Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Ootes.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the social assistance regulations are pursuant to the Social Assistance Act and the income support delivery must be consistent with both the act and the regulations because income support is a statutory program. The policies were developed to provide communities with consistency in administration of the program. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister Ootes. Supplementary, Mr. Lafferty.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Ootes.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There is a project underway for harmonization between the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation and the Department of Education on their social program to make the program consistent. That is underway at the moment, Mr. Speaker, and we expect to bring that forward that harmonization to make consistency an issue. We should be bringing that forward in the near future.

Thank you, Minister Ootes. Supplementary, Mr. Lafferty.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Ootes.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I believe what I said, Mr. Speaker, was that the issue of income support would be, if there is delivery and control, that it would have to be done through the self-government negotiating process, which we have in process in this government. Of course, the Ministry of Aboriginal Affairs is the lead on that. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Ootes. Final supplementary, Mr. Lafferty.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Ootes.

I cannot answer the question in that sense, Mr. Speaker. The departmental officials are following the act and the policies that are in place. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Ootes. Item 6, oral questions. The honourable Member for Inuvik Boot Lakes, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my question at this time is directed to the Premier. Mr. Speaker, as in my Member's statement, this is an issue that has been going on and it is regarding the contract. The Minister gave me a suggestion and said that I could go and view this contract. That has not happened to date. I made the call. I tried to see if we could set up a viewing and that is not happening. So he has given me an empty suggestion.

I would like to know from the Premier, will he once again provide that information to Members of this House to finalize this issue? Let us clean it up. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. The honourable Premier, Mr. Kakfwi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Committee on Accountability and Oversight has sent me a letter. The chair has written me a letter indicating that the committee is prepared and is supporting the suggestion made earlier this week to proceed with amendments to the Public Service Act to provide clarity to the roles and responsibilities of the political staff.

So we are in agreement with the committee. The chair has also indicated that he understands that a contract cannot be provided for reasons of privacy and so has asked for certain information to be provided to the committee. Mr. Chairman, we are preparing that information for the committee.

I want to point out, Mr. Chairman, that the information that the Member has asked for has in fact been provided on a number of occasions. There was a meeting with the Accountability and Oversight Committee last Friday, which I believe Mr. Roland was not present at, where the deputy minister, the most senior civil servant in this government, has said categorically:

"We cannot put in a contract anything that goes against an act or regulations of this government, that is, we cannot contract out of the Public Service Act and we have not done that."

The Member was not in the room when this information was being provided. Mr. Speaker, we have said consistently we have been advised by our staff that what Cabinet has done or is doing is consistent with the laws and regulations provided to this government. We have said that the contract does not refer to the individual in question as the deputy minister. The contract does not refer to the individual in question as the deputy minister. What the contract does is, in the section, refer to an appendices, which refers to deputy minister-type benefits. The contract says she is a chief of staff and that she is an executive assistant to the Premier and that is the function.

It says that where there is reference to deputy minister, it should read chief of staff, instead of DM, in regard to conflict of interest requirements. This is what we have already provided to Members and the response is being prepared right now to the chair of the Accountability and Oversight Committee, Mr. Speaker. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Premier. Before we proceed to supplementaries, I just want to caution Members to be very careful about references to meetings that are outside of this Chamber that may or may not have been in-camera but still have not reported to the House. So just be cautious on how references are made to other meetings that may have been attended. Supplementary, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I feel that I have to clarify that since the Premier has raised the issue. The Speaker does have my letter stating where I would be. I was....

-- Interjection

Order, please. Order. Order, Mr. Roland. I am just cautioning the House not to take liberties that may conflict with rules, your rules. So, please, if Members will abide by that and not refer to other meetings that may or may not have been reported to the House yet. Proceed, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I guess he can make a comment and get it recorded and I cannot. The fact is, Mr. Speaker, we have asked him for this information and he has, I believe, just quoted from the document saying that where it said deputy minister level, it should say executive assistant.

Seeing that he has quoted from the document, will he table it in this House now, since he is using pieces of the actual information in that document? He is leaving us at a disadvantage and he is going to supply what information he wants to hear. So will he table that now that he has quoted? Table it as it is and not revise it as he has stated. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. The honourable Premier, Mr. Kakfwi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In all respect to your requests that we adhere to the rules, I was simply quoting statements made by Liz Snider, the secretary to Cabinet, in response to questions that were made. I was not making references myself personally from the contract.

As I have said consistently, the contract cannot be tabled and cannot be provided to Members as is, due to privacy reasons. We have an obligation, I believe under the Act to protect the privacy of employees of this government. This is personal information that is entrusted to us by employees. I would ask the Member to respect that, to quit implying that I am...