Thank you. Next I have Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am just wondering if the Minister could provide a breakdown of the fees and payments under corporate human resources, the $4.28 million. Does he have a breakdown of what those numbers are?

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, the fees and payments under corporate human resources include the Maximizing Northern Employment and interdepartmental training development subsidies to GNWT staff training, staff retention and that supports retaining of individuals, and the Employee and Family Assistance Program. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Ramsay.

That is good. Thank you.

Thank you. Page 2-101, 2-103, activity summary, corporate human resources, operations expenditure summary, $6,470,000.

Page 2-104.

Page 2-105. Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just a question to the Minister on 2-104, could I ask the committee to go back to that?

Thank you. The Member is requesting to go back to 2-104. Does committee agree?

Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. On this one here, especially for the Employee and Family Assistance Program or staff with less training or interdepartmental training development, especially again going back to some of the benefits for the staff in terms of families who may have gone through a rough time throughout the year that they need extra days to get support or support their families. Is there extra time without them dipping into their days that they earn or things like that? Some families have special leave for grieving that they give them a certain amount of time, like three days. It is really short. Is there any type of flexibility? I might be getting into some other issues that I am not aware of. I guess that is where the compassion comes in and some of the care comes into families who are going through a hard time, especially in the small communities where it is expected of people of members of the family to be there when they are going through a hard time. They have a tough decision to make in terms of their job and employability after they come back from such a tragic event if they are going to be penalized or whatever. Is there some flexibility in terms of having special consideration to these employees, especially in smaller communities? It may be true also for the larger centres, because I am not living here in Yellowknife or Hay River. I don't know. The communities I represent, in our culture, consideration is given to employees, especially to family members who are suffering at certain points of the events there. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, the specific area of Employee and Family Assistance Program differs from what the Member is speaking about. We get into the specific area of leaves, and special leave is a provision that is provided for occasions that, yes, an employee runs into difficulties and needs support, but our guidelines are quite clearly established as for what an employee can apply for that special leave. Beyond that, there are provisions that can be taken into account. If there is annual leave, if that employee would have annual leave on file or, as well, we would look at leave without pay if it is going to be a prolonged time away. So there is some of that flexibility built in.

When you do look at our overall package and we talk about special leave, annual leave, sick leave and things like that, we have a very generous system out there to help employees to try to deal with some of these areas. There is some flexibility. For example, if there is a loss in a family, and an individual has to travel to another community, there are some things that can be applied in there, but it still falls in with the allotment of time that has been established through negotiations with the employees. Thank you.

Thank you. Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. The Minister is right. There are some other areas that I can talk more about these employees' relationship in the leave here on special leave. I want to talk, then, about the Employee and Family Assistance Program. How is it operated in our communities? My understanding is that some of the employees receive this type of assistance through a 1-800 helpline through the department. It is not very effective or very good for the employees. It is only when you come into a really crisis emergency situations that the employees are looked upon. I know there are some people in my region within this department have said there was support for them in their work. However, they had to call. They used a phone system. That's unacceptable, Mr. Chair, in terms of this type of program and we are trying to be good employees for our people. Is there any way that this program is going to be reviewed and strengthened to have employees from the government actually come and receive face-to-face family support assistance program or, actually, Employee and Family Assistance Program for themselves and families? Right now, it's just not doing what it's intended to do. Thank you.

Mahsi, Mr. Yakeleya. Minister Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the Employee and Family Assistance Program is under review and a new contract will be let out in approximately a year's time. As I stated, we are reviewing how the existing contract has operated and how we've been able to get service into communities across the North. The majority of communities are serviced by a 1-800 number as the initial point of contact. Where we have been able to get contracts in place with firms that would help in communities, we've been able to do that. But it is a very difficult field to try to find staff in regions or communities that would fulfil this area. It is an area we recognize needs to be improved and, as I stated, we are reviewing that to try to improve that before we go out for a new contract in about a year.

Thank you, Minister Roland. Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I look forward to the review. Hopefully it will be done within a couple of months from now to see where we could work. I am not too sure how long this review will take or when we will have time to have some input into it. The Minister did say that in a year's time there are some options to renegotiate or negotiate new contracts for this family assistance program. I am going to leave it at that level, but that program is going to be one of the key benefits to attracting and retaining good quality workers for the Government of the Northwest Territories. Certainly, I would love to see that 1-800 number have some good quality programming.

The Minister needs to recognize, I guess, counselling services are also offered by our traditional elders in the communities. You can't always rely on western science of counselling. Our elders offer good counselling. They are experts. Use the elders in the communities. I don't know how we are going to get around that, but use them. They guide us in our life. They are actually born natural counsellors. I don't know why we are getting away from them and looking somewhere else. That's not our life. Maybe for some others, but not for us in the communities that rely heavily on the elders who are recognized as spiritual counsellors, medicine counsellors, relationships.

They are there just waiting and we are not using them. It's not rocket science in our communities.

I just want to say to the Minister in terms of venting some of my views, be open and flexible to look at what works in the communities as opposed to working on a blanket-wide policy. Thank you.