Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I can appreciate that we may not know until the contracts are written, but surely the Minister can see that we have four months where the funding is of any use to students: May; June; July; and August. We are going to approve this interim at the end of March. So they will put these contracts out and have roughly one month to decide where the money is going and how many contracts this is buying, et cetera. The money will run out in June. At that point, they are proposing, since they cannot go any further than June, that at the end of June when we approve the mains, they are going to turn around and do another set of contracting? Or are they just going to extend the existing contracts?

If it is going to take them a month, from the beginning of April to the end of April, before they can be ready for May, where is that month going to come at the end of June for these students? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Ootes.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We are going to advertise this. In some cases, contracts start at a certain time and other contracts start at a later date. We can make commitments for those contracts for $150,000, as a result of the interim appropriation. We do expect that with the mains, from the sounds of the Members, that there will be approval for the funding for this.

Thank you, Mr. Ootes. Mr. Bell.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Minister is basically saying then that they are going to be able to commit to 74 jobs this year because we cannot make commitments past the end of June, and roughly the money had provided 500 and some odd plus jobs last year. He is saying he is pretty sure we will approve additional funding in the mains, but are we talking about additional funding for only 74 jobs, since we cannot commit higher than 74 positions? That is what I think I am hearing. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The bulk of the work is July through August. We expect that we will receive further funding for this. We are vying for further funding. We expect that this will be available through the approval of the mains. We anticipate we will be able to meet most needs.

Thank you, Mr. Ootes. Mr. Bell.

I can appreciate that the bulk of the work might be done in July or August. That is when high school students are out. Kids on their way to their first year of university might be trying to access the funding only for July and August. But for May and June, for the university students who are listening and are going to read about this in the newspaper, having to prepare for final exams and these kinds of things, hoping they will be able to find employment when they come back here...we do not have much of a response for these students. We can basically say to them we can do a little better in July and August. Are we suggesting they stay down south and look for work? It looks pretty bleak.

I think we need to be able to assure students coming back that we are not going to provide only 74 jobs with this $150,000. We are going to make the commitment to hire more students than that with the understanding that we will approve the funding in the mains. Certainly we commit to year-long contracts in other areas. I do not think this commitment is out of line with what we see in just about every department. We make year-long commitments. This is a four-month commitment. I do not see why we could not make the commitment for the length of the time. Even going back, if it means getting more money in this interim, more than $150,000, then we do it. I think that it is ridiculous to say to students we can provide a job for a few of you but only for a couple of months, and then you are on your own. Whether or not you will have employment or can find any employment for the last two months of the summer, we do not know. We cannot help you. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Ootes.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Our experience has been that the $150,000 will tide us over for the demand to the end of June and into July. It is our intention, as I said earlier, to seek further funding for this. We anticipate and hope that it will receive approval. That will take care of the rest of the summer. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ootes. Mr. Bell.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. That sounds good. I am hoping that we are then going to realize that since that is the department's intention, we are not just talking about 74 jobs here. Since it is the intention to get funding in the mains for the rest of the summer, we might as well let out contracts for 500 jobs, or some number higher than 74, because I think that is just a drop in the bucket of what we really need.

Since we are going for the funding in the mains anyway, I just think that we let out the same number of contracts that we have in years past with the understanding that the funding will be made available in the mains. There are many other year-long contracts, many other contracts in this interim that extend over a length of time greater than the interim, and we commit to that. It is just understood that money will be there in the mains to follow up.

We certainly do not expect to hire a consultant who might have a year long contract and tell them that this is the amount of money for you in the interim. We cannot tell you what is going to happen half way through a project when we get to the mains. You will have to come and talk to us then. I think that is the same approach we are taking with the students.

The department has to be a little more upfront in saying we are going to take care of the students. We are not just going to stick to the number of 74, or whatever the $150,000 justifies, and commit to contracts for the duration of the summer. Thank you.

Thank you. Comments mostly. Did the Minister want to respond to that?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The 75 contracts would be for funding for the full amount. As I mentioned, we are anticipating, and our previous experience was, that $150,000 would tide us over until the end of June. It is our intent to seek further funding for this particular program. It is unfortunate that this program was sunsetted. Perhaps it should be looked at in other ways. It has landed on us in terms of a sunsetted program.

We feel that the $150,000 will tide us over and we will, providing we get the funding, be able to meet the demands of most students. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ootes. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. There are some other areas that I would like to raise here. In the area of Community Skills for Work, which some Members had raised earlier, is that a federal program or a territorial program?

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Mr. Ootes.

Thank you. It was originally, if I recall correctly, a two-year program funded by the federal government. That ended, and then the territorial government established it as a new program last year, which sunsetted as of March 31st this year.

Thank you, Mr. Ootes. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Minister was saying earlier that everybody knew that as of March 31st, this program was ending. As with every other contract within government, March 31st is the natural end date until there are new approvals.

My concern is that, for example, the Aurora Campus in Inuvik deals with 13 communities. This specific program covers them for six out of that 13. If this program is no longer in existence, we are going to have six communities that will not be covered by this. That means having to drop those programs in those communities. That is what it comes down to.

One of our goals is to try to make sure our people are workable and that they come off of the side of social assistance, or as they call it, income support. In fact, we do not seem to be helping that. It is in the smaller communities that it benefits the most, yet those are the ones that are going to be hit by this.

Does the Minister have any further information on which specific areas or regions are going to be negatively impacted by this decision? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Mr. Ootes.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We will be providing a list. I believe we are going to have that tomorrow. I stand corrected on a previous comment. Apparently, the territorial government has run this program for three years. It was indicated that it was sunsetting and was funded on that basis. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ootes. Mr. Roland.