Thank you, Mr. Nitah. The honourable Minister responsible for Health, Mr. Antoine.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Item 6, oral questions. The honourable Member for Great Slave, Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment in the area of income support. It relates to the housing market in the city of Yellowknife, Mr. Speaker. We have a very vibrant economy right now in the city. One of the consequences is the pressure on vacancies and the cost of rent. I wanted to ask specifically in that area because of the impact, of course, on government budgets and things as rents go up. Does the department have any ceilings or restrictions at this time on the amounts paid for rent to income support clients? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The policy is that we provide public housing for income support individuals. In the event that public housing is not available, then we go to the private sector. Mr. Speaker, we provide the cost of housing, whatever that may be. Additionally, we supply and pay for the cost of fuel as well as electricity for those on income support. The Member's question being is there a ceiling on that? No, Mr. Speaker, not at the present time and we do not anticipate any. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Supplementary, Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. To follow through on the Minister's final remark that none are anticipated, this is contrary with some information that I have that new regulations and new amounts are being considered to go into effect as early as the first of November, two days from now, Mr. Speaker. Could the Minister confirm that indeed no caps or limits will be forthcoming for income support clients? Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. To the best of my knowledge, Mr. Speaker, we do not have an intent of limiting the amount of the housing allowance for income support clients. Naturally, we do try to adjust in terms of space available for families, the size of a family and so forth, and for others -- large families, small families -- it depends on the availability of units, of course. We are naturally not prepared to put a mother with one child into a four-bedroom house, for example. However, Mr. Speaker, the intent -- if there was such and I am not familiar with it -- is certainly not to cap it. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the talk recently about education and the achievements made by students compared to the national averages has reminded me of an issue that I raised with my colleagues here when business plans were going through in a previous year and then followed up with the Minister in the area of the level of programming that we have within the NWT. For example, Mr. Speaker, right now we have a general program, I believe it was qualified as, where students in high school go into 16, 26, 36 level courses whether it be math, social studies or those areas.

I would like to know if the Minister and his department have done anything to change this because it does not meet the requirements of students nowadays. My concern is that there are a lot of students, especially when you look at the amount of aboriginal students that are in that program. I would like to know if his department has done anything to improve programming in that area to make sure that students taking those courses in our high school system are going to achieve a grade 12 diploma and be able to work with that diploma? Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, we worked over the summer and into the past month and a half to look at the whole issue of pathways and the strength of those programs and the versatility for students to be able to use the programs so that they can continue on in high school and complete high school with a diploma that allows them to stream into the appropriate areas, such as perhaps university or college, into apprenticeships or into the workforce, Mr. Speaker. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Supplementary, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Can the Minister elaborate on what was done to the programming areas to improve on what was happening in previous years? Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I cannot elaborate in terms of the details but I can certainly get that for the Member. My officials were working on it to bring forward a strengthened process that students have the ability to move on throughout high school so that we do not have the dropout situation that is occurring now and the ability to stream into specific areas, pathways. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Supplementary, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Will the Minister then make that available to Members of this Assembly and myself? Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The process that I would like to follow, and what we normally do, is to brief Cabinet on these matters first. Then, once I have Cabinet approval, we will no doubt be consulting with Members and proceeding from there. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Final supplementary, Mr. Roland.