Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will keep my comments brief as a lot of my concerns have been addressed through the committee report. Some I would just like to personally emphasize as MLA for Thebacha, of course. One of the ongoing concerns I keep hearing about is the special needs issue, class size and special needs assistants. I was called by one constituent today who has children who have special need requirements. He indicated that he had been told, for example, at the elementary school in Fort Smith, they could use as many as ten SNAs. They have seven. Word is that it is going to be cut back to three next year. It is a pressing issue that I will be bringing to the table with the Minister in the coming days and weeks as I receive more information on that.
A broad issue I want to stress is the absolute imperative nature of the cooperation between the departments, between Health and Social Services and Education, between Education and Housing when you look at harmonization. As the Minister has committed, it is going to be able to demonstrate clearly a working link between the Literacy Strategy, the Aboriginal Languages Strategy, the Maximizing Northern Employment Strategy and the Early Child Development Program, all that are on a continuum and are linked and should flow from one to the other. Unless they are linked, the money is not going to be as effectively used as it could be.
Another issue I want to talk about -- and I will wait for more detail when we get to that particular part of the budget, of course -- is the decentralization of the SFA Program. It is an ongoing concern. We have communities running complex services for their citizens. We have aboriginal governments planning to take over all sorts of government programs for their people. We have programs being run, income support and such at the community level. I want to come back to the point that for some reason, the Department of Education is vigorously resisting the need to decentralize this program and move it out to their communities, close to the students it serves, with the ability to cut cheques and do all the appropriate work.
I could tell you my own personal experiences as an MLA that I have more contract with the department on student financial assistance than any other single item in my constituency. That I can recollect, I never contacted the department on income support at the headquarters level, but Mr. Cleveland and I, during certain times of the year, sometimes correspondence on a daily or hourly basis on some issues. This is an issue I am going to come back to until the Minister will finally recognize the benefit of moving this program and saying yes, within a year, we will movie it or whatever it may be.
Finally, Mr. Chairman, there is a strong concern about what will be entailed in the maximizing northern employment. There were a tremendous amount of commitments made in terms of providing employment, defining priority occupations, beefing up apprenticeships, both at the school level and at the college level. What does that mean? As I see it, the department has a tremendous amount of work on their hands over the next couple of months.
There are students coming home for two months now from university. There have been commitments made in terms of jobs and such. I am not sure where they are. Do they have the numbers? Do they have a process in place that will allow them to address those needs?
My own sense is that the magnitude of the number of students coming back who may be looking for employment are going to be significant. It is going to be very difficult organizationally for the government to adjust its current hiring processes and job requirements to honour that commitment. I would love to see the details of that. It is critical. Time is of the essence in that particular area, especially given the clear public proclamations and commitments.
I will have other comments as we get into the detail, Mr. Chairman, but that concludes my general opening comments. Thank you.