens out there with the environment the land and so on the Inuit have lost the knowledge about the environment, the weather and the land and everything.
I think that we have to use the Inuit traditional knowledge more in these scientific studies I’m not an old person but I was brought up taught about the environment the water, around Clyde River area and I have yet to see a true pictures drawn by the result of the scientific people.
The Inuit are very closely linked to the environment and to the different seasons and it’s results in the winter and in the spring.
Our world revolves around the changing seasons and I would seriously like your department to consider using Inuit traditional knowledge when it comes to environmental studies and so on.
So we got a true picture of the North, it’s not a question it’s just a comment that I wanted to make and I hope that I got my point across.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you Mr. Iqaqrialu, it’s very true.
There’s a lot of word that we use for the environment either the Minister or the Deputy Minister can make a response to Mr. Iqaqrialu’s comment. Mr. Irniq.
We discussed the various issues in regards to Inuit Traditional Knowledge with the Nunavut Social Development Council.
We covered various topics like land survival, weather and we include the environment and everything else in these discussion.
Chairperson: Thank you Mr. Deputy Minister.
Mr. Iqaqrialu do you have any further comments.
Mr. Chairman maybe just a follow up on the Mr. O’Brien’s comments earlier on IQ has the Department developed any specific policy on how there going to integrate this not only into their department but with the other departments and also into the programs and services of the government.
Mr. Havioyak or Deputy Minister Irniq
Yes, we are setting up a policy on Inuit Qaujimajituqangit and we are working with the various government departments in setting up this policy and we also work with the Nunavut social development council.
Will we work together with NSCC in setting up the Inuit  Qau-ji-ma-ja-tu-qa-ngit policies.
Mr. Chairman could the Ministers Deputy Minister give us a possible time line or when we could see such a policy. I know that it’s a question that I get asked by constituents and it is nice to see you're working on it.
It would be nice to know when to expect to get some kind of information back so that we can provide it our constituencies.
Minister or Deputy Minister Havioyak
I apologize Mr. Chairman we’re not trying to keep any information confidential.
We will have to work closely together with the Nunavut Social Development Council, I cannot pin point a deadline, I apologize Mr. Chairman because I cannot answer your question directly but we will be working on it.
Like I was saying I could use an example of the Elders who are now in the schools teaching Inuit traditional knowledge.
That’s now in existence we hear from the governments that we have to do more in regards to Inuit traditional knowledge and we will keep working on it in the future.