Nunavut Tunngavik, Canada, reach tentative deal in $1B lawsuit

A tentative settlement has been reached in abillion-dollar lawsuit that alleges the federal government has never
lived up to terms of the Nunavut land claim.

Cathy Towtongie, president of the Nunavut land-claims group thatfiled the lawsuit against Ottawa, made the announcement in a newsrelease.

Arguments in the lawsuit by Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. were scheduledto begin Monday afternoon. The trial has now been adjourned.

Contents of the settlement were not immediately available.

"Details of the settlement will be disclosed once the agreementhas been considered and approved by NTI, the Government of Canadaand the Government of Nunavut," the land-claims group said in therelease.

No further comment was available.

Nunavut Tunngavik had been seeking $1 billion in damages, inaddition to punitive damages.

The lawsuit dates from 2006. It alleges Ottawa has failed to funda wide variety of activities guaranteed in the 1993 land claim,including wildlife management and development planning.

It also alleges the federal government underfunded education in the territory. It says that has prevented the territory fromachieving its goal of 85 per cent Inuit employment in the publicservice, a level roughly equal to the percentage of Inuit in thepopulation.

That argument was backed up by a 2006 conciliator's reportwritten by retired justice Thomas Berger. Berger's report said theeducation system was producing graduates that were competent neitherin English nor Inuktitut. He recommended a bilingual approach whichhe said would take an extra $20 million a year.

Ottawa lost an earlier aspect of the lawsuit last year. TheFederal Court of Appeal agreed with a lower-court ruling that saidthe federal government had failed to fund an agency to monitor andreport on the new territory's economic and social progress.

A $15-million award was set aside until the entire lawsuit wassettled.

Another lawsuit between a Nunavut agency and Ottawa remainsoutstanding. The Nunavut Planning Commission has sued the federalgovernment over its decision not to fund public hearings on aland-use plan for the territory.