Canadian Heritage aware of turmoil in Indigenous languages office months before audit

The Three Watchmen statue is seen near Parliament Hill on Wednesday, June 2, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld

OTTAWA — Documents show the Canadian Heritage department was aware of internal strife at the Indigenous languages office for months before it launched a financial audit of the organization.

Half a dozen sources, including former employees, told The Canadian Press that over the five years of its existence, the arm’s-length Office of the Commissioner of Indigenous Languages has failed to move the needle on strengthening Indigenous languages and supporting research.

Instead, they say, the office has focused on extensive travel and hosting one big conference in Ottawa that cost $10 million. They also allege a toxic work environment, bullying, projects left uncompleted and staff quitting in frustration.

The sources spoke on the condition they not be named due to fear of reprisals.

Similar allegations are outlined in an April 2025 letter to then-Canadian Heritage minister Steven Guilbeault. In it, former employees call on his department to “immediately investigate significant financial mismanagement, improper and perhaps illegal governance and delegation of responsibilities, and other failures at this publicly funded organization.”

The complainants alleged the office’s directors were paying above market rates to their friends for contracts and spending excessive sums on travel and conferences. They also allege the office was rife with bullying and harassment.

They wrote the office “has a once-in-a-generation opportunity to help reverse language shift and make a difference for Indigenous language speakers and learners across this country” — and warned that the opportunity was slipping “further away.”

“If action is not taken at the political and government level to address what we have raised, we are prepared to take our concerns public,” the April 2025 letter said.

Andrew Brown, an associate deputy minister at Canadian Heritage, wrote to the complainants in May 2025 to say that Guilbeault had asked the federal ethics commissioner to examine the allegations and decide whether the office’s directors violated the Conflict of Interest Act.

Brown wrote that the commissioner reported he was unable to conduct that probe, “primarily due to a lack of information in the public domain concerning important elements of the allegations.” He added the decision could be revisited if new information emerged.

He told the complainants Guilbeault directed the department to “launch a process to investigate the allegations related to financial and resource management, as well as workplace health.”

Draco Dunphy, a Mi’kmaw language advocate in Newfoundland, also forwarded complaints to Guilbeault’s office in a May 2025 letter about what he called a lack of financial transparency in the office, especially regarding a conference the office was hosting later that year.

“I am asking you to investigate whether or not there have been significant cost overruns that have led them to drift away from their business plan for the year,” Dunphy wrote.

In an August 2025 letter to the complainants, Brown wrote the department would hire an independent third-party firm to investigate allegations relating to finances, resource management and workplace health at the Office of the Commissioner of Indigenous Languages.

He said the firm wished to speak with the complainants directly.

In a followup letter sent this past January, Brown acknowledged that the complainants wished to remain anonymous but cautioned that the federal government could not take “certain actions based solely on the result of an anonymous review.”

It is not clear if the department pursued an investigation without speaking with the complainants.

Commissioner of Indigenous Languages Ronald Ignace and directors Robert Watt, Georgina Liberty and Joan Greyeyes have not been made available for interviews.

Ignace said in a media statement that the office’s evolution has faced challenges but he is proud of the work done to establish it and advance its mandate.

His office said it received three formal complaints of bullying, which were investigated last year. Personnel changes were made, it said, and there have been no new complaints since.

In response to the claim that the office was outsourcing contracts to friends of officials, the office said expertise in the field of preserving Indigenous languages is limited and that “professional relationships are often long-standing and interconnected.”

Brown wrote in the January letter that the department would pursue a financial audit of the commissioner’s office under the Indigenous Languages Act.

The department has not said when that probe will be completed or whether the results will be made public.

It said it is also conducting an independent review of the office, as is required every five years under legislation.

This past February, the complainants wrote a letter to Canadian Heritage Minister Marc Miller saying they were troubled by his department’s “delays and inaction” in addressing their allegations against the commissioner’s office.

“Since raising our initial concerns with you more than 10 months ago, we have not felt adequately supported by your department, nor satisfied that the government will take action to hold the governing board and its allies accountable,” they wrote.

They also told Miller the audit results should be released publicly.

They warned a failure to address concerns about the office in a timely and transparent manner would allow them to fester after the terms of the commissioner and directors expire in July.

“Time is of the essence, as once the governing board’s terms are complete, they will no longer be obligated to participate in any investigation or process you set up,” they wrote.

“When the organization itself doesn’t follow the law or even its own policies and procedures, and Canadian Heritage will not intervene on what appears to be the premise that the organization is ‘independent,’ who is accountable?”

Miller said Wednesday that the allegations brought forward against the office are serious enough to warrant the audit and that people need to be held accountable.

“But part of holding people to account is giving people the benefit of the doubt, and that includes making sure the due process is respected,” he said.

— Written by Alessia Passafiume in Ottawa and Brittany Hobson in Winnipeg

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 4, 2026.

The Canadian Press Staff