Federal officials testified they never approved a $10 million expenditure by Indigenous Languages Commissioner Ronald Ignace for a four-day conference in Ottawa, as an internal audit into the spending continues.Senior managers with the Department of Canadian Heritage told the Commons public accounts committee they only became aware of concerns surrounding the expense after receiving anonymous complaints.“The onus is on the Commissioner and the directors in terms of oversight,” Associate Deputy Heritage Minister Andrew Brown told MPs.Brown said the department launched its review after receiving information from a whistleblower.Conservative MP William Stevenson questioned what he described as a lack of government oversight over the commissioner’s office.“Would it be fair to say this investigation now would not have even come on your radar if there wasn’t a whistleblower?” Stevenson asked.“That is fair to say,” Brown replied. “We are conducting this because of a whistleblower.”Brown said officials are still determining whether broader management concerns exist within the Office of the Commissioner of Indigenous Languages.“At this stage, we do not have evidence that would validate that one way or another,” he said.Stevenson criticized what he characterized as a hands-off approach to financial oversight.“It doesn’t appear there are any checks and balances from your end,” he said. “You kind of give them a blank cheque and they run with it.”.The controversy centres on the Waves 2025 conference, held in Ottawa from Aug. 11 to 14 last year.Conservative MP Gérard Deltell pressed Brown on the reported $10 million cost of the event.“Ten million dollars for a four-day conference, do you think that’s money well spent?” Deltell asked.“It’s a lot of money,” Brown replied.When asked whether federal officials had approved the expenditure, Brown said they had not.“Did you authorize $10 million for a four-day conference on Indigenous languages?” Deltell asked.“I would say no,” Brown responded.Brown said officials knew the commissioner's office planned to hold a major conference and had received annual funding to support its operations, but denied authorizing a specific $10 million conference budget.Deltell questioned whether the funds could have been better used to support language preservation efforts.“This is $10 million,” he said. “How many indigenous people could have learned their language with $10 million?”.Ignace, an anthropologist from Savona, B.C., and former chief of the Skeetchestn Indian Band, was appointed commissioner in 2021. The position carries an annual salary of $216,000. His current term is scheduled to expire July 12.Ignace has not publicly commented on the audit.Parliament created the Office of the Commissioner of Indigenous Languages through Bill C-91, the Indigenous Languages Act, passed in 2019. The legislation was intended to support efforts to reclaim, revitalize and strengthen indigenous languages across Canada.A 2018 Statistics Canada report counted more than 250,000 speakers of indigenous languages nationwide. The most widely spoken included Algonquin, Cree, Inuktitut, Ojibway and Innu.
