I think this government has to clearly identify its priorities. It says it is going to improve the social conditions of communities. This is not going to improve it. It will probably make it worse. They are going to become another statistic that we are going to

have to pin on the wall and say, "Oh, oh, Social Envelope dollars just went up again." The same thing with empowering communities and community wellness. These people get the respect and maintain that dignity in the community by being elders and people that you can look up to because they show the other people that they do not need government and that people can try to do it on their own and. But because I am a pensioner, we are not going to push you aside and use you as another statistic.

My question to the Minister is, I would like to know exactly how he came up with the criteria in which he cut almost 60-something percent of the people that used to be eligible, in which the remaining 38 percent of the people that he came up with. I would like to know if he took into account the cost of living in the other areas of the Northwest Territories in the form letter that he used, and that there are people out there that are widows, there are people with disability insurance and benefits that were arrived at because of the circumstances that they found themselves in.

Could I have the attention of the Minister, if he can get his head out of that book. I would like to know if he has the answer to that question because I believe that if this is how we are going to treat the elders -- and we are talking about the 24 positions we agreed to in this House when we came in here, is that we would not affect those people that need it the most.