Those are ongoing discussions that we’re having within our department — if the money is taken out, then what options do we have? Certainly, with the Justice department alone, that’s a substantial amount of money. If we need to find it within, it’s going to be a bit difficult. We’re looking at options to move forward. If we’re

going to proceed with the facility in Smith, then we need to have more discussion on that. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr.

Lafferty. Oral

questions. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to follow up on my statement on Friday about BHP Billiton’s Ekati Diamond Mine tailings spill. In particular, I understand that there was a three-day delay, we now know, between the occurrence of the spill and its detection. So to the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources: is there an attempt to get to the bottom of that and tune up the detection abilities or to work with the inspectors that are responsible for that? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Bromley. The

honourable Minister responsible for Environment and Natural Resources, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The first priority was to make sure that the spill was dealt with properly. Very clearly, as that issue is dealt with, there’s going to be a review, a debriefing and a post-mortem on what happened, what were the timelines and where improvements are needed.

I certainly don’t disagree with the priority there. I understand that cleanup is going well.

I also understand it was a malfunction of a spigot that caused the spill. Apparently it was some ice and whatnot clogging it. I suspect it’s partly because of changing conditions. We’re finding our springs are a lot different than they used to be and so on.

I’m wondering if the Minister has considered having a fairly broad review of the protocols that developments such as this are following in regard to the new information we have on climate change and the source of extreme variations we can expect from now on.

The Member has identified an issue that is going to bear some scrutiny. There have been a number of spills and situations that have happened resulting with leaks of fuel and tailings ponds attributed to ground shifting, things freezing. There seem to be some things — while I’m not in a position to say emphatically or unequivocally — that are related to the issues the Member has indicated. Clearly, one of the issues that has been attributed to those causations has been the changing climate. So the Member raises a point that is going to bear scrutiny.

One last question: will the review include the tailings dams that have ice cores in them? I understand they were designed for a warming of 1.5 degrees Celsius, and we know now that that’s quite insufficient.

All those technical criteria will be part of what is going to be reviewed to make sure that we can try to hopefully anticipate some things and not wait until there’s actually a failure. All those factors will be considered.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Oral questions. The honourable Member for Kam Lake, Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr.

Speaker. My

questions are for the Minister of Human Resources. It gets back to my Member’s statement where I was speaking of aboriginal persons in senior management positions with the GNWT, the Affirmative Action Policy being in place since 1989. The number of aboriginal employees in the GNWT workforce has been hovering around 30 per cent — that’s government-wide — but in senior management it’s at 15 per cent. This policy has been around for 20 years, so I’m wondering what plans the government, this current government, has to address the low numbers of aboriginal people in senior management positions with this government.

Thank you, Mr.

Ramsay. The

honourable Minister responsible for Human Resources, Mr. Bob McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Member is correct in pointing out the low levels of aboriginals in senior management. This is a problem that has been around for a long time. The Government of the Northwest Territories’ aboriginal representation in the public sector has been flatlined at 31 per cent for at least eight or nine years. We’ve proposed to the previous government and will be coming forward to propose once again that we look at making changes and moving towards an employment equity program.

There are a lot of reasons why I’m bringing this issue up today. I hear about aboriginal constituents who work for the GNWT who are consistently passed over for promotion when it comes time to look at advancing in the department. It’s not just one department — Transportation, Justice — it happens all the time.

I’d like to ask the Minister of Human Resources…. It sounds like they’re coming forward with the employment equity program, but what are we doing today to address these low numbers?

Presently the Affirmative Action Program gives priority to qualified aboriginal employees. So they apply for a job, and they get priority if they meet the requirements of the position. I think it’s also important to point out that when the Affirmative Action Policy was first introduced, it was accompanied by training money under the Public Service Career Training Program, which allowed the government to train aboriginal people and others to aspire to positions. That program disappeared. In order to improve the performance of the Affirmative Action Policy, we have to find a way to provide additional training to accompany it.

In addition to aboriginal people being passed over for promotions, I also think and have heard from folks who get educated and get trained, and then when it comes time to apply for positions with the GNWT, they get the back turned on them. These are home-grown aboriginal employees or potential employees.

I’d like to ask the Minister: it doesn’t sound like we’re doing anything today, but are we not doing some succession planning when it comes to our aboriginal employees in this government? Is there any that’s underway today?

This is certainly an issue for our government. All of the senior managers, as a criterion in assessing their performance, are directed to work in helping develop aboriginal people towards achieving senior management positions within the government. I think our problem is our pool of people. Not everybody wants to work for the Government of the Northwest Territories. There are a lot of options for aboriginal people who have the qualifications. Those are the issues that we have to deal with.

Thank you, Mr.

McLeod. Final

supplementary, Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the Minister for that. It seems to me that we used to do a fair bit of management training opportunities and mentoring aboriginal employees so that they could make that transition from a rank-and-file employee into senior management. What’s happened to the management training opportunities that were out there? I just don’t see them anymore.

We still have those programs. Some of them have been reduced, but we still have the management employment program, where we bring 15 to 20 people into the pool and work very closely with those people so that they can aspire to higher positions within the government. That program is still in existence.

Thank you, Mr.

McLeod. The

honourable Member for Inuvik Twin Lakes, Mr. Robert McLeod.

Yes. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement I talked about training opportunities for youth. In the Minister’s statement today he talked about the same issue. So I’m glad to see we’re both on the same page on this.

I’d like to direct my questions today to the Minister of ECE. I’d like to ask the Minister if the department works with the aboriginal governments and industry in identifying potential training opportunities for youth across the NWT.

Thank you, Mr.

McLeod. The

honourable Minister responsible for Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Lafferty.

Mahsi, Mr.

Speaker.

Certainly we are working with the communities, aboriginal organizations and aboriginal governments. Our departments are also working in the regions. They do offer a wide variety of programs at the community level, at the regional level and also at the headquarter level. They provide services that relate to career development, apprenticeship, employment preparation and training, which the Member has alluded to. At the same time, we have worked with industries in the past, because we’re very interested in apprenticeship training.

Certainly those areas have always been a key interest of the Northwest Territories, because we do lack tradespeople in the North. We also encourage and work with students to access SFA, the Student Financial Assistance Program, so they can pursue higher education as well.