Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, today I rise to make a Member's statement regarding the elders in the Territories and how news gets around fairly quickly, Mr. Speaker. Yesterday, in this House, the issue of harmonization was raised and before the day was done, I had a message that someone wanted me to call them back soon and making that call, I was told quite straightforward about their concerns of what they were hearing this government was planning to do.
Specifically, Mr. Speaker, I was told to remember what elders have done for our communities and continue to do today. Mr. Speaker, they continue to help out families by taking care of grandchildren, by still helping out family members, their own children today. They continue to have a productive part in our society through many of the elders' groups that are established in the communities and by spreading on their traditional knowledge in schools or through workshops in the evenings, put on by the cultural groups. So they have a very significant role to play.
Mr. Speaker, when the message of the harmonization was mentioned in this House, I had a concern raised to me: what is this and what are you doing again to the elders? Mr. Speaker, it was put to me quite bluntly. Why should elders pay for the mismanagement of funds by our government? They feel that they've produced, they've put into our communities across the North and they feel that they have done their share and why at this late stage are we going back to knock on their door and put bills in front of them.
Mr. Speaker, I'm torn between the realities we are faced with as a government and what is happening to our constituents, but I feel I must raise this concern on behalf of the elders in my constituency and hope that the government will look at these issues because the comment made was, if you are going to take what we earn as elders, if there is sewing and so on as extra income, and start counting that towards their rent, then be ready to pay on the social end when elders start having to pay all this other money and can't afford to help take care of their own children and grandchildren. Thank you.
---Applause