Mr. Chairman, the report has been given fairly wide distribution since it was received. Letters were sent out across the territories to people letting them know that the report is available. Quite a number of requests have come in from different individuals and organizations, as well as government bodies and academic institutions outside of the territories. That was one of the first things which we did.

With regard to the recommendations which are contained in the report, they have been broken down into a number of different groups. We have asked the department to draft an action plan, to put the recommendations in a certain order and put some priority on the implementation, and to try to work towards a timetable which could be presented. The action plan is still in draft form and has not gone to the Cabinet. It will hopefully be presented to Cabinet in the next month or so. I should point out that many of the recommendations within the report are not under the authority of the Department of Justice or under the control of the department or even of the Government of the Northwest Territories. We have sent out a number of letters, one to Justice Canada, a number of the recommendations fall under their jurisdiction. There is about less than 12 recommendations which fall under Justice Canada. We have forwarded a letter to them asking them if they would go through the recommendations and give us some response and ideas, their views on those specific recommendations.

The RCMP have about seven recommendations going to them. By letter we have drawn their attention to them and asked them to respond in some capacity to us. The legal services board has about five recommendations which related to their work and jurisdiction. The law society of the Northwest Territories had about four or five recommendations. The judiciary, the justices of the peace, courts and territorial courts had a great number of recommendations which fall under them. Some of the recommendations are going to acted on in the short-term, there is a number of them that we think we can act on in the short-term. Members are aware, we have indicated a couple of pieces of draft legislation which are aimed at that. There are other recommendations which we have that will take us more time, more research and more consultation. Some of them relate to the Department of Social Services, others are with the Department of Education.

That is, generally, where we are at. I can be more specific with the exact recommendations, the numbered recommendations that go to each responsible body, if the Members wish. I do not know if the Members are satisfied with that. I have Mr. Geoff Bickert who would be able to join me as a witness if Members wish.

Mr. Chairman, our time frame basically is by the fall session. I would hope to have done by then an analysis of all the recommendations which are contained in this report. Do whatever further legal research is required and produce for the Members a consultation document for the public as well. The different agencies and departments and bodies that are involved in this have been advised that we would like to have their response and thoughts on this as soon as possible. As the Members know, since the report came in, there has been quite a bit of work being done by officials within the government having to do with the fall session and this session. There has not been the kind of flat-out working time that is required by the different departments to work on this, but we are still targeting to come up with some sort of a response document by fall.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Master Development Plan that we are referring to here, deals largely with capital requirements. As the report suggests, the present system that we have is overloaded. We are over capacity and we have been for about five years now. The standard of the facilities that we have are largely considered substandard. In short, we need a substantial injection of capital just to bring our present facilities up to standard. A standard, at least, from the eyes of the federal government under the different agreements that we have. They largely view the present facilities we have as not quite adequate. There is quite a negative view of the situation as we have it, in light of the exchange agreement that we have with them. The program area only, for instance, is considered to be under-funded and under-resourced. The staffing ratio we have with inmates is considered to be inadequate as well. When we look at the population growth and the crime rate that we have now, the capital requirements then jump even more. It is a double barrel shotgun that looks like it is going to go off any time. I think in many ways, this master plan comes along at a good time because all of us are uncertain, in all the areas of responsibility we have, we should take a comprehensive approach to it in terms of planning and developing strategic plans to make sure we have the proper resources and the type of facilities that will meet the increasing demand by communities to play a greater role in the justice system.

When you look at the political landscape that everyone in this Legislature has indicated, as well as the communities themselves, the present justice system and the present system of corrections we have is not the kind of system that our people require and want. So model B, in fact, seems to be the option that has been chosen by the sentiments that I have picked up from this Legislature, from our government and from the communities across the territories. With that comes, of course, the commitment we have to make that in order to move into option B we have to have a strategy on how we are going to accommodate the wish to move into a more community and regionally oriented type of approach to corrections. That means that we have to give some support to communities, some resources to develop some ideas and some suggestions on how they want to become a significant partner in the corrections field.

It is the kind of approach we have been advocating in the community transfer initiative. We cannot really give you the kind of definitive options that we might want. However, as far as facilities are concerned, for instance, what type of facilities are we envisaging to implement option B? We do not know that communities want to look at providing facilities, training and programs for young offenders, out on the land programs, small community-based facilities and regional facilities. Those are just starting to be articulated by a number of communities. We are trying to put together a strategic plan on how to respond with the type of approach we want to take. We are developing a more comprehensive document. I do not know how long it will take to deal with all the recommendations. Some of the family law review recommendations we can act on quite quickly, we have started already, such as looking at a good information system, the type of training that might be required to implement some of the recommendations that are made. Some of the recommendations, I am advised, up to ten years to fully realize, so some of them we can do, some of them have to wait until we develop a more comprehensive approach to them.

Mr. Chairman, I know one of the recommendations was to move the corrections over to Justice and that is done, so we can be proud of at least one achievement. There is a recommendation, for instance, that we should look at trying to put together a plan for capital planning. In the Department of Justice we have recently hired a person

to devote strictly to the capital planning work. We are working with the Department of Public Works to help with this strategic planning effort. We have done some training programs that have been suggested, others are under development. For instance, for correctional officers and staff who work in young offenders' facilities we are looking at well-organized training manuals. We are looking at budget planning for the focus to go more from central oriented type of facilities to community planning. We are trying to do a budget analysis of our present budget to come up with some ideas and suggestions on how we could try to develop some flexibility to be able to respond to some of the suggestions on moving towards community and regional types of facilities.

There has been a recommendation that we should look at a new system for information management and keeping track of training. We are working on a new system to meet that recommendation. We hired a manager of information services within the department so we can work on finding solutions on information system problems that have plagued the corrections services division. It has never had an adequate information system. We have had a recommendation that there should be increased communication within the division with the department and specifically with the staff. So we have started meeting with wardens and managers of the different facilities. We have linked up almost all of the facilities with electronic mail and teleconference calls. These are considered taken for granted in some places, but we are just moving into it.

For the recommendations which call for increased accountability and some commitment to regionalizing service delivery, we have looked at ways of regionalizing service delivery within the context of the community transfer initiative. We have had quite a bit of discussion with a number of communities and regions about the Department of Justice, specifically, and what it is prepared to have discussions with specific communities on the area of responsibility that the department now has.

We have a recommendation that calls for increased number adult secure custody beds, repatriation of all federal inmates in the south who are from the Northwest Territories or northern citizens. We have commenced discussions with the agreement of the Solicitor General, we have had a series of meetings with his staff, all of which have been very good. There have been very good discussions, to date, about the exchange agreement and the suggestion that we make the argument that the federal government and ourselves have a great interest and an interest to be served by working out a solution to bring back, to the north, all federal inmates who are from the north and serving time in the south. As I said, presently we do not have adequate training programs available for adults and perhaps young offenders. We have started working on this with communities. We have had discussions with a number of different agencies to try to get some general idea of what kind of programs which should be provided in these facilities. We are seeking input from different communities that we talk to. We have groups such as the Dene Cultural Institute, the Gwich'in Tribal Council, and a number of others who have expressed an interest. That is what we have done to date.

We have put on line, staff people who are hired to be community corrections specialists in most of the regions. We are reviewing the entire staffing. Those are some of the recommendations which we have done some work on. Thank you for listening.

I move we have all our sessions in the evenings.

---Laughter

Mr. Chairman, I am interested to do what the Member suggests. I believe the situation we have in corrections is not one that anyone is comfortable with. There is a call by Members of this Legislature to come up with some comprehensive approach to corrections. There is a call by all of our communities to have a significant role and input into a larger plan which they will be part of. I am very interested and will work to provide to the Members by this fall, a document which will be very helpful and useful in guiding our discussions and our approach to addressing these issues. Thank you.