Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I'm pleased to speak for the seventh time and hopefully this is my record. Last general comment, but, Mr. Chairman, I think we should be mindful of the fact that we did change the process this year for the budget review where we cut out the normal committee review process. I'm sorry to be seventh in a row to speak or something like that, but I can't help it if I have lots to address here.

Mr. Chairman, I just want to say one more thing, and I will reserve my questions for details and there will be many at that, but with respect to general comments on the Yellowknife Facilities Plan Committee I have to tell you, once again, for the record, how unsatisfied I am with this process, Mr. Chairman. If we are not careful with this, the Minister is going to leave behind a humungous, colossal mess here. I respect all the players that are in it, but this is becoming a symbol of what you do when Ministers don't want to make the decisions that a Minister is paid to make. Now he's hiring people to make his decisions. Board chairs get into this committee, I mean they're elected, they have things to do, they know what the space needs are and what the school needs are. They don't need to have a hired board chair to organize their meeting because other than that, what is the purpose of this committee? They can make all the recommendations they want to about what to do about facilities, but the ultimate decision is with the Minister and this House.

I tell you, there are lots of schools and parents advisory committees who spend hours raising money. I'm sure they could figure out lots of things to do with the money that the Minister chooses to spend to do study after study and to set up committee after committee and asking them to do things that he should be doing. He should get his sleeves rolled up and go in there and talk to these board chairs and get things done.

Minister Miltenberger has made it a process. He set up a Joint Leadership Committee where he meets with the chairs of hospital boards to find out what's going on. I mean, the Minister was asked to chair this committee and he doesn't want to do it because, I don't know what reasons, he wants to be neutral. I think that was the answer, and I think that's just another answer for indecision and inaction. I'm telling you, there's an emergency happening in the city. We have, as a collective, and we're all responsible for this, and I don't

want to leave behind a legacy where we walk in this Assembly, I walk in as a Yellowknife Member with the budget money there for a new school and I'm going to walk out of here with no new school and a 30-year-plus old school with no renovation money and every teacher, and every child, every student, and every board not happy with the process because the Minister refuses to do what he's supposed to do. He says that asking questions, you know, he accuses other people wanting his job, but he has no problem hiring someone else to do his job.

So I have a real issue with that and this facilities review is not going to be able to recommend to go with anything. The final decision is with the Minister. So I would suggest to him that he start doing his job in the third year of his mandate and sort this out, because otherwise it's going to be 15 months of a colossal mess that he's not going to be able to clean up. So let me just leave it at that and I'm going to wait for the line-by-line detail. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Dent, would you like to comment?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just for the record, I have joint chair meetings, very similar to the ones that Mr. Miltenberger has, twice a year with all the chairs from all of the boards, and that's been an ongoing process since day one. I have met with the chairs of the boards in Yellowknife outside of those meetings, as well. In fact, I met with the chairs of YK 1 and YCS twice in January alone. I met with YK 1 this past Saturday. I talked on the phone to the chair of YCS yesterday. There is a lot of communication happening between myself and the people who are involved in education, Mr. Chairman. I have a report that all of the stakeholders participated in and made some recommendations. I have followed those recommendations and, in the process, it's got significantly more money into the capital plan than what was there before. There will be, I'm sure, some discussion about how to resolve the issue that is outlined in the report. It clearly says in the report that a redistribution of students among available space is required, and the report sets out three different options. Well, I have tasked this committee to take a look at those three options, and I am going to give them an opportunity to try and get that work done. I know they've got another meeting planned for February 21st, and I am hopeful that the members of that committee will be able to come back with some recommendations in their first report to me. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Ms. Lee. Thank you. Mr. Ramsay. Thank you, Ms. Lee.

Sorry, Mr. Chair. I just had a question, but I will pass and I will ask it again because I just lost it.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Next I have Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I wanted to get back to this and the more I think about this, the more I think there's reason to discuss this. I know the Minister knows I'm supportive of the concept of bringing all these programs under one roof. That is indisputable. I mean, I think that should happen and the sooner it happens, the better. But the fact of the matter, Mr. Chairman, that remains is it's costing the Government of the Northwest Territories more to do this than it should. Again, from an administrative point of view, this shift is going to cost us more money. If you look at the government's track record in amalgamation of our HR department, if you look at the division of the departments, of ITI and ENR, it always costs more money and, Mr. Chairman, I don't understand why, as a government, when we're going to go into a process like this, we don't look at everything and put all the cards on the table, understand where it is you want to get to and go there. But why it costs $1.3 million more to do the same work you're doing right now is beyond me. There's something about that that I just can't comprehend.

Again, I'm going to state for the record that I'm very supportive of what you're trying to do, but it should not cost more money. I don't understand that. We rush out at the drop of a hat, we rush out and hire people. That's always the answer, Mr. Chairman, always the answer. Just hire more people, just pay more money. Ultimately, Mr. Chairman, the thing that really bothers me about this is the $1.3 million is not going to go to the people who need it, and that's really bothersome, Mr. Chairman. That's $1.3 million that's not going to get to where it's needed.

