Agreed.
Debates of Feb. 27th, 2001
This is page numbers 1265 - 1329 of the Hansard for the 14th Assembly, 3rd Session. The original version can be accessed on the Legislative Assembly's website or by contacting the Legislative Assembly Library. The word of the day was chairman.
Topics
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Some Hon. Members
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
The Chair Paul Delorey
Page 10-29, community access roads, grants and contributions, contributions, total contributions, $517,000.
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Some Hon. Members
Agreed.
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
The Chair Paul Delorey
Page 10-31, motor vehicles, budget summary, operations expense. Mr. Miltenberger.
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Michael Miltenberger Thebacha
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just have a question about the removal of the $10,000 to fund SADD and CYAID conferences, both good programs with a laudable goal of dealing with stopping impaired driving, drunk driving. I was wondering if the Minister could indicate why? Was it just for a conference and not any ongoing support? Thank you.
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Vician
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. In terms of funding for the CYAID conference, the department provided a contribution to the organizers of the upcoming conference and did so in cooperation with other departments. This funding established the Minister's commitment to the overall funding, but in addition to that, the department is providing in-kind support with some personnel time and other efforts. Hopefully, we knowingly will make a success of this very important conference that is coming forward. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Michael Miltenberger Thebacha
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Could the Minister indicate then, is this conference before the end of this fiscal year? Thank you.
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Vician
Yes, Mr. Chairman, but the budget, if I could just be clear, the budget is accounted for in the year the contribution is made. So the budget was provided under grants and contributions in the 2001 fiscal year.
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Bill Braden Great Slave
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Under this section, the description accounts for the department's responsibility in the area of safety, safe operation of motor vehicles in the NWT. I would like to ask the Minister what kind of targets or measurements it has for improving safety on our highways and what kind of resources it plans to bring into play to help promote and achieve those targets? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1301
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
February 27th, 2001
Page 1301
Vician
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. In specifics to the department's overall objective for highway safety, we have identified in the business plan of the Department of Transportation a key outcome, which is...say for territorial transportation system, our specific objectives are for the safe movement of people and goods on the highway system. We have targeted three specific things that we want to achieve in our business planning cycle.
Number one is the reduction in the number of injuries and fatalities on the highway system. Number two is the reduction in the number of alcohol-related injuries, accidents and fatalities on the highway system. Number three particularly is the increased usage of seatbelt and child restraint devices in the Northwest Territories.
Within the business plan that the department has brought forward, the department is seeking improvement in all of those statistics throughout the highway system and hopes to report a significant improvement in the territorial results over the three-year period of the business plan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1302
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1302
Bill Braden Great Slave
Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Could the department advise of what specific methods does it have in mind to communicate those goals, which I think are good ones? There are some measurements in there and some target figures, but I think they will get some support and some buy-in if they are well advertised, well communicated. If we can get some sense of how the department is going to go about that. What kind of media, what kind of campaign, what kind of information is going to be brought to bear to let the public know that these are goals that we want to achieve? Thank you.
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1302
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1302
Vician
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will speak to the three key issues that I have just raised. Number one, in terms of injury and fatality rate reduction, our objective is to continue the campaign for public awareness to reduce speed and drive safely according to road conditions. We continue to do that through both media and through our compliance initiatives with our officers. We are also dealing directly with the Department of Justice and the RCMP with regard to increased enforcement on the highway system, ensuring that there is adequate enforcement to deal with speed infractions, to ensure that residents who are users of the highway system are aware of speed and its contribution and violations are not tolerated in that sense.
Number two with regard to alcohol-related vehicle accidents injuries and fatalities, this is a concern that we do not own exclusively. It is across the country. We continue to work with youth through the CYAID program. We continue to work with our jurisdictions with regard to national publicity and campaigns. The Minister has legislation proposals under consideration that would look forward to tougher consequences for those that would not comply with those provisions for drinking and driving.
The final are of seatbelt and child restraint. The department is still and will continue to have underway public relations campaigns that speaks to the usage of seatbelts in the Northwest Territories, which happens to be the lowest in Canada, and the use of child restraint through the fire officers at various communities, who are providing community-based training for proper use of child restraint devices. Most of the problems today with child restraint devices is the inappropriate use of those devices. Those are some of the measures. There are numerous others that we can elaborate on, but those are the key measures to the targets we have discussed previously. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1302
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1302
Bill Braden Great Slave
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Could the department advise how much money is being put towards these? What kind of staffing human resources are going into it? What I am looking for, Mr. Chairman, is to set up some kind of way of measuring effectiveness in the performance of these. Not so much this year, but as we build a baseline of targets and then be able to compare the resources that go in, it is going to be an easier and a more effective way of deciding whether we are getting there, how fast we are getting there and whether we are getting value for money. I would like to repeat my question. How much money and what kind of human resources are we putting into promotion of safety? Thank you.
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1302
Committee Motion 39-14(3): To Revise The Highway Strategy To Incorporate Cost-effective Inter-community Travel (carried)
Item 19: Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
Page 1302
Vician
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. In terms of a dollar amount, we do not discriminate the actual dollars spent on human resources and program costs by specific safety initiative. However, in the department, there are a number of staff that are directly involved with the various initiatives, whether legislative, whether communications or specifically compliance. So in aggregate, I would sense that there is a significant dollar attributed to safety programs. However, in terms of these specific measures I have mentioned, they are captured and incidental to a number of initiatives that those staff are already doing. I do not have a specific target number. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.