Mr. Speaker, I apologize for that and I will speak to the motion, especially on one fundamental part of the motion that Mr. Dent spoke to and that is the second last paragraph, which reads:

"and further, that the funding necessary for this program should come from instituting a rent policy for seniors living in public housing".

I am speaking against the motion and similar in the lines Mr. Dent said that we are already looking at options. The social envelope, the Minister especially, Mr. Dent, myself, and Mr. Ng, are already looking into the issue to see if we can find any options. What I wanted to inform Members about is of the consultation that the Housing Corporation conducted late last year on the issue of charging rent to seniors. As Members know, through the Housing Corporation, programs do not charge rent to seniors if they are in public housing. When requests came from a couple of MLAs and a few Members of the NWT Seniors' Society, what I did was write to all the communities asking for their input. I will not go through the responses, but I just wanted to mention a few of the communities. The communities that were against re-assessing rents to seniors, they only chose the boards themselves, were Rae-Edzo, seniors did not want to pay rent; in Arctic Bay they were against seniors being assessed. In Clyde River, in Iqaluit, in Kimmirut, in Pangnirtung, in Resolute Bay, they are also against charging rent. In Arviat, Chesterfield, in Coral Harbour, in Holman Island, most are not in favour. A few stated they would be prepared to be assessed a minimum rent, like $32. Cambridge Bay, they also said that they would be willing to pay $32. Gjoa Haven does not support rent being charged to seniors. Hall Beach Hamlet, no support for change. Fort Providence and so on. There are about twelve other communities that said the same thing. So with that, I would ask Members to vote against the motion, keeping in mind that we are already working on this issue. The Minister of Education has committed to coming back with an answer on a certain date. I will be asking for a recorded vote at the appropriate time.