Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Mr. Delorey.

Thank you. One final comment and question. It's on the bottom of page 3 of the Minister's opening remarks, where he talks about a partnership agreement, that this agreement provides communities with new decision-making abilities. Has the department talked to communities and considered turning the money over to communities for their housing allocations for the year, and allowing them to go out and deal wherever they think they could get the best deal, whether it's with local northern contractors, southern contractors? Was that an issue that was pursued? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Delorey. Mr. McLeod.

Madam Chair, I need further clarity. I'm not sure if I caught all that question, whether it's referring to market housing or block funding. Can I ask for clarity on that question?

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Mr. Delorey.

Thank you, Madam Chair. What I'm referring to, Madam Chair, is the 22 units or 42 units, whatever the case may be. The Housing Corporation obviously knows what communities they're going in and how much money they're planning on spending in each community. Has the corporation looked at partnering in their agreement with the communities? Have they considered allowing the communities to do their own tendering for units with the money that they have available from the Housing Corporation, rather than the Housing Corporation making one large contract and providing the units? Was that avenue pursued at all? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Delorey. Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The initiative is based on full cost recovery. Turning over dollars to the community is not something that we would consider full cost recovery. We also have to recognize that there is an economy of scale of bundling these units together and tendering it as one contract.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Mr. Delorey, are you finished? Thank you. Next I have Mr. Hawkins. General comments.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I guess I would first start off by making a point of saying I would caution the department for getting the trailer business. My concern being in that I truthfully would like to hear more about this program and how we plan to initiate this. I don't want to see the corporation stuck with a whole whack of trailers, which this could quite possibly lead us into.

There is one point on page 3 that I first want to start my discussion on, and it refers to the 10-year plan and it goes on to the perceptions and attitude and dependency of their clientele. I'm almost positive I heard the Minister refer to the fact that they're going to have their staff offer life skills and advice. I guess my question to the Minister in this regard is, is the Minister willing to take a social work program up in his department? What qualifications will he be endorsing his staff with? What liability will the department be now offering the department and his staff to now offer life skill advice in a social work concept? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. McLeod.

Madam Chair, I did indicate earlier that we intend to improve our counselling skills throughout the ranks of the department. It's especially targeted at tenant relations officers and managers. We feel that they should be looking at increasing the skill level of our employees in those positions to better serve the community and deal with the tenants in public housing, and also the potential homeowners and people who apply for homeownership programs to ensure they fully understand the financial aspect of owning your own home, and also to ensure that they recognize the commitment that is going to be entailed with owning a house. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I guess I'm still a little fuzzy on the area of will these tenant officers be working as social workers, and if we're going to add this new role to them, are we going to qualify them with credentials, and what aspect of liability will the department now be covering itself with offering advice of this nature? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Madam Chair. As I indicated earlier, we are not expecting more than the general counselling for the tenants. We want them to be as well versed in this area as possible. We're not expecting them to be social workers, however they may want to refer and direct some of the tenants to social workers. That will be an option. What we're attempting to do is increase the counselling skill level of our employees.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Mr. Hawkins.

Madam Chair, I will be satisfied with that answer for now, although, of course, like many others, I will probably be watching this issue very closely.

I am going to proceed down the page a little further to an area where we talk about the sale of public housing initiative. To my knowledge, this probably links the discussion, as I see it, when the Minister originally brought this to us it talked about selling public housing to people and getting people who are presently paying a percentage of their income to social housing and loading a house onto

them through a mortgage process. Is that precisely what the Minister is referring to in this statement? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Madam Chair. That's correct. Over the next 10 years, as part of this 10-year plan, anticipating and planning to sell 450 houses to be replaced and building more in the area of multi units, 250 units.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Madam Chair. As I recall, maybe not as passionate as Ms. Lee does, but during committee this issue didn't raise concern with probably mostly myself and several other Members with regard to how we are going to create a position where people are struggling and they are in social housing. Now we are designing a mortgage for them that we have to now carry. As an example I had given at the time and as we talked just in general terms, the new mortgage for these foils would be worth more than their present percentage that they are paying for the social housing. At the time, speaking straight to Ms. Lee's point -- not all her points by the way -- I want to reference that it seemed quite clear that this initiative, although interesting, still needed a lot of work. It appeared to the committee, as well as myself, that this issue was not clearly ironed out. I am still looking for some information of surety from the Minister on how we are going to implement this program when we presently have people paying 25 percent of their salary and now we are going to bump that up and have them carry a mortgage. Maybe the Minister can enlighten me, as well as the other Members of this House, on that initiative and how they've cleared up the concerns we had earlier in committee. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. McLeod.

Madam Chair, we have 2,300 public housing units now in stock. We are planning to sell 450, roughly 45 units a year. I had indicated earlier that we have now a lot more people in the communities that are employed as a result of economic activity. We have people who are living in the units, a lot of them at the high end of the rent scale. Our rent scale is up to 30 percent of their income and many of these people are paying a considerable amount, but for some reason or other, are not willing or are not able to purchase their own unit or qualify for other programs. We are looking at ways to encourage them to purchase the units. At first indication, we have a lot of people who are interested. It may require some assistance for them to approach the banks or work within our financing systems to do so. That's how we anticipate moving forward. Loan guarantees are something we do, internal financing is another tool we have to accomplish this. As Mr. Hawkins has alluded, it's a small percentage of our current stock and we believe it's achievable. Thank you.