SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Accommodating the territory's 11 official languages continues to be a challenge for the territorial government.
Translators at work in Yellowknife June 4 during the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board's public hearings surrounding the Gahcho Kue mine. - NNSL file photo |
Although all members of the legislative assembly have the right to speak in any of the languages at any time, interpreters are not always available and written transcriptions are often missing from house records.
The issue was raised on Twitter earlier this March - which also happens to be Aboriginal Languages Month in the territory - when bilingual resident Batiste Foisy commented on gaps of information missing from the assembly's online record of debate, a document commonly referred to as Hansard.
Notably, Minister Responsible for Official Languages Jackson Lafferty had spoken in Tlicho without an English translation 42 times since 2008.
"What happens most often, the bit that was spoken in an official language ends up in the minutes as 'English translation not provided,'" Foisy told News/North. "I mean the sentence itself speaks volumes about the unavailability of translation services."
Foisy added, even if indigenous languages make it into the Hansard, the address is only provided in English - there is no written text included.
"It's as if in the eyes of the legislative assembly, when speaking a language other than English, it only has value once it is translated," he said. "Before, when it was spoken in Gwich'in or French, it doesn't exist in the record until it gets translated into English - if there's a translator that day."
Speeches made in indigenous languages can still be accessed through the audio/visual recordings of the sitting, said assembly clerk Colette Langlois, but limited funding and infrastructure means only two or three interpreters can be present at a time - and the public is not informed which languages will be available on a particular day.
"We do three languages other than English a day and in terms of our infrastructure that's sort of what we can manage," she said.
"The difficulty is depending on the language, for some there's not a lot of interpreters available ... so if someone calls in sick at the last minute or has something come up, we can't always get a replacement."
In terms of incorporating indigenous text into Hansard or translating the entire document into Tlicho for example, Langlois said it would just not be financially feasible.
"We really encourage members to use different official languages," Langlois said. "In terms of the ideal scenario of being able to have ... all 11 at the same time, I think
it would be pretty difficult to put into practice."
Asking for each Hansard to be available in all languages may seem a bit excessive, but Foisy said the document should at the very least reflect what is spoken in the legislative assembly.
"If Jackson Lafferty speaks Tlicho then there should be some Tlicho paragraph in the Hansard and possibly the English translation as well," Foisy said.
Sahtu MLA Norman Yakeleya regularly speaks North Slavey at the legislative assembly and said he tries to let the clerk know beforehand so a translator will be available. He prioritizes the practice because he believes continuing the use of aboriginal languages in the legislative assembly sends an important message to the rest of the territory.
"The legislative level is the highest level of government ... this is where we see our languages and the language of the heart is very powerful," he said. "By using our language, we give life to these words and these words ... bring life to what we're saying on behalf of our region."
However, he said he has seen continued difficulty when it comes to providing consistent translation services, which he blames partly on a lack of federal funding.
"We are constantly asking Ottawa to increase our funding for our official languages," he said.
"They do not recognize other languages within their jurisdiction. We have two official languages in Canada and that's what Ottawa recognizes."
He said he has seen some cases where the feds have provided a translator in court, but the dialect was wrong.
"In one of our cases in the Sahtu, we had a person who was in court as a victim and didn't understand English very well, but they had a different dialect interpreting for him - totally wrong," Yakeleya says. "This is an indication of the department (and) government not doing due diligence."
The legislative assembly in Nunavut has had interpreters at all sittings and committee meetings and published its Hansard in both English and Inuktitut since creation of the territory in 1999. However, this is partly due to Inuit languages being the native tongue of 80 per cent of the population says assembly clerk John Quirke.
"The Inuit population is the basic population in Nunavut whereas the West has lots of different cultures," he said. "Of course that would be a challenge."
Nevertheless, he said Nunavut is coming across its own difficulties when it comes to maintaining the system - with an aging population, it is harder to find those with the skills necessary to complete auditory and written translations.
"Although we still have that solid core group of people ... they're getting on in age and we're finding that the younger generation does not see that as a career path to follow," he explained. "We'll always have people but it's something that we can't ignore."
Back in the NWT, Foisy laments the continuing gaps in written records, arguing it could be an issue for historians down the road.
"When historians look back at the procedures of the legislative assemblies in years to come, they won't be able to figure out what the minister was talking about on that day he was speaking Tlicho," he said. "It's an issue for every citizen. I want to be able to read the speeches from the minister of my government with everything they say. I want it to be on record."