We had a discussion in the House the other day about day cares and the inequity in day cares and how they are funded, how charity leases are allowed to take place, Mr. Chairman. We don't have money, we can't treat all the day cares the same way, but yet here we are, $1.3 million, it's no problem, just rush out, do it, hire some people, hire the people that are going to look after this. There's something about this that, to me, is fundamentally wrong and it's not being fiscally responsible. We only have so much money and why we can't take the resources we have and direct them to do what we want them to do, I have no idea. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Well, the money has been transferred, so there is no increase to the budget to pay for this. This is being accommodated within existing resources. I

think that Mr. Ramsay says the government has a poor record and I would challenge him on that in particular when it comes to income support. Yes, when income support was transferred to ECE, there was a short-term increase in costs; but if you take a look at what's happened in income support, even in the administration of it over the years, it has reduced its overall cost to this government and significantly. It's not all just because of the better economy. I am quite confident that as we work through our income security review and we move to bring all of our subsidy programs under a common policy framework, that there will be the sorts of savings that Mr. Ramsay is anxious to see. But you can't necessarily accomplish them on the moment of the transfer. When you've got new people doing a new job and you've got a different group of people looking after the program, it sometimes takes a while for things to get worked out.

We made the promise that people who were in social housing would see no change as of April 1st and in order to do that, it does require some increase in staff from the Education, Culture and Employment side. Now, those dollars have been offset in the Housing side. So it's not a situation where we're asking for a total increase in the budget all across the board for the department. This is a transfer and we will accommodate the delivery of the

program, as I said yesterday, hopefully with no net increase in calls to the Members for the program. That is our goal, but it's going to take us a while to work through the income security review. The plan is to have that worked out with the committee and the Members of this Assembly, and hopefully through the next business plan you'll start to see some of those savings come into play. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to ask this question: Why can't the Minister, why can't the government if it's going to save us money down the road, why can't you paint us a picture, draw us a picture, show us how this is going to save us money? Then a Member like myself may be able to buy that, but we haven't been able to see a model or something to the effect that, administratively, and the numbers of positions to carry this work out, is going to decrease, we're going to be able to be more effective, we're going to be more efficient in the way we handle these programs. The picture, Mr. Chairman, hasn't been painted, and I'd like to ask the Minister why can't the government show us this? I know you're dealing with some numbers and things like that and there are different scenarios that might play themselves out, but certainly somebody can paint us a picture. That's all I'm asking for, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. When the department took on income support it couldn't paint a picture then, either, because it had to go through a consultation process with NGOs and stakeholders about what the program should look like at the end. But the program that came out in the end did save this government a significant amount of money and we are halfway through that consultation process right now. I'm confident that by the time we get into the business plan, that we'll be able to propose some ways in which we can accomplish some savings, and that's always been stated as the goal. The standardization in the program delivery is going to, I think, be one of the ways in which we will start to see some savings, but we have to get the program housed in the department, get the people experienced with how it's being delivered, before we can actually come up with some of the proposals for change. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I'd really like to believe the Minister when he mentions that, but we heard the exact same story when it came time to amalgamate our HR division under one roof. We heard the same story. Oh, it will save us money; it will save us money. I've had nothing but headaches dealing with the new HR. It's soon to be a new department. Nothing but headaches and that's the track record I'm working on. I hope that everything works out and I hope that we can save some money, but, again, I have to question that and that's my job here, is to question whether or not that's, indeed, the case. Given what's happened here the past two-and-a-half years, I'd have to say, no, it's not. Nobody has proven that this government is capable of taking a project and actually realizing some savings, realizing some cost effectiveness, realizing some efficiency. It just doesn't happen, for whatever reason. I don't know; maybe people are afraid to hurt other people's feelings or something. There's got to be a big problem somewhere where the decisions just aren't made that are going to save this government some money. Nobody ever wants to save any money, they just want to spend it, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I don't question Mr. Ramsay's responsibility to question all that government does. It's important that Members hold the government to account for what it does and I accept and agree with that. I would hope, though, that Mr. Ramsay would take a longer view than the time he may have been in government, and think back to when income support was transferred to ECE, and take a look at some of the changes that took place in that department in the mid '90s and how we've managed to actually rationalize the delivery of that program. So I think that I can point to some areas where we have had some success, and I believe that we will have this area to point to again in the future. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Ramsay.

That's good, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm looking at the Minister's opening comments where he refers to student financial assistance, and I'll be requesting the detail of that. Thank you, Minister Roland, for helping. I appreciate that, Mr. Roland. The Minister cites that there will be new money in addition to the existing monies for SFA, and I'm trying to get a sense of value for money. Now, would the Minister explain to me on a typical grant a student would receive, would they receive the typical same grant they would get if they went to, say, St. John's, Newfoundland, Memorial University versus the University of Victoria in B.C., or would they receive the same amount of money if they went to Aurora College in Inuvik or Yellowknife? Would they receive the same basic grant? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. When it comes to grants; for instance, the grant for tuition, that's a maximum number. So if tuition was less than next year -- $1,925 -- then that would be the amount that would be paid out, whatever the tuition was for that semester. If it's more than $1,925, then $1,925 is the maximum that the student would get and that's not dependent on where the student goes to school, that's a maximum for the program. The same is true for the grant for books, and the maximum amount next year will be $400 per semester. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Hawkins.