Merci, Monsieur le President. My questions are for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. The Minister said the only thing holding us back from renaming the territorial museum is ourselves. I'd like would like to establish what the position of Cabinet is on this issue and what, if any, priority it may have.
Can the Minister tell us whether this government supports and takes responsibility for giving the territorial museum a more regionally and culturally appropriate name within a reasonable timeframe; say, perhaps my lifetime. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member for Frame Lake. Minister responsible for Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I can't bind future governments but I'm confident that we will see a name change in the Member's lifetime. I wish the Member a very long life. But the plan has been to as the Member knows, we are working to address some of the infrastructure issues at the museum, some type of retrofit, perhaps a new governance model, and tied in with that would be a name change. Instead of just slapping a new name on an old building, we want to package it all together so it is a new there's a sense of renewal associated with it so it's not just we're doing it for the sake of doing it. We're doing it as well in conjunction with significant other changes. Thank you.
Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that, and I hope to be present during the renaming ceremony whenever it takes place.
I have to confess to the Minister, I like to hang out at the museum in the archives. He probably knows that.
When I first arrived in Yellowknife in 1985 and visited the museum, there was a fulltime toponymist with a dedicated office and workspace. That's somebody who studies place names. It's not clear to me that we have the same resources dedicated to this important function.
Given UNDRIP article 13 and our government's commitment to implementation, can the Minister tell us how we can fulfill our place naming obligations? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And there is still a fulltime toponymist which is now known as a cultural places officer, and that was renamed about ten years ago, so still 30 years after the Member first arrived here. And then that position does all of the naming work that the Member is talking about. And it is a busy office.
There have been hundreds of name changes and new names made official in the last number of years, and currently there are 424 new and replacement names that have been submitted by the Lutselk'e Dene First Nation, and 13 Indigenous place names in the Naats'ihch'oh National Park Reserve, and we are working to make those name changes happen. So I would say we're one of the leaders when it comes to indigenizing names in the territory, rather making sure their actual names are official names. Thank you.
Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that. Yes, and I too fully recognize the work that's being done by Indigenous governments and organizations, like the Gwich’in Social and Cultural Institute. They've done a lot of work on place names.
But I think that we need a concerted effort and a program to fully recognize and change colonial and racist place names here in the Northwest Territories. It's not clear, you know, whether we actually have such a program ourselves. So I want to ask the Minister whether he intends to fully implement UNDRIP article 13 and whether any additional resources are needed. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. No additional resources are needed. We are making our way through hundreds of names, as I mentioned. And we are fully staffed. I know that the Government of Nunavut has had some staffing issues with that toponymist position, but luckily we've been able to maintain staff and are making our way through that.
We do have a geographical and community names policy of the Executive Council, and that guides how communities and geographical features are renamed. And I don't think that there's any sort of, you know, policy adjustments required, any sort of additional resources required. What we need is community engagement and communities to bring forward these needs. It's not up to the GNWT to say what a particular place should be named. It's up to the communities, and the communities have been bringing forward those names by the dozen. And we have been making those changes as they're brought forward. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Frame Lake.
Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that. Lastly, I just wanted to follow up on how our territorial museum can better support important cultural practices like the lighting of an Inuit qulliq.
Can the Minister explain whether lighted qulliqs have been allowed in the museum before, what the current policy is, and the basis for that policy for practice. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Yes, Mr. Speaker. Qulliqs have been lit in the museum before, in the auditorium area. There could be arrangements made to have them lit in other areas but a bit of a head's up is needed to ensure that, you know, sprinkler systems are turned off so that we don't damage any of our artifacts and that smoke detectors perhaps are temporarily removed. And that's the situation we found ourselves in, where there just wasn't enough lead time given to make a change like that to allow for one to be lit. And it's an unfortunate incident, and I think there's we would have done things differently if we had known earlier. But I'll leave it at that. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Thebacha.
