Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I stand to speak in opposition of the motion, but it's with some reluctance and I am going to try to explain my position and reflect that what I am trying to do today is really in the best interest of my constituents here in the riding of Great Slave in Yellowknife. A year ago, when this new policy was brought forward -- actually more than a year ago -- I was in firm support of it. The thing that really appealed to me is two departments were actually going to combine their resources and their needs in the interest of improving service to clients and customers, in this case in the income support and the public housing area. One of the things that I found as an MLA is that low income people or those who have had some kind of disadvantage often have very common needs relating to their incomes, their housing needs and very often there are issues relating to justice, perhaps, or education and health. A great barrier, Mr. Speaker, to these people getting by and improving their lives was within this government in a number of so-called stovepipes that were set up from one department to the other that kept people going back and forth from one voice mail or one appointment or one office to another.

So the whole idea of harmonizing these two departments, bringing them together on these very closely related social services was, I thought, not a great step forward but at least a good step forward. I was hoping that we would be able to see more, if you will, harmonization and amalgamation of services. It's somewhat disappointing that a year after this move was deferred, with the hope that we were going to be able to level out some of the bumps in it, take off some of the rough edges and improve some of the communication, we still obviously can't seem to achieve that. However, I still stand in support of the harmonization effort as proposed and just recently amended by the Minister.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to talk about the impacts or at least the forecasted impacts, of this harmonization on tenants in Yellowknife and I'll be happy to make this paper available to anyone who would like to see it. It came to me a few days ago from the Housing Corporation and it talks about the impact of the new rent scale in Yellowknife, for a total of 259 housing units. The information suggests, Mr. Speaker, that 63 percent of those people will actually receive decreases in their rent. Now these were numbers that were put together as of last October, so things may have changed somewhat. I haven't seen or heard of any brand new information or numbers, Mr. Speaker, so I think I need to go on this; it is fairly recent. Let me give you a little bit of a breakdown.

Of 259 units, 192 are occupied by working families; 146 of those will see their rent decreased. That's three-quarters of those working families will see decreases in their rent. Half of the 30 units are occupied by students who will see decreases in their rent. Mr. Speaker, there is a third area that is defined here and that is for seniors and of the 37 units occupied by seniors, only three will see decreases. This is not entirely unexpected, Mr. Speaker, because in the interest of fairness - - which is really, I think, one of the underlying philosophies of this policy -- the departments wanted to redistribute some of the wealth that was going into this program. It's long been understood that there are a number of seniors who have good incomes, adequate incomes at least, who are paying nothing or next to nothing for their units; whereas, a neighbour might be a single mother, a student who is being forced to pay a whole bunch of money on a monthly basis because of her situation. So in the interest in fairness, I liked what this program wanted to do, which was balance the needs and the resources among our population and our government. So that's largely where it got my support.

Another indication, Mr. Speaker, that I should be supporting this, is that my phone and my e-mail has been largely quiet on this issue where people are complaining that they are going to be misused or abused by this. This is where I really have some sympathy and a large question in my mind about the kind of impact this is having here in Yellowknife, compared to what is going on with my colleagues in the smaller communities. The kinds of questions and issues that are being raised there seem to be dramatically different from what is going on here.

I have no explanation or information about that and it does point, Mr. Speaker -- and this is the last point I would like to make -- in that as much as I don't want to see this program deferred because it is going to help more people in my riding that it may harm or effect, I'm not pleased to see that we are continuing to tinker with, to design, to add new layers to subsidy programs, to welfare situations, to lifestyle inequities. Every time we try to do something or make an improvement somewhere for a deserving group of people who are at a disadvantage or disabled or cut out of the action somehow, we are creating yet another tier of inequity and inequality where people can say, with some justification, you are better off than I am because of this government's policies or approaches to things.

Government has a big responsibility, Mr. Speaker, to redistribute wealth, to provide safety nets and buffers for people who don't have the best and the biggest and all the opportunities that are afforded in this country. But the consequence of it is that we're leaving ourselves open to so many of these challenges, so many of these barriers. The idea that this program should be deferred for a year, Mr. Speaker, if it is approved or adopted, may have one hope that we will look back at the whole philosophy and what we are doing with these lifestyle supports, back-up, safety nets, whatever you want to call them. That is really where we should be looking to see whether or not this is in the best long-term interest of people in the NWT. I thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate everyone listening and again, I say with some reluctance, and with a qualified answer, I will be not supporting this motion.