The honourable Member is seeking unanimous consent. Are there any nays? There are no nays. Please proceed, Mr. Arvaluk.

(Translation) Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The directive even states that the director of education should cooperate with the divisional board. Mr. Speaker, if this was a truly autonomous board the expectation would be for the employee to be answerable to the board, to be accountable to the board, not just cooperative.

I believe that the Minister responsible for Education, Culture and Employment Programs should be moving into the direction of increasing the authority of divisional boards of education, not tying them down in more bureaucratic red tape from Yellowknife.

I hope that the Minister will agree to address this matter at the earliest opportunity. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Item 3, Members' statements. Mr. Patterson.

The honourable Member is confidently seeking unanimous consent to continue. Are there any nays? There are no nays. Please proceed, Mr. Patterson.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and thank you, Members. I am confident that the new policy on museums, which is being developed by the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment Programs, will take into account these important provisions in the Inuit land claim agreement, and will be in place in advance of the next budget cycle so that plans can be put in place to establish necessary facilities in Nunavut communities, so that the many artifacts of the Inuit heritage now in museums and storage outside of Nunavut, can be repatriated, stored, protected, studied, displayed and enjoyed in the Inuit home land. Qujannamiik.

Item 3, Members' statements. Mr. Kakfwi.

Item 3, Members' statements. Mr. Gargan.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have been a Member for ten years and through that time there has been a great deal of highway construction in my constituency. That has, in return, benefited many people, in Hay River, Hay River Reserve, Kakisa and Fort Providence. I would like to thank the government for it.

One of the concerns I have, Mr. Speaker, is with regard to private truck operators. We have many of them who do operate large vehicles to haul gravel and asphalt for the repaving of the roads. Those people are not being paid as high a rate as they would be in Alberta. Although many people have benefited, private truckers who own their own vehicles and operate during construction season are not making a good living. I would like to ask the Minister and the government to ensure, when they are awarded contracts, the truckers are given a fair return for hauling. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Gargan. Item 3, Members' statements. Mr. Lewis.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think the last few weeks have demonstrated that in the spirit of goodwill, the 24 people present have been able to accomplish a great deal. That has proven to be a rather desperate position for the press. That is being remedied by the Federation of Labour deciding today to take on new powers. They have decided to re-dedicate April fool's day as annual MLAs' day.

---Laughter

They, in fact, are going to have a protest march at 5:00 pm today outside of the Legislative Assembly building at the corner of the YK Inn. They made a long list of those foolish items which they say we are guilty of. It is incredible that a federation of labour should take on, itself, the power to say that the people of the Northwest Territories are held in such ill-favour by the federation of labour that they consider the people elected by that electorate are not doing the work they were asked to do, but, in fact, behaving foolishly. I think it is a terrible thing for any union to do, tell ordinary people that the 24 people who represent them are fools. They should be ashamed of themselves.

Item 3, Members' statements. Item 4, returns to oral questions. Mr. Todd.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a return to oral question, asked by Mrs. Marie-Jewell on December 3, 1992, with respect to WCB contribution of funds to carry out a survey.

Ron Williams, then deputy chairman of the WCB and Jim Evoy, board director, recommended a grant of $15,000 be provided to organized labour to develop an NWT workers' education program on WCB matters. This program to be comparable to that of the Ontario WCB and the Ontario federation of labour's nationally recognized initiative.

Messrs. Williams and Evoy comprised the committee established to review and report on the workers' advisor function and this was one of the recommendations contained in their report of March 30, 1992.

Item 4, returns to oral questions. Mr. Kakfwi.

Item 4, returns to oral questions. Ms. Cournoyea.

Mr. Speaker, I have a return to an oral question asked by Mr. Fred Koe on March 29, concerning revision to the development policy.

Mr. Speaker, the policy on policy development has not been revised since 1983. It does establish the government's authority to develop policy and outlines the process by which policy proposals will be reviewed, approved and implemented. It is true that some of the terminology is out of date. For example, the document referred to as the senior managers' handbook is now commonly called the Executive committee systems handbook. However, the process, authorities and responsibilities remain current.

Mr. Patterson asked whether the priorities and planning committee of Cabinet is still in existence. As was indicated on March 29, in the past all Members of Cabinet sat on the priorities and planning committee, but Cabinet is now functioning as a priorities and planning committee. Previously, the Cabinet was, in effect, making recommendations to itself by sitting in a separate meeting as a priorities and planning committee. Cabinet now deliberates on policy proposals as many times as it takes to get it right. The policy is not inconsistent in this regard, Cabinet has not dissolved the priorities and planning committee, it just constitutes itself as such when required.

