Thank you, Mr. Erasmus. Mr.

Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Most of the communities in the Akaitcho territory will have their own district education authorities right now, for instance Detah, Lutselk'e, and so on do. Ndilo does not. As the Member is aware, the department has been working with the community on an initiative that will probably culminate in a formation of a district education authority for Ndilo.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Erasmus.

Thank you, Mr. Erasmus. Mr. Dent.

I should just get some clarification from the Member. When I am talking about a district education authority that is one that refers to a community only. Detah has a district education authority. The chair of the district education authority sits as a member on the Dogrib Community Services Board. The same is true for Lutselk'e. The chair for the Lutselk'e District Education Authority sits as a member of the South Slave Divisional Education Council. I just want to make sure that the Member and I are talking about the same thing, so perhaps I can ask the Member if he could clarify his question.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Erasmus, do you wish to clarify your question?

Thank you, Mr. Erasmus. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, there is a real problem with resources and capacity in creating divisional education councils with numbers that are too small. The Education Act was set up in such a way that significant local control of schools can be exercised at the community level. The requirement for some of the overhead, superintendents and the accounting functions that are performed at the divisional education council level, mean that it is fiscally very difficult to support the creation of new smaller divisional education councils. There is a difference in the per capita cost to run a divisional education council right now, more that $2,000 per student, between the larger education councils and the smallest ones. It is a situation where we cannot afford to set up any more divisional education councils and that was one of the reasons that the act does give so much control to local bodies.

One of the problems always is, Mr. Chairman, that when you get a local district educational authority they sometimes do not understand the overhead cost and feel that perhaps they are not getting a fair share of the overall funding passed on to them at the community level. That is always going to be a challenge for the education councils to deal with. If the Member is asking if we can find a way to create another divisional education council, I would have to make sure that he understands that the only way to do that is to significantly increase the pupil/teacher ratio and I do not think any of us want to see that happen.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. We are one page 9-6, operations and maintenance, total operations and maintenance, $5.284 million. Are there any further questions on this? Mr. Erasmus.

Thank you, Mr. Erasmus. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The discussions that are underway are with the district education authorities in terms of their approach to governments and not on an approach that would form another divisional education council. There are discussions with nearly all of the communities the Member refers to.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Erasmus.

Thank you, Mr. Erasmus. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the divisional education councils have the overall authority. They generally set the parameters and then the district education authorities or the local bodies are typically the ones that do the interviews and decide on which teachers to hire. It is not always the same in every single community because it will depend on how much authority each community has negotiated with the divisional education council.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Erasmus.

Thank you, Mr. Erasmus. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, we are happy to work with any community that would like to discuss issues of empowerment, especially when it comes to education. I am surprised to hear the Member's concern because I know I have had more complaints about the power exercised by the district education authorities and how there have been a number of concerns that they, for instance, are making the decisions locally not to hire local people. That has been a concern that has been expressed to me by Members in the past. In general the system works, where the local community is the one in charge of making decisions about who teaches in the community. We are certainly prepared to work with any community to address issues of helping their boards develop. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Total operations and maintenance, $5.284 million. Agreed?