Nunavut government attempt to challenge lawsuit in the highest court is dismissed
Canada’s Supreme Court dismissed the Nunavut government’s request to hear its bid to kill the four-year-old legal battle with Nunavut Tunngavik Inc., over Inuit-language instruction.
“We respect the decision and look forward to moving forward,” Premier P.J. Akeeagok told reporters Thursday at the legislative assembly, after the Supreme Court ruled on what’s known as a leave to appeal.
Canada’s highest court was the final legal avenue for the government to appeal lower courts’ decisions that sided with NTI.
NTI, the organization responsible for ensuring the rights of Nunavut Inuit are protected, sued the Nunavut government in 2021.
That lawsuit claims the government has failed to ensure Inuktut language education is available throughout the territory’s public school system.
By doing that, the government violated “constitutionally protected equality rights of Nunavut Inuit,” NTI alleged, citing section 15 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which prevents discrimination on the basis of language.
With the Supreme Court’s decision, the matter is now set to go to trial, although Akeeagok said he is “optimistic” the issue can be settled.
“I really think it’s so important to realize nobody wants to be in court,” Akeeagok said.
He didn’t say what the government’s legal strategy might be if the matter does proceed to trial.
“It’s tough to be excited about this,” NTI president Jeremy Tunraluk said in a phone interview.
“We were trying to avoid going through with litigation, at the same time it is very important for Inuit to actually be able to learn in their own language,” he said, adding that even though NTI is trying to work with the government of Nunavut on the education program, the trial will “remain.”
The Inuit organization’s lawsuit calls for a five-year plan to implement the Inuit language from kindergarten to Grade 12.
Since the lawsuit was filed, the GN has been trying to block it, with litigation dragging on for four years.
Both the Nunavut Court of Justice and the Nunavut Court of Appeal sided with NTI, rejecting the government’s attempts to kill the lawsuit.
In November, the Nunavut government attempted to challenge the decision in the Supreme Court.
“We don’t want to spend years and years in court,” Akeeagok said of the government’s repeated attempts to block the lawsuit.
As the highest court of the land, when the Supreme Court refuses to hear a case, the ruling of the court of appeal stands and cannot be challenged further within the Canadian legal system, according to the Department of Justice Canada website.
The language lawsuit is one of at least five initiated by NTI against the territorial or federal governments since 2015, according to its four-yearstrategy report.
In February, Tunraluk said he was not anticipating any new legal actions against the governments in the near future.
Despite the warming relationship between NTI and the Nunavut government, none of the existing lawsuits have been dropped.
“I look forward to having more conversations around what we could do to settle these differences [with NTI],” Akeeagok said.
“I really think there’s a common goal of wanting to move past this. And I look forward to that in the near future.”