With regard to the screening of policy proposals, there is basically no change to the process since Mr. Patterson was Government Leader. Central agencies such as the Priorities and Planning Secretariat provide advice through an assessment process. As Mr. Patterson knows, it is the prerogative of the Government Leader to screen Cabinet submissions as part of the agenda building responsibility. As chair, the Government Leader decides what goes on the Cabinet agenda and when. Cabinet decides on whether a policy is approved by reviewing the Minister's submission and the independent assessment report.

Mr. Koe noted that the policy development policy provides for the review of government policies, neither this government nor the previous government has been stagnant in this regard. Policies are continually monitored by Ministers and their departmental staff by central agencies to ensure they are up-to-date. In the life of this government, for example, five new policies have been developed and approved and there have been 19 amendments to existing policies approved by Cabinet.

However, as some Members noted in their questions, it is true that some terminology in the GNWT policy manual is out of date. An overall review of the manual has been conducted and areas requiring update have been noted. However, since a complete revision and reprinting of the manual is an expensive and time-consuming undertaking, the government has chosen to wait until the process of departmental consolidation is complete before revising and reprinting the entire document. In the meantime, the reference to ministerial authority such as the reference to the Minister of Public Works and Highways, noted by Mr. Antoine, is not of great concern because clarification of ministerial responsibilities is reflected in the departmental establishment policies which are revised as an area of responsibility as transferred from one department to another in much the same way that the Interpretation Act covers off inconsistencies in the use of terminology in legislation. The establishment policies ensure that ministerial responsibilities are clearly defined. In any interim period while provisions are being processed Cabinet records of decision specify ministerial responsibility.

Finally with regard to Mrs. Marie-Jewell's question to Mr. Pollard yesterday about consistencies of definitions in policies, it should be noted that although all policies are screened for consistency, sometimes definitions cannot be standardized among policies. For example, although we would all agree that the word "resident" refers to someone who resides in the north, for the purposes of specific programs resident requirements will differ. Thus the term might be defined differently in different policies, for example six months and up to five years in another.

I have another return to a question, asked by Mr. Antoine on March 29, 1993, with regard to the revision of the GNWT transfer policy.

Revisions to the transfer policy to reflect changes in ministerial authorities will occur as part of an overall revision and update of the GNWT policy manual, once the process of consolidating departments is completed.

As I indicated in my previous response, there is no gap in responsibilities as ministerial mandates have been clarified through revisions to establish policies or interim records of decision.

Mr. Speaker, I have a return to an oral question asked by Mrs. Marie-Jewell on March 19, 1993, asked of Mr. Don Morin, Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation, regarding the annual report of the NWT Housing Corporation.

Mr. Morin had hoped to table the 1991-92 annual report of the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation during this session. However, there have been unavoidable delays with the Inuktitut translation, and the report will not be ready until late April.

Mr. Morin will table the 1991-92 annual report at the beginning of the next session. The 1992-93 annual report will also be tabled at that time. Thank you.

Item 4, returns to oral questions. Mr. Allooloo.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a return to an oral question asked by Mrs. Marie-Jewell on March 24, 1993, regarding policy on sales and shipping of caribou parts.

Over the past several years, the Department of Renewable Resources has been discussing the need for a policy on the sale of inedible parts of wildlife with regional renewable resource boards and organizations. To date, no consensus has been reached. Any policy developed will have to reflect regional concerns. The department will continue to work with regional renewable resource boards on this issue.

Existing legislation does allow the sale and shipping of animal parts. An export permit is required for anyone to ship caribou parts out of the Northwest Territories. To obtain an export permit, a person must demonstrate that the parts were legally obtained. Parts may be legally obtained by harvesting caribou under the authority of a licence, or by purchasing them from a hunter who has legally harvested a caribou under the authority of a licence. When parts are shipped, the licence number of person selling the parts is needed to prove legal possession. Thank you.

Item 4, returns to oral questions. Ms. Cournoyea.

Mr. Speaker, I have a return to an oral question, asked by Mrs. Jeannie Marie-Jewell on March 30, 1993, of the Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation, regarding rural and remote programs.

The Northwest Territories Housing Corporation has not written off any units under the rural and remote program. In a few instances, rural and remote clients have abandoned their units, or signed quit claims, giving ownership of the unit back to the corporation. In these cases, the corporation has either converted the unit to public housing or sold the unit by public tender.