Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to direct my question to the Premier or to the Finance Minister. I understand that through the summer student employment program communities are given opportunities to hire students. Unfortunately, when the GNWT hires students, because of the union scale, they have to pay students $18 per hour while local businesses and housing associations' student rates are $7.50 per hour. Because of the high hourly rate that the government pays, they seem to run out of money very fast because they don't allocate a lot of money into that program.
I wonder if the government is willing to contract that service out to private companies and housing associations so that money could be spread out over a longer period of time and more students could be hired in the summer so that more people benefit from the program. Thank you.