Thank you, Mr. Groenewegen. Mr. Beaulieu.

For the record, I just wish to go over some of the Social Programs committee

recommendations. Committee expects to learn more about the department’s plan to ensure that communities without detachments continue to have services or just the Minister of Justice to increase access to funding the positions to the First Nations Policing Policy.

For the community justice programs, committee acknowledged the importance of these programs and the need for community justice committees to have increased support and training from the Department of Justice.

The committee supports the proposed changes to the Arctic Tern facility and expects the Minister will implement recommendations resulting from the facilities review.

The support for changes in the role of the court workers. Committee supports the work being done to enhance the role of the court workers in assisting clients with civil and family law matters as well.

As far as the family violence programs go, the committee supports the implementation of phase two of the action plan and funding of the programs for men who abuse, and encourages the Minister of Justice to initiate programs to support and resolve issues for families in conflict.

In the area of fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, the committee supports the work of the Department of Justice; the support that the Department of Justice is initiating with regard to clients and inmates with FASD.

In the legal aid services, the committee encourages the Minister to keep working to resolve the backlog in the system.

As far as the Minister’s opening comments, just, I guess, once we get down to the details of the department going page by page, I would be interested also, as Mrs. Groenewegen indicated, in what was called the Special Constable Program, but the name has changed to Community Policing Program, I believe.

I’m also interested in how the department is dealing with the backlog in legislation that has been proposed from the various departments and whether or not the department has now dealt with at one time, which was a process that was fairly slow and that the people who were putting legislative proposals together or the departments that were putting legislative proposals together and Justice didn’t have the lawyers there to be able to deal with developing that legislation as quickly as I think the departments would like. I’d just be asking in that area to see if that has changed. That’s it for now.

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Mr. Krutko.

Mr. Chair, I, too, would like to thank the Minister for making an attempt to try to increase the police presence in the community of Tsiigehtchic. It’s a start, but at the end of the day the community would like to see officers in the community permanently, if that’s possible. It is a start and the Minister should be commended for thinking outside the box and coming forward with an initiative that hopefully will improve policing and services in our small, isolated communities.

I, too, have concerns regarding the young offenders’ facility in Inuvik. Last time I checked, there were four individuals in there. For a facility that should have a lot more people in there it is a wasted facility such that the capacity is not being utilized. For the number of staff per inmate, it’s not justified.

We have to start looking at other types of facilities, such as wilderness camps. We have programs that have been delivered for the Department of Justice that were pilot projects but we don’t seem to have gotten anywhere with them.

We do have to work on dealing with the issue with regard to abuse and the issue around rehabilitation of clients