EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
Interestingly, these people are not Inuit, or rarely Inuit.
Can the minister assure me that the materials being developed for use in our textbooks will be respectful of religious faiths and their practice, including Christianity, Judaism, and Islam?
Speaker (interpretation): The Minister Responsible for Education. Mr. Picco.
I want to just clarify your earlier question and the response from Minister Tapardjuk. The workshop that was given on Shamanism was given to some of the staff of the Department of Education. It was through the Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit Group of the department, and suggestions came up for different types of questions and different types of areas to be asked about.
That was one that they had raised. It was facilitated through the group.
Specifically, on the member’s question, on the textbooks; Mr. Speaker, all of our textbooks are again drafted and proofed before they get into a classroom. We have certain protocols in place on the design of textbooks.
Some of those include the western protocols where they involve other territories and Alberta and British Columbia just to name a few provinces working on curriculum matters.
Specifically on the issue when it comes to religion, when you look at religions, you want to have a depth of understanding of different religions.
As the member pointed out, there is more than one religion in the world. And when you are looking at multi-cultural programs and courses in the schools, at times they will touch on some of the different religions in the world.
I hope that answers and clarifies the question.
I am concerned that there are double standards when it comes to what groups can and cannot use public property and resources for different purposes.
My question for the minister is this: what is his department’s policy with respect to the use of departmental or school facilities to hold discussions on the rich religious traditions and practices that we have in Nunavut?
The direction on the policy of school usage is dedicated and acquiesced through the auspices of our district education authorities, or the local DEAs. For example, if a group wanted to use the school for a meeting and what have you, it goes through the district education authority process for approval at the local level.
I am not aware of where a particular religious group have contacted the district education authority and requested to use the school to hold meetings or so on. I am not privy to that information. But that is the process; it goes through the local district education authority.
We can call it Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit just for a cop out. But really it is religion.
And we heard from the Returns to Oral Questions that a workshop was held in terms of promoting Shamanism.
Mr. Speaker, you will have noticed the very first item on Orders of the Day for the Legislative Assembly is prayer, and the last time I checked the Legislative Assembly it is a public institution. What is the Minister’s position on prayers in our schools?
Does he support Christian biblical programs in our schools?
Mr. Speaker, I go to church every Sunday and my kids don’t. I give them the opportunity when I go. Do you want to come with me?
They say no. I don’t try to bring them along. However, that is my belief.
Mr. Speaker, when we look at our school system, when you are doing subjects in schools…let’s use an example Mr. Speaker, if you use history for example, if you are going to study what has occurred throughout history in the last 2,000 years you have to look at the Moors, where Muslims invaded Europe and took over for example Spain.
Their cultural influences, the cultural influences through the dark ages, the middle ages with the Christian renaissance, when you look at what has occurred with the second world war with the holocaust with Jews and Judaism as an example; the strong Southeast Asian religion of Hinduism; Shintoism in Japan.
So, Mr. Speaker, anytime when you are looking at cultures, you are studying history, you are going to have a religious aspect, Mr. Speaker. I would welcome, like any individual looking at studies and academics, to be able to look at all that in context in the school.
And I support that practice in the school like any other jurisdiction.
Over in the Kivalliq region there are pastors that call youth rallies and they often ask for funding from different various organizations but the government’s stand is they cannot fund religious activities.
Are we hearing then that he will support programs like this and will they be able to ask for funds from the Department of Education for the youth rallies that they hold each year?
The Government of Nunavut and most governments don’t fund churches as such.
Mr. Speaker, they don’t fund programs offered through secular or through structured religions. We have a public school system and a public government, Mr. Speaker.
So when programs or services, or events come forward for different departments to fund, each one is based and judged on its own merit.
So I think that’s the short answer to the question.
Question 111 – 2(3): Review of Funding Strategy for Safe Harbours (Alagalak)
Mr. Speaker, earlier today I spoke of needs for a safe harbour in Arviat. The Minister of Economic Development and Transportation recently wrote to the Chair of the Standing Committee on Infrastructure, Housing and Economic Development.
He indicated that his department has been working with the federal government to review funding options for implementing the Safe Harbour Strategy.
The minister tabled the Safe Harbour Strategy document earlier this week.
I note that a breakwater project in Arviat is not specifically identified with the strategic vision, however there is potential for work to be done under minor works.
Will the minister commit to including a review of the breakwater needs of the Arviat community under the minor work plan for the Safe Harbours, Healthy Communities Strategy?
I want to assure my colleague that I am committed to working with the community of Arviat along with the other communities that have not been identified in the first proposal that has been submitted to the federal government.
As you know, Mr. Speaker, our department, being responsible for the breakwaters, under transportation, we have also identified a need to the federal government on the other communities that are not identified currently in the proposal.
So to answer my colleague’s question, yes, I am committed to looking at Arviat and also the other communities that are in need of breakwaters and facilities to be able to provide a safe harbour and also conveniences for both economic development opportunities and also safe keeping of community infrastructure.
We’ve been neglected for over 15 years in regard to this. I know that you’ll be receiving some requests for compensation from individuals that have lost their boats.
We don’t even have a safe harbour. The dock we have is not even safe enough.
(interpretation ends) Can the minister provide an update on the current status of the Safe Harbours, Healthy Communities Strategy and provide details on what funding options are currently being considered.
The Department of Economic Development and Transportation currently has no base funding. It has nothing in the base funding for facilities such as breakwaters or to even develop them.
However, Mr. Speaker, as a verbal update in the House today, we have been continually discussing this matter with the federal government and we had reached a point in having forwarded this to the Deputy Minister of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans at the federal level but, as everybody saw the other day with the collapse of the government, it is very hard at this time to determine where this file will sit and if there will be delays.
Mr. Speaker, I remind myself and my colleagues that the next steps in how well this file advances at the federal level will be dependent on the elections and the appointment of the minister.
Mr. Speaker, I will commit to providing this in written form to my colleague and also the House of the events where they are today.
Question 112 – 2(3): Food Mail Program Point of Entry Winnipeg (Curley)
I would like to ask the Premier. I made a statement in regard to the food mail order program, especially in the Keewatin region.
The point of entry that you can order from is Churchill.
Churchill is not very useful for the Kivalliq region.
The only time you go to Churchill is when you are ill, as a patient.
The Keewatin people don’t even go there to shop.
During the summer could the Premier state that Winnipeg could be a point of entry if he had heard from the federal government if this could be changed, that Winnipeg could be the point of entry for those Food Mail Programs?
Is he working to make this proceed?
Yes, we’ve been lobbying on this.
It is still under review and we have not received any response from the federal government.
The elections are on now. It is evident that this election is going to delay the review of this.
It’s not just for Winnipeg point of entry; it’s for the Baffin region too. The point of entry is Val D’Or for the Baffin region.
So it’s not just the Kivalliq that requires a solution for a point of entry. When we have those places as points of entry the fresh products arrives already rotten, so all Nunavummiut need to get fresh produce that are still fresh.
I would like to thank the Premier for working on this because we know that this has to go ahead in the Kitikmeot.
They are not as concerned about this because their point of entry is Edmonton or Yellowknife. They are able to send the Food Mail Program.
I am urging the Premier to continue lobbying. Perhaps the federal government should transfer the responsibility to the Nunavut Government.
If you have not considered this, perhaps if you can consider taking that responsibility, that way we can administer our own point of entry for a Food Mail Program.
Yes, we have been looking for solutions because it’s quite expensive.
That is a concern but we can try and lobby the federal government to continue to pay for this program.
I believe that we can probably take that on.
Some of the harder issues that have been transferred from the federal government have been done in the past along with the funding.
That way, I would support it myself if the transfer came with the funding. I would not be in support of it if the Nunavut Government would have to use its own funds.
I know that the federal government is not too respectful of where we can get cheaper groceries. For that reason, perhaps you can include this in the list of your priorities because it’s getting very expensive to order food and we keep talking about how expensive the food is in the communities of the High Arctic, Kivalliq, and also the other communities. The government can give support in regard to this.
Perhaps you can work harder on this issue.
Perhaps it’s more expensive to use this because they have to transport their order by train. If they had directly flown those orders from Winnipeg or from Ottawa directly, it would be cheaper for the freight.
I will not stop dealing with this issue and I will have my officials look into this further.
With the next new government that is elected I will discuss this and also work with the members of the legislature.
Question 113 – 2(3): Northern Strategy Funding (Peterson)
Mr. Speaker, the Northern Strategy Fund for the north was announced in December 2004 and Nunavut’s share of the $120 million strategy funds is $40 million.
My question for the Premier: can the Premier explain to the House if the Government of Nunavut undertook a comprehensive public consultation process to discuss with Nunavummiut how the Government of Nunavut should invest the $40 million from the Northern Strategy funding?
What we were given is the option to spend the money any way we wish as a government.
So what we set out to do was to accomplish what we set out during this term and we also talked with the regular members before announcing this $40 million expenditure.
So that’s what we have done and I feel that, with the responses that I have received so far, that those are the right decisions we have made on the $40 million.
I thank the Premier for the answer.
I’m a Regular Member as well and I don’t recall being directly consulted on how to spend the money. I recall bringing it up in March of 2004 and I recall the Premier mentioning that we would be consulted at a Full Caucus Retreat.
My question for the Premier, Mr. Speaker: can the Premier explain to the House exactly how the Cabinet arrived at the decision about how to spend the $40 million?
We have discussed it over a lengthy period of time. We wanted to take the time to review it and felt, as a Cabinet, that if we were going to accomplish what we set out, as a whole, the direction that we received from Arviat just after we created our government is that we want to set up a trades school, we want to set up a culture school, we want to set up a heritage centre, and we want to focus on the smaller communities. Those are the directions that we received from all Members of this House.
So as a Cabinet, we said, how are we going to accomplish that? Well, this $40 million is targeted toward Nunavut and that’s the vehicle that we will use to accomplish what we set out, as a whole, in this legislature.
So that’s what we discussed and agreed that that’s the direction that we will go on.
So all members took part in forming that mandate for this term and I recall that I wrote a letter to all members outlining how we will spend that money over a month ago before we announced how we would spend this money to the public.
Yes, the Arviat Retreat was last September 2004 and the funding was announced in December 2004, and it was my understanding that there would be a consultation process.
Yes, I did get a copy of the letter.
The letter is obviously... it looked like the decisions were already made and we were just being informed of the decision. Mr. Speaker, in the Northwest Territories the government decided to move $35 million of their funding directly to communities using a base allocation and per capita formula.
They obviously felt that more of their residents would benefit if the funds were moved directly down to the community level. My question for the Premier: why didn’t the Government of Nunavut consider doing the same to help out our Nunavut communities?
Hon. Paul Okalik: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think we have differing issues in Nunavut.
We’ve decentralized our government considerably, so some of those communities are doing quite well, and we all hear that the smaller communities are suffering so we wanted to provide special attention to the smaller communities and give them special attention in terms of improving their economies.
We also agreed as this government that we have to incorporate more of our culture into our government.
So that’s why we felt that, in this government, we wanted to institute our own school. We don’t even have a museum or cultural centre in Nunavut.
Those are some things that the Northwest Territories already have. That’s why we felt that in order for us to promote more of our culture here in Nunavut, we have to implement those things.
How are we going to implement them? So the first opportunity that we received was with the $40 million.
That’s why we put those programs in place, so that we can make those happen.
The Northwest Territories have the luxury of having a heritage centre. They have a diverse population, so they can’t focus so much on any particular cultural group. In Nunavut, we have the benefit of having a homogeneous populace so we can focus on our culture to enrich it and make it stronger for future generations.
I thank the Premier for that answer.
Mr. Speaker, I think the heritage centre may end up costing $60 million over the next five to ten years, and we need money now in our communities to help with economic development and other social and cultural initiatives.
Mr. Speaker, over the last two and a half weeks during the capital estimates process, the Cabinet Members heard directly through regular members about several possible social and economic development projects across Nunavut.
Every riding I believe... I didn’t keep track, but every Member of the Legislative Assembly spoke about things that their ridings needed.
So my question for the Premier, Mr. Speaker: will the Premier commit to reviewing the issues of projects raised by the regular members before the Northern Strategy document is finalized with the issues mentioned in the Commissioner’s with a view to ensuring that every Nunavut community benefits directly with investment funds from the Northern Strategy.
We also have the benefit of getting some federal assistance for all municipalities. I believe it is over $30 million that will be coming in the future.
So we have the benefit of that, which is going directly to the municipalities to assist them in building up the infrastructure.
So that’s why we felt at this time that the focus should be on our priorities as a government as a whole on issues that we’ve discussed in detail as a caucus, and that’s why we felt that to catch up to the rest of the country in terms of having those facilities.
In particular, we don’t even have a trades school, and there are these mines that will be opening up in the very near future and we felt that should be a priority and we want to make sure that we take advantage of any mining activities coming to Nunavut.
So those are priorities that we’ve set and we want to implement, so that all Nunavummiut can benefit.
Question 114 – 2(3): Include Mine Training in Adult Learning Strategy (Barnabas)
(interpretation ends) On the mine training; will the government include mine training in the Adult Learning Strategy?
The member is correct. Under the Adult Learning Strategy that we tabled in the House, mining is a component of that as well as the other trades and secondary education.
Again, the strategy is just a draft and we are looking for feedback from Nunavummiut.
I would hope to be in the position in the new year to bring forth and complete this strategy and will include I am sure at the end of the day different types of trades that are involved in mining.
Mine training includes many trades and does the Minister acknowledge this.
The mining trades are inclusive, which means, Mr. Speaker, they are not exclusive of other trades. They include heavy equipment operations, they include administration work, they include financial accounting and so on; whatever the trades are that are involved in mining operations.
What we are seeing right now, Mr. Speaker, is that the traditional mine trades, when we think about mines a lot of people think about a hole in the ground with someone with a pick and a shovel. Mr. Speaker, we are far removed from that reality today. Today many of the mine jobs are technical and they require a good sounding in engineering and carpentry in some of the trades because Mr. Speaker, in many of our cases our mines are isolated mines and so you actually have a worksite.
And at that worksite if you had 300 people working, you need cooks; you need heavy equipment operators and people to extract the product from the ground and so on.
So the short answer to the Member’s question is yes it includes all of the multi-facets of trades.
Will the training be available to all the communities in Nunavut?
There is a Nunavut mining training group that is in place looking at the different training opportunities. For the Member for example near Arctic Bay we heard talk of the Baffinland iron ore find.
Mr. Speaker, some of the projections show that mine, in itself, could be 75 to 100 years in a timeline.
So there is going to be a lot of opportunity in mining throughout Nunavut. And we know about the situation in Baker Lake and we know what is happening in the Kitikmeot as an example, in Igloolik with the recent diamond find. Mr. Speaker, in the next ten years, there will be a lot of activity in mining in Nunavut as these projects move forward.
So part of the opportunity for training is for all of Nunavut, that is part of the Adult Learning Strategy and it is also part of the mine training focus group and also with the commitment by the Premier and the government to move forward on our own trade school program in Nunavut itself.
We have asked repeated questions on the trade school and the cultural school.
Could the minister tell us what is going to be happening with the trade school and where it is going to be located?
Right now, the opportunity had presented itself to look at putting the trade school in the community of Rankin Inlet because we had an opportunity with our partner, with the federal government the Department of National Defence with the FOL site.
We’ve had a team in Rankin Inlet over the last several weeks looking at the opportunities that present themselves with that site. We have to be cognizant of the fact that the federal government and the Department of National Defence may have different caveats in place.
For example, would we have to leave the building within 24 hours, or 48 hours, or two-week notice? Would we have to return the building the way we found it? For example, if we put up walls and so on, and make classrooms, what are the O&M costs on the FOL site?
So, all of those factors should be figured out in the next several days.
I would hope to be in a position in two weeks to have a report on the FOL site, whether we move forward with it, or not.
At that time Mr. Speaker, we’ll look at options on how we deliver trades training in Nunavut. As the Premier just indicated earlier, under the Northern Strategy, we have allocated $10 million for a trades’ school. At the same time we have $780,000 in the capital budget.
What that brings for us Mr. Speaker, is an opportunity to look at, if the FOL site is not available, is there other infrastructure available in the community. Should we multi task our money? For example, to multi task the monies in different regions of Nunavut to provide the same exposure?
Should we have a stand-alone facility?
Once we look at the report in two weeks, which will be presented to me, as Minister of Education, on the FOL site, if we are going to move forward, or not, then we can actually look at the other options; A; B; and C. What I would to is make a commitment to the members of the House, and to the standing committee that I will bring an options paper to the Cabinet, and then to the standing committee and members on how we can approach delivering trades training in Nunavut.
Some of the members have said Mr. Speaker, that it is not acceptable that all of our trades people, in many cases, have to go to the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology in Edmonton, or to the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology in Calgary, or indeed, go to Fort Smith.
Question 115 – 2(3): Inuit Employment Plans (Tootoo)
My question is not for the minister with a pick and a shovel. My question is for the Premier, the Minister responsible for Executive and Intergovernmental Affairs.
Yesterday I raised some questions in regard to hiring practices and basically outlining that there are gaps in how our priority hiring policy is implemented.
I know that the Inuit Employment Division is a division within the Department of Human Resources, and basically, it has the task of policing themselves. We all know how that works; you can ask the RCMP when it comes to people’s opinion when it comes to the dog slaughter issue.
My question to the Premier is in light of this, in light of the slow increase over the last three years, I think we’re at 46 percent Inuit hire right now within the government, as a whole, it is just like it crept up, one or two percent each year.
Would the Premier be willing to take a look at shifting those responsibilities out of the Department of Human Resources, putting it in as a secretariat, like they did with decentralization, and giving them some teeth; broadening their power to monitor and patrol these hiring practices by the departments and the government?
So far we are making slow progress but the benefit of having it at human resources is that there is additional staff that they can draw on to ensure that the Inuit Employment Plans can be followed through.