Thank you, Mr. Chairman. To my left is Dave Murray, the acting president of the NWT Housing Corporation. To my right is Penny Ballantyne, she is the director of policy and planning.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The new rent scale for the NWT Housing Corporation was tabled yesterday and is up for discussion today. This new rent scale hasn't been developed overnight. It's been a long outstanding issue with the Housing Corporation as well as with people out in the communities. Many people raised concerns about the old rent scale; that is wasn't treating people fairly or equally throughout the Northwest Territories. The old policy was in place since 1983. The new program is designed to go into place now to address the inadequacies within our program.

The main principle that we tried to meet and tried to address is that we treated all our tenants fairly and equally no matter where they live in the Northwest Territories. We wanted to provide incentives for tenants to take advantage of opportunities for home ownership programs, and for education and employment as well. Our old scale did not address these things. We also wanted to continue to enjoy the existing funding from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. We

also wanted to make sure that tenants could afford the rent that was being requested of them.

The last time this rent scale was brought to this House it was by Mr. Butters, when he was the Minister. It wasn't implemented at that time. We've worked very closely with the communities and the Special Committee on Social Housing to update this scale. One of the things that all Members must remember is that our job as MLAs and as Ministers is to try to treat everybody fairly and as equal as possible. I've always attempted to do that. I always do that in my riding as well. I believe the reason people re-elect me is that when people come and ask me for assistance, I don't ask them who they are or who they represent, I just ask them how I can help them. That's what my job is. I look at that the same way I should be handling my job as the Minister; to try to treat people all the same, all equal.

With the limited amount of dollars that we do have, we have to try to help those people who are in the most need. This is what we're trying to do with this new scale. I'm not going to carry on and on with this issue, Mr. Chairman. I will be happy to answer any question any Member has. I'm here to listen to any concerns that you have and I will try to address them. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think it is important on the outset that we determine where we are going from here. I have been hammering away on this issue during the last couple of days and perhaps speaking too much about it. My main concern is that we will be getting good advice from my constituents about how to make this thing work. We realize there is a need for a new rent scale. I would like to know today that this won't be the last chance to have input and to give advice that hopefully could lead to improvements in the present document, however good it is right now and that, particularly, the major round of consultations planned next month and in June could lead to improvements and revisions in this document.

I would like to remind the Minister, and Mr. Pudlat may well have some comments on this himself, that on February 21, 1994, in answer to Mr. Pudlat's question, the Minister made very satisfactory commitments about the consultation process and particularly about the fact that no changes will be implemented until 90 days after the complete process has been gone through, in his words, including full information being provided to the community, which I do not believe has happened yet.

Before we get into the pros and cons, I have a number of questions about:

-the cost of living;

-the manner in which the cost of living zones were calculated for communities; -why the overcrowding issue wasn't addressed;

-the capacity of the corporation to do the community development work, the tenant education, and the home ownership orientation that is required;

-issues like money management, whether that is going to be built into the operations of the corporation or whether they expect to do this major job with existing staff; and

-the realism of the timing to do this all in two years.

I have many specific issues that I will want to discuss. Before we get into those detailed questions, and hopefully the Minister has considered our views, will there still be an opportunity to revise this rent scale? I said this about the staff housing policy. This one affects even more of my constituents. I think the notice to tenants will come out right while the election campaign is in full swing. If it is for January 1995 and it is three months or prior to the rent increases, it will be a major election issue. I am not planning to run, but I can tell the Minister that this will be a very significant issue in ridings like mine, which are typical of many, where half the tenants are going to be getting rent increase notices and substantial ones at that.

I would like to have it clarified right now from the Minister. Is this the last kick at the can or will the Minister be open to accepting advice, if it is good advice, from constituents, MLAs, the community consultation process, before these changes are implemented beginning in July of this year? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Any advice the Members would like to give us, we will take that into consideration. The rent scale that is going out can be revised through the consultation process that this Legislature has set up, which I said yesterday. We have a process set up. It can be revised if needed. That process means that there are community meetings in every community once a year. The regional meetings are going to happen in May or June. Advice could come from there. It will come back to the Social Housing committee. They would look at those recommendations. Like I said yesterday, all of our programs in the Housing Corporation can be updated yearly. That is the way it is and it should be done. This is another program that can be updated at any given time. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. To follow up on that, the Minister is chair of the Advisory Committee on Social Housing. Will he commit now to convening a meeting of the Advisory Committee on Social Housing after the round of community consultations are completed in May and June and before the first stages of implementation of this rent scale is implemented in July so that he can have the good advice of that committee and perhaps of other MLAs who may wish to participate before finally implementing this new rent scale? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The committee has already agreed to do that. We were scheduling a meeting in Mr. Ningark's riding some time around that time.

I will let other Members make general comments. I will have some specific questions later. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

(Translation) Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With regard to the new rent scale, I had asked a question today when question period started. I have to inform my constituents before this rent scale is implemented on a rent scale review. For that reason, before it is implemented, we wanted to have a review in my region, especially in Lake Harbour. The hamlet council wanted to review the rent scale and they wanted to be included in the consultations. The previous Minister, when asked privately by the Commissioner, stated that the communities would be given documents detailing exactly how they are going to have the rent scale set up. It has to be done too. It didn't state exactly how the Minister answered the question that the consultation process has to be established before the rent scale is implemented. There will be many people who don't know the exact detail or what is in the rent scale review. There are going to be many people who will not be pleased with this increase before they are told exactly how they are going to have to pay and exactly how the scale is going to be set up, if they don't have the copy of the document or know if the housing associations have the scale. The people in the communities will want to be informed way ahead of time. They will want to know exactly how the rental scale is going to be implemented.

For that reason, I have a concern that you are going to rush this rent scale. I understood that the Minister indicated that there will be community consultation before the rental scale is implemented. Members of the Legislative Assembly represent their communities. We know it is going to be implemented very quickly and we have to try to represent our communities and try to keep our communities informed.

I have no real concerns, but I would like my communities to be properly informed. They are going to have a hard time accepting it and they will be very afraid of it. For that reason, I would like community consultation, not just with community councils and housing associations, but the whole community population needs to be informed in my region. Is this going to be the way it is going to be implemented?

You said this document is a final document for the establishment of the rental scale. It seems it is trying to get everyone at the same time, even though some people are going to have rents raised and some are going to be lowered. Is my question quite clear? Before the new rental scale is to be implemented, are there going to be community consultations, Mr. Chairman?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just today I signed letters off to all the hamlet councils, band councils, Metis Nation locals, and local housing authorities with a complete document of the new rent scale. Also, as part of the process of informing people about the rent scale, Housing Corporation staff, working along with the local housing authorities, will meet with every individual client in the communities to explain. That will be done in the summer, prior to any notices going out.

Also, I have notices on my desk going out to individual MLAs, explaining how rents would increase or decrease for every unit in their riding. I just have to sign those off, and you'll be getting those.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would tend to agree that we need to do something about rent scales since the Minister stated that the last rental scale adjustment was quite a few years ago and there's great pressure from the federal government for us to change it. Like Mr. Patterson's, my community was consulted -- I believe it was in December or November -- and when the Housing Corporation came into the community, they didn't have the full information for the people to look it. The community asked for information that the people who came into the community could not provide because they didn't yet have clear direction from the ministry to give out that information.

I know the Minister stated in the House that this is ongoing, that this is, in no way, the final document and that it can be changed, that sort of thing. When the next round of consultations takes place, if there's significant, valid concerns of the people in the communities, would this document be changed in order to better reflect the way the people live in certain communities?

I don't agree with the cost of living zone that is in this document. I think it has to be updated. I know the Minister of Social Services is trying to review that. I don't believe it reflects the reality of the cost of living, when you look at the communities in these brackets. I would encourage the Minister to get as much information as possible and put communities in their proper zones. I don't believe my community of Pond Inlet has the same cost of living as communities who receive jet service. It is placed in the same category as communities that have airstrips and regularly receive jet service. I think that has to be looked at more so it can be improved. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As far as the cost of living zones go, those are the cost of living zones that we get from Social Services. It puts Pond Inlet in zone 8, the same as Pangnirtung. There are quite a few others in that zone. All programs of the NWT Housing Corporation can be updated through the consultation process. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to say at the onset that I support the concept of user-pay as long as it is implemented fairly and dealt with in a fair manner. The overall intent of this restructuring is to provide more housing for the lower-income to moderate-income families, which our public housing program is supposed to be geared towards. At the same time, I would like to point out that the Housing Corporation, and ourselves have a responsibility to find some alternate and affordable housing for some of these higher income earners. I believe the Minister has tried to address this in saying that the emphasis may be on the access private home ownership units versus public rent supplement units in the next year or two years, or whatever it is going to take.

Has the Housing Corporation already undertaken a survey of higher income families to see if these new rental rates are enacted on what their choice is? Are they going to look at the alternatives of owning their own houses? If that is the case, how is the Housing Corporation going to address that and meet those needs of these higher income families? Thank you.