Mahsi, Mr. Villeneuve. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We are hoping to have the regional appeal committees up and running by April 1st this year.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Villeneuve.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I guess, I know they were talking about regional appeal committees being set up, but people in the communities don't want to, like, people who are appealing from Res don't want a committee that's established in Yellowknife, or Fort Smith, or Hay River, to hear their income support appeals. I think the appeals should be heard at the community level, whether it's a three or four-person volunteer committee, which probably, you know, no honorariums attached, but I just believe that it will be just more client favourable, I guess, for everybody in a community if there are actually people in the community who know the people, who see them everyday and know their situations to be on this appeal committee. Is there any appetite for addressing that need instead of going by regional appeal committees? Thank you.

Mahsi, Mr. Villeneuve. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Villeneuve.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I guess just to clarify, one of the good reasons that these appeal committees are hard to get together to sit down and hear these appeals is because many times these appeals just go as far as the committee, and any recommendations the committee makes really gets overturned by either the

income support worker or the regional supervisor of the Income Support Program. Because of the inconsistencies with probably the training program that the volunteers have to go through and with just changes in the information that clients are getting from income support workers, I think each community...It's a great idea to hear the appeals in the community. I think if these regional appeal committees are established in the regions only, is there going to be a travel budget for them to actually hear appeals in a particular community when...Are they going to be able to travel to that community to hear the appeals of a particular community, or are these appeals just going to be heard in one particular community at certain times of the year? How is that going to work?

Thank you, Mr. Villeneuve. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Madam Chair. We're anxious to make sure the appeals are heard on a timely basis, so they will be heard quickly, in accordance with legislation. In some cases the committees will travel. In other cases I have no doubt that in order to make decisions quickly, they will have their meetings by teleconference or by some other means. There may be some members who travel and some who participate by teleconference. It's entirely flexible in terms of how the process is handled, but the goal is to make sure that decisions are made on a timely basis. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Villeneuve.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I know, I guess it would be kind of in a dilemma here if, because I know the income assistance cheques, you know, people want them right away, yet if you have to go through an appeal process, you want it done within even a quicker method of 30 days at the most. Cheques usually come out within 48 hours after your application gets processed. So I think we're going to, I think with this appeal process, the way it's set up, and it does sound very flexible, which could be good and it could be bad, but I'm just wondering, you know, are we not setting ourselves up here for some real backlashes as far as income support appeals when they do come in, and people get their appeals heard in a community where they are not even from and another person gets their appeals heard six months later when the appeal committee happens to travel to their community? Roughly the same appeal around the same circumstances, but one gets accepted and one gets turned down. I think we are setting ourselves up for a real problem on that front just with some inconsistencies on how these appeals are going to be handled on a regional basis.

Speaking of consistency, how are these people in Colville Lake, as opposed to people in Fort Resolution, have totally different income needs and the Income Support Program addresses those needs in a different fashion? How are we going to regulate or even set some across-the-board standard appeal policies that are going to make it fair for everybody? Where are these policies, if there are any, for this appeal committee if it is going to roll out here in June? Are there any policies in place already for these appeal committees? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Villeneuve. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, there are policies in place right now. Appeals don't happen six months later. They happen within seven days. These are done quickly. Our goal is to make sure that we don't have to have the appeals heard by people here in Yellowknife, but that we can have them heard by people from the region.

People from Colville Lake will not be sitting on the regional committee that would hear appeals from Fort Resolution. It would be people from that region that we are hoping to have set up on the regional appeals committee. They have to be able to hear appeals quickly.

I would be happy to share the policies with the Member. We will make sure that we get those circulated to him right away so that he can see what the policies are. He is absolutely right; in order to ensure consistency, we have to make sure that training is provided to members of these regional appeal committees. That is one of the things that we will be doing in order to try and ensure that there is consistency. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Villeneuve's time is up. Next on the list, I have Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I am going to make a few quick comments, and then we can get into detail.

---Applause

I am pleased to see that the department has set up a fund for full-day kindergarten. Hopefully, some of the local boards will use some of this money that they were using for kindergarten to supply bussing so our kids don't have to walk to school at 40 below and two feet of snow uphill in a raging blizzard. The increase in SFA, I like that. It is a good start. Everybody could always use a bit more. One of the things I have always tried to do is get kids that I know to try and go to school and take advantage of the government because they will put them through school. They don't have to worry about working their way through school. They can just concentrate on their studies. So we have a pretty good system.

Anything we can do to help the seniors is more than welcome, help them to be a little more independent. I have always been a big supporter of the Apprenticeship Program. I believe we still have one of the best apprenticeship programs around. One of the problems I have heard, talking to a few people, is one of the requirements they have is Grade 12, I believe. A lot of these guys decide early on they want to get into trades and some of them don't have Grade 12. I remember years ago, it wasn't that way. I know now they have to pass a trades entrance exam. There are all kinds of opportunities for kids up here to do anything they want. A lot of times, the government will take care of it. I think, sometimes, the income support, as one of my colleagues said before, is supposed to be just a temporary solution until people can get back on their feet. I still think that a lot of people treat it like it is a birthright. There are some people who do need it. I agree with that. I have seen people who are disabled try and work rather than collect income support. It also bothers me when I see people who do try and earn a living seem to be worse off than people who are on income support. I have a real problem with that.

A few comments I thought I'd throw in there, Mr. Minister. I don't expect you to comment to any of them. There are still a lot of questions that I have. I will ask them at the appropriate time. I like some of the programs that run out of ECE. I don't think anything is perfect, as you obviously hear about all the time. I was actually planning on asking the Minister how this new human resource amalgamation was affecting some of the district boards' ability to do their job, but I changed my mind and decided not to ask it. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Those were comments. Did you want the Minister to respond to any of those comments? No questions there in Mr. McLeod's general comments. Are there any further general comments?

Okay. Then we will proceed to detail. Before we do that, we are taking a break for 10 minutes. Thank you.

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I will call the Committee of the Whole to order. We have finished now with general comments and we are ready to go on to Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Under general comments, I just have a few further questions. I just want to know, I heard through the media that the standardized testing that we had done on grades 3, 6 and 9, the results have been finished and correlated, but they are not being released. Have the results been released? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The results may have been released. I am not sure yet. The issue that I think has been a concern to some people is the manner in which they are being released, and we are insisting that the results be released on the divisional education council or board basis only. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Hawkins.