One Land - Many Voices: Report of the NWT Special Committee on the Review of the Official Languages Act.
By Canadian Parliamentary Review
- Release Date: 2002-09-22
- Genre: Law
Description
In 1984, the Government of the Northwest Territories (GNWT) passed the Official Languages Ordinance which recognized English and French as official languages. The Ordinance also gave recognition to the Aboriginal languages of the NWT. In 1985, the Official Languages Ordinance became the Official Languages Act. This Act was amended in 1990 to recognize Cree, Chipewyan, Dogrib, Inuktitut, Inuvialuktun, Inuinnaqtun, Gwich'in, North Slavey, and South Slavey as official languages within institutions of the Legislative Assembly and GNWT, along with French and English. It also established the Office of the Languages Commissioner. Since that time, the government has been carrying out activities to promote the use of all official languages. A Special Committee on the Review of the Official Languages Act was established in 2000 as a committee of the Legislative Assembly of the Northwest Territories. It tabled an interim report in June 2002. This article is based on the executive summary of the interim report. The Special Committee was asked to review the effectiveness of the Official Languages Act. The Committee has had to respond to the following questions:
