Thank you, Mr. Speaker and a good question by my honourable colleague. Just a little history, if I may, for clarity's sake. If you remember when we were negotiating last year with the UNW, we indicated to them that we thought we could try to find a wage rate for students that was different from the normal civil servant, so that we could employ more students, not less. Unfortunately, for one reason or another, we could not get an agreement. We are, as I have said in the House before, as Mr. Dent has said, looking at an affirmative action policy and also looking at a northern job strategy. As part of that overall northern job strategy, we are also looking at, specifically, a program for students this summer. We are going to be, hopefully, bringing forward to the committee, the Government Ops Committee, both these papers to seek their input and direction on and get this thing under way, so that we can be up and running for the summer. Thank you.

Thank you. Oral questions. Supplementary, Mr. Erasmus.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Would the strategy result in more jobs being available for students than there was last year?

Mr. Todd.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It is certainly our intention to do that. We hope to be able to get the resources from within and as I said, hopefully next week, we are going to have both these reports ready. We are going to be presenting to the Government Operations Committee, have a healthy dialogue at committee to try to get some consensus as to where we move forward and, I am optimistic and confident, that this summer we will be able to bring more students to the work force than we have in the past, based upon the cooperation and support we get from the Ordinary Members with respect to our overall job strategy and the affirmative action policy. Thank you.

Oral questions. Supplementary, Mr. Erasmus.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. One of the problems that many students have from the small communities, is that there is no work in the communities. Often they have to come to Yellowknife, Hay River or Rankin Inlet, to a larger centre to work and they may not necessarily want to do that. Is it possible to provide, perhaps, some funding to the communities or some other means so that there are more jobs available in the communities, as well for summer students. Thank you.

Mr. Todd.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Our overall objective is to accomplish exactly that. It is going to take the energetic cooperation of the government committees and the Ministers, who are leading this, both myself and Mr. Dent. As I said to my colleague in answer to his last question, I am confident, if we move quickly and enthusiastically, we can get some changes into the system for implementation this summer.

Thank you. Oral questions. Final supplementary, Mr. Erasmus.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yesterday the Premier indicated there was no central agency for hiring people in Yellowknife. Is it possible to have a central agency for the students, so that we can be more properly coordinated in our efforts to make sure that they get their jobs?

Mr. Todd.

The details, as I say, have not really been worked out in terms of where we are going with this. We need to sit down with the committees. Plus Cabinet will ultimately have to approve some of the initiatives that we are considering right now. I think it would be fair to say that the general thrust, at least at this early stage, is for more of these things to be driven from the communities, rather than from the centre. So, it is a little early, at this time, to determine exactly what the deliberating stage will be but there will be adequate opportunity for the committee to give us advice and direction on that, as we proceed through this exercise, hopefully in March and April. Thank you.

Thank you. Oral questions. Mr. Steen.

Thank you. The Minister of Aboriginal Affairs. Mr. Antoine.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the honourable Member asked a question here in regards to additional funds that are required to carry on the very important work in with Aboriginal Affairs, and as other Members know from the Infrastructure Committee that every time I appear before them I made a point that we are lacking funds and we have a lot of work to do to accomplish the kind of directions that is put forward here for us to accomplish and as a result of that we move forward. I thought the understanding there was that the different Members that there is a real need to secure additional fundings to carry on the work that is directly for this ministry to do. Thank you.

Thank you. Oral questions. Supplementary, Mr. Steen.

Mr. Antoine.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it is a financial matter and as a government we like to defer these type of financial matters to the Minister of Finance to answer this question. Mr. Speaker, thank you.

Thank you. Mr. Todd, would you like to respond?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Well I did already respond to another question asked by Mr. Picco as to the dollars and the process for it. The reality is that self-government negotiations are under way. We believe, the Cabinet and the FMB and to some extent many Members in this House believe there is an urgent need for additional resources to move this thing forward. A submission came in through the normal process through FMB, which was approved and that will be subject to approval of this House, either in this session. It is not for expenditures until the new fiscal year and we follow due process. Thank you.

Thank you. Oral questions. Supplementary, Mr. Steen.