Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to make some brief general comments about education. Very clearly, on a comparative basis, when you look at other departments, the Department of Education, Culture and Employment has been blessed in terms of resources.
Granted they have lots of social needs, and they had to endure cuts along with other departments, but in this instance, as they sit before us, they are the one department that has had money put back into it in a substantive way.
The goal now, the challenge of the task is to make sure that money is put to good use, and to meet the goals that have been identified in the legislation. The class size, and more importantly, the special needs issue.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to briefly but emphatically touch on the issue that I will be touching on with all the other social program departments as well. That is the very pressing need for demonstrable inter-departmental cooperation. It is still an unachieved goal. They may be making some efforts, but I would say they are quite cursory, and as we look at things like the Territorial Strategy for Children and Youth, or reviewing some of these shared initiatives such as Healthy Children, it cannot be done in isolation.
I would suggest that hopefully in the not-too-distant future there would even be, on these common areas, a joint business plan put forward that would clearly show the link and relationship and how the funding is pooled with the responsibilities that are identified.
As we focus on education, and as we look at special needs, we have to realize and continue to focus on the front end of working with families and children with the Department of Health and Social Services. This will ensure that children are born healthy and are brought up in good homes with parents with good parenting skills, so that the kids come to school ready to learn. Otherwise, we will never have enough money for special needs. It is going to be a losing battle.
The quality of education is something that we have to constantly focus on. There are concerns from small communities to large communities, from northern communities to communities in southern jurisdictions as to whether the quality is the same throughout, whether we can compete and meet standards. The concern that schools with grade extensions do not have the same choice and quality of education as students in larger communities, I think that it is an issue that has not been fully resolved as well.
Mr. Chairman, I have a couple other major issues that I would like to touch on. I will get back into more detail when we reach them in the budget. The issue of literacy is a broad one and we cannot just focus on adult basic education. But I think, like the language strategy the department is working on, we should also be looking at a literacy strategy, and a very comprehensive one.
That means not only English, but also literacy in the language of which you are born into and the languages you have been brought up with. It cuts across other departments, but clearly education has to be the main driver in any kind of literacy strategy. It affects health, affects employment, and affects any number of areas. It has impacts in justice. So when we come to that particular stage of the budget, I am going to be pressing, and hopefully all of my colleagues will as well, very hard on the Minister to commit to this endeavour, along with a language strategy. The two probably could be very clearly linked.
There is also a considerable number of SFA issues related to implementation. While the department is to be commended for bringing forward the long overdue changes and some new money, there are a considerable number of concerns brought to us as MLAs in regard to the regulations and how things have been implemented. For example, grandfather clauses, simple things like direct deposits and issues of that nature.
I will also be strongly encouraging the department to continue to work with the schools. Having them work with the college and the career centres and industry to make sure that we do have a continuum that is connected and that we do not have three separate components of Education, Culture, and Employment, but they are all part of the same long term process. They as well are working with the social program envelopes.
So those are my general comments at this point, Mr. Chairman. If the Minister wishes to respond, I would appreciate his comments. If he chooses to wait, I will revisit some of these issues. Some of them are very fundamental and more of process, such as interdepartmental co-operation, which is absolutely critical for the success of the department. Thank you.