EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
Honourable Leona Aglukkaq, Honourable Olayuk Akesuk, Mr. David Alagalak, Mr. James Arreak, Honourable Levinia Brown, Mr. Tagak Curley, Mr. Joe Allen Evyagotailak, Mr. Peter Kattuk, Honourable Peter Kilabuk, Mr. Patterk Netser, Honourable Jobie Nutarak, Honourable Paul Okalik, Mr. Keith Peterson, Honourable Edward Picco, Honourable David Simailak, Honourable Louis Tapardjuk, Mr. Hunter Tootoo.
Speaker (interpretation): Let us pray.
I would like to take this opportunity to review for members some of the principles, guidelines, and rules applicable to debates in the Assembly.
Members of the Executive Council and regular members have different but equally important roles in the House.
The rules and guidelines applicable to debate are designed to facilitate the orderly and efficient business of the House, while ensuring that all members are able to carry out their mandate as elected representatives.
Question period is an important tool in this regard.
Marleau and Montpetit, in House of Commons Practice and Procedure, set out the following guidelines for question period:
Question period has a two-fold purpose: first, to illicit information from the government and second, to hold the government accountable for its actions;
time is limited, so questioning should make the most efficient use of the time available;
members should be given the widest possible freedom in the putting of a question; and
the Speaker, or in committee, the Chair, does not evaluate the quality of either the question or the answer.
The substance of these guidelines is incorporated into the rules of our own Assembly, which also provide that a question shall be concise and clear and shall refer only to a matter which may reasonably be assumed to be within the present knowledge of the minister responsible.
Further, a question must not repeat an earlier question which was answered, taken as notice, or to which an answer was refused at that sitting.
A further element that must be carefully considered is the role of the Speaker or Chair.
The Speaker or Chair is not in a position to evaluate the quality of questions or responses.
Nor should the Speaker or Chair be placed in a position where the substance of questions or answers is constantly being challenged on procedural grounds.
When answering a question, a minister may:
answer the question;
state that he or she takes the question as notice and respond to it orally on a subsequent day under the item “Returns to Oral Questions”; or
decline to answer a question.
It is important that the rules not be applied in such a way as to stifle legitimate debate on issues.
Equally important is that the rules operate to prevent repetitious questioning that does not further the business of the House.
The issue that has arisen is the extent to which a line of inquiry or debate should be terminated by the Speaker or Chair when a specific question has been taken as notice.
In considering this issue, one must determine what the purpose is of taking a question as notice.
Taking a question as notice is not a refusal to answer a question.
Rather, it is an indication that the minister requires time to either obtain the necessary information or to frame a proper response.
Having said that, taking a question as notice cannot be used as a means to shut down questioning on an entire subject matter.
By way of example, a minister might be asked, “What is the minister’s position on decentralization of government departments?”
. If the minister were to take the question as notice, it could not be said that having done so, no further questions may be asked of this or any other minister on the issue of decentralization.
Such a finding would effectively eliminate all further debate on a legitimate matter of public interest.
By way of contrast, a minister might be asked the very specific question, “How many school buses were purchased by the government in the 2003-2004 fiscal year?”
. If the question were taken as notice, that specific question or questions, designed to illicit the identical information, could not be asked again until the government had provided a reply.
However, questions relating to the government’s policy on acquiring school buses would be permissible.
This issue arose on Friday May 21 in the context of questioning regarding the awarding of a contract for medevac services to a specific airline in the Kivalliq.
I have had the opportunity to review Hansard in both English and Inuktitut.
Because of the complexity of the debate, I will provide a ruling which is intended to guide future debate rather than rule on each specific question that arose.
The question which was taken as notice was put to the Minister of Finance.
The minister was asked if cabinet had scrutinized the responses to the request for proposals and if cabinet had directed the deputy minister of Health and Social Services to award the contract to a particular airline.
Subsequent questions on the matter asked why the awarding of the contract had been considered by cabinet at all, whether it was the usual practice for cabinet to consider and award contracts, and whether there had been political interference in the awarding of the particular contract at issue.
All of these questions, given the context in which they were asked, clearly related to the Kivalliq medivac contract.
However, none of them seek the same information as the question which was taken as notice.
Accordingly, they are permissible lines of questioning.
One question asked whether the direction given by cabinet on the awarding of the contract was different from the recommendation made by the department.
This question presupposes the answer to the question taken as notice, in that it presumes that cabinet did in fact provide direction on the awarding of the contract.
Accordingly, this question is out of order.
It is important to remember that the fact that a question may be asked does not entitle members to a response.
Ministers may take any number of questions as notice and may even decline to answer questions, with or without an explanation.
The appropriateness of doing so is a matter for the members and the pubic to determine, not the Speaker or Chair.
This issue was made more difficult by the fact that a government official provided a response in Committee of the Whole to the question which was taken as notice.
It is understandable why this could cause confusion.
In the course of this debate a point of privilege was raised.
The point of privilege arose in response to a decision by the Chair.
Once a point of order has been ruled upon, the matter is no longer open to debate and cannot be raised again under the guise of privilege (Marleau & Montpeit House of Commons Practice and Procedure, page 543).
There are occasions when members will disagree strongly on issues, debates will become intense, and emotions will run high.
(Interpretation.)
My role and the role of the Chair in Committee of the Whole is to ensure an orderly, fair debate.
In the course of fulfilling our duties we will undoubtedly make decisions that not all members agree with.
This is to be expected.
Members must accept those decisions and move on with the business of the House.
I find that there is no point of privilege for consideration.
Another issue that has arisen in this House during the past week concerns the citation of, and referral to, documents in the possession of members.
The specific question here is the extent to which members may quote from, or refer to, documents that have not been formally tabled in this House.
Two principles to be respected here are as follows.
Firstly, where information is given to the House, the House itself is entitled to the same information as the member who may quote the document.
Secondly, the ability of members to express themselves and seek information should not be unduly constrained by unreasonable procedural requirements.
This is another area of procedure where a degree of discretion and reasonable interpretation must be applied by the Chair, especially in light of our rules’ lack of detailed guidance.
I would also draw the attention of members to page 517 of House of Commons Procedure and Practice, which illustrates the point: “There is no Standing Order which governs the citation of documents; the House is guided mainly by custom and precedents.”
As a guide, documents that have been formally tabled in the House or that are clearly in the public domain may be quoted from freely without fear of points of order being accepted with respect to the ability of a member to cite them.
These would include, to provide some diverse illustrative examples, such items as a Government of Nunavut news release; a territorial or federal statute; scripture; the constitution of Canada; or a local newspaper story to which all members have reasonable access.
It would be perfectly reasonable, for example, for a member to quote at reasonable length from the federal budget speech when posing a question to a minister on intergovernmental relations, notwithstanding the fact that the speech itself has not been formally tabled in this House.
It would also be perfectly reasonable for a minister to quote from a document tabled in the first Assembly, such as the Clyde River Protocol.
There is no need for such a document from the first Assembly to be retabled prior to its being cited.
To impose such a requirement would serve no reasonable purpose, especially insofar as the document is not an item requiring a decision of the House, as would be the case of a bill being re-introduced by the government.
The issue of correspondence is somewhat different.
In some cases, a member may wish to quote from, or refer to, a letter that he or she reasonably believes to be in the possession of another member or members.
This could include a letter sent to all members from a territorial advocacy organization.
In other cases a member may wish to quote from a letter sent by a constituent that only the member has in his or her possession.
Certainly, all members may quote freely in their members’ statements from correspondence that has not been formally tabled, provided that the correspondence is signed and the member is prepared to identify the author.
An example of this could include a constituent’s comments on a matter of public policy.
I would add at this point that some members of the House will recall that this issue of anonymous correspondence was clearly addressed during the first Assembly.
I would remind the House that ministers always have the right to indicate in a response to a question, whether during oral question period or during proceedings of the Committee of the Whole, that they have not read a document in question and decline to answer on those grounds, but the question is not itself out of order.
However, detailed supplementary questions based on the contents of the document would not be permitted by the Chair, especially when the minister has indicated to the House that he or she is not cognizant of the document’s contents.
In a case where a member later engages in a line of debate or questioning that revolves around a document that has not been formally tabled and is clearly not in the knowledge or possession of the members involved in the interlocution, then the Chair would rule that the document being quoted be tabled at the next opportunity prior to further interventions based on its contents being made.
This ruling would be made in the interest of the business of the House not being unreasonably stalled.
Again, in some cases a degree of reasonable discretion on the part of the Chair is required in this area.
For example, let us envision a situation where a member has previously written a letter to a minister on a matter of public policy and wishes to pose oral questions regarding the written response received by the member from the minister.
Neither the original letter nor the response have been formally tabled.
Would questions be out of order solely because not all members had necessarily seen either of the documents?
In the event of a point of order arising on the matter, the Chair would likely permit the minister the discretion to answer the question, while asking the member to subsequently table the documents involved for the benefit of the House as a whole.
The Chair would again encourage members involved to table such materials in advance of their questioning so that all members have the benefit of knowing their contents.
To examine another possible situation, let us envision that a minister, in the course of responding to an oral question on a detailed budgetary matter regarding his or her department, reads aloud from briefing materials prepared for his or her use.
The Chair would not entertain a point of order made against the minister on the grounds that the briefing materials themselves, which certainly could be considered a type of document, had not been tabled in the House.
The same approach would be taken if a minister were to make a point of order demanding that a member opposite table his or her written speaking notes on a motion.
I would conclude by saying that the Standing Committee on Rules, Procedures, and Privileges may wish to explicitly address this area and bring forward recommendations for amendments to our rules.
While the rules cannot be expected to provide detailed guidance to cover tabling requirements for every possible form of information that could be referred to in the course of deliberations, a more detailed set of guidelines concerning the citation of written and signed correspondence could be introduced.
Information is, by its very nature, a flexible concept.
For example, it would not be in the interest of open discussion in this House for the rules to impose tabling requirements on members wishing to refer to information coming to light in the form of radio or television broadcasts.
Circumstances may require that a document be tabled so that it is available to all members.
This is within my discretion or the discretion of the Chair.
Indeed, members may find that tabling a document brings clarity and context to the debate which is otherwise lacking.
Members are also reminded that when referring to a document it is important that the document be identified with precision so as to minimize the possibility of confusion.
With respect to the matter at hand, the member was invited by the Chair to table the document in question.
Given that there is clearly confusion surrounding the nature and content of the document, he may want to take the opportunity to do so.
The issues discussed are often difficult and are always a matter of discretion.
No set of rules will ever be sufficient to address every circumstance.
I am hopeful, however, that this ruling provides some guidance to members as they carry out their important duties.
So that was my brief ruling.
Item 2, “Ministers' statements.”
Item 2: Ministers’s Statements
Minister’s Statement 019 – 2(1): Hamlet Deficits
I rise today to update the members of this House on the activities of my department in assisting municipalities with deficits and the financial difficulties they are experiencing.
My department’s Community Development Division focuses exclusively on municipal operations, training, and increasing community capacity.
Staff from our regional offices and staff from our Community Development Division are working together with the municipalities, offering assistance to ensure that all municipalities remain financially stable.
Over the past few months we have assisted several communities to develop and implement deficit recovery plans. These will see the communities gain substantial ground in recovering their deficits over the next 12 months.
My department is proactively working towards assisting communities in avoiding deficits.
Staff continue to conduct full municipal, financial, and operational evaluations in communities.
These evaluations are key in identifying capacity within our municipalities and allow us to assist communities in strengthening their abilities to manage their affairs in a more efficient and financially sound manner.
Over the next number of months, staff from my department will continue actively to assist the municipalities in addressing their operational challenges.
Minister’s Statement 020 – 2(1): Inuinnaqtun Interpreter Translator Program
I would like to take this opportunity to inform the House today about the development of an Inuinnaqtun interpreter-translator program at the Kitikmeot campus of Nunavut Arctic College.
As we all know, there is a need in Nunavut to have more trained Inuinnaqtun interpreter-translators, and I am pleased to inform the House that the Department of Culture, Language, Elders, and Youth has contracted Nunavut Arctic College to develop an Inuinnaqtun interpreter-translator program to address this need.
Nunavut Arctic College struck a committee to provide guidance in the research and development of the program.
Furthermore, an access-year program outline has been developed to increase the students’ knowledge in Inuinnaqtun. Courses for both the access-year and Inuinnaqtun interpreter-translator program have been identified.
The program is well underway and we anticipate delivery of the access-year program beginning September 2004.
Item 3: Members’s Statements
Member’s Statement 087 – 2(1): Homelessness in Nunavut
I rise today on the issue of homelessness in Nunavut.
It is all too easy to ignore this issue in Nunavut.
Homelessness is largely invisible here; no one lives in cardboard boxes on the streets.
This does not make homelessness any less serious.
Our extreme climate means that people are given a roof over their heads whether there is space for them or not.
Families make room for their loved ones even when they are already living in overcrowded situations.
My colleagues have raised the complex issue of overcrowding and the social and health problems that are related to it in this House many times.
The problems associated with overcrowding do not stop Nunavummiut from helping their loved ones: families share their limited space and resources because they know that there are no other options available.
A roof over a person’s head, Mr. Speaker, does not make them any less homeless.
Often, the homeless feel like they are a burden to their family and end up moving from home to home.
They have no stability.
It is time for this government to address homelessness decisively.
It is time for this government to acknowledge the reality of homelessness.
It is necessary to have shelters for the homeless in our territory.
We need shelters that are staffed by caring workers who can help people get back on their feet by helping them gain access to social programs and build life skills.
It is difficult for people to access the government’s existing programs if they do not have the basic stability of a dependable roof over their heads and help to access those programs.
Mr. Speaker, the homeless in Nunavut do not need a hand-out; they need a hand up.
I will be asking questions on this issue at the appropriate time.
Member’s Statement 088 – 2(1): Triplet Girls
I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate a young couple.
On Saturday, at about 2:45 pm, they had triplets.
I would also like to congratulate their grandparents, Agnus Kokak and Bennett Hikomak, and their families.
Best wishes for you both and for your three new little girls.
Member’s Statement 089 – 2(1): Member Absent from the House
Mr. Netser (interpretation): Although I arrived with Mr. Mapsalak, he was quite ill today.
So, he was not going to attend the session today, for your information.
Member’s Statement 090 – 2(1): Arviat Cod Fishing Derby
For the long weekend I would like to recognize the Arviatmiut.
There was a cod fishing derby in Arviat.
All of them really wanted to catch a good-sized cod and they really wanted to get the prize.
There were very good prizes available.
I was very pleased this morning when I heard the elders had won the derby.
The elders who won were Lee Angalik, from Arviat, who won a Bravo.
His fish was 57 centimetres long.
And also an elder who had gone to Arviat, Lizzie Ittinuar, won some cash.
I was very pleased to hear that.
I was very pleased to hear about the elders winning all the prizes, although they stayed on the ice for not too long.
Billy Quqsuk and Lisa Ukkutaq , although they are elders, went fishing. I was very pleased to hear that they attended the fishing derby.
I would also like to congratulate and recognize all of the participants of the fishing derby as well as the winners.
There were 15 prizes to be won, and I very pleased that Arviatmiut won the prizes. I would like to see this happen all the time.
Member’s Statement 091 – 2(1): Beluga Whaling in Hudson Bay
I rise today to talk about whaling in Hudson Bay.
The Inuit of Sanikiluaq, I know, are very knowledgeable about beluga in that area because the beluga do not really migrate very far.
That is in the traditional knowledge in the Sanikiluaq area.
Back in the 1990s or at the end of the 1980s there was a concern about the number of belugas. We wanted to see a study done on belugas to find out where they migrate to, using recent testing methods.
Sanikiluaq residents wanted to find out whether these beluga migrate to James Bay or if they are the same stock.
But to date, we have not heard any results of this study. These beluga whales that have been caught by Sanikiluaq residents, they have been tested and it was stated that they are part of the eastern Hudson Bay beluga.
There is currently a concern with the eastern Hudson Bay beluga.
At the appropriate time I will be asking a question to the appropriate minister in regards to the Sanikiluaq beluga whales, to find out where they actually came from.
Member’s Statement 092 – 2(1): Workshop in Taloyoak
I would like to inform the Assembly about an important workshop that is taking place in my constituency, Taloyoak.
This workshop is part of the Qamma Mobile Treatment Program, a project which was initiated to assist people that may have suffered as a result of a residential school experience.
It is important to note that this program is unique as it is also geared to the families of those that have been impacted by residential school experiences.
The Taloyoak session of the program runs from May 3 to 28 and there are approximately 10 participants from the community of Taloyoak that are taking part.
In addition to sharing their experiences, they are also working on setting up aftercare and are receiving valuable instructions on how to facilitate a similar workshop on their own.
I would like to wish the participants from Taloyoak all the best in the program.
Member’s Statement 093 – 2(1): Spring Seal-Hunting Incident
We go seal hunting every spring all over Nunavut and in Pangnirtung.
During the past weekend people were out seal hunting, but it was very different from years past because there was a son and father who reached whales but their boat capsized.
Fortunately, the son was wearing a floater, while the father almost drowned.
The son caught him by his leg, and that is the way that he saved his father.
I spoke with the father, Lita Kullualik, this morning.
We would like to thank Jimmy Ittuqquuq Kullualik on behalf of the community of Pangnirtung and the other members of the Legislative Assembly for saving his father’s life when their boat capsized out at sea.
I would like to give thanks again to Mosesie and Silasie Nakasuk who picked them up out of the sea. Mr. Speaker, members, during the break I will be celebrating, with maktaaq that they caught, because these two were saved.
Member statements.
Hon. Louis Tapardjuk.
Member’s Statement 094 – 2(1): Physical Activity Week
I rise today to announce that this week is physical activity week. I would like to thank everybody for playing hockey.
I am not too sure who it was, as I was the goalie, but because it was so hard, one of us got cut and had to have seven stitches on his finger.
The next time we are going to play hockey maybe we should exercise a bit before we start the game, because it is good for your body, mind, and soul to have physical activity such as this.
I would like to thank all the members for being a part of this morning, a very good use of leisure time.
Speaker (interpretation): Members’ statements, Mr. Tootoo.
Member’s Statement 095 – 2(1): Speech and Hearing Month Fundraising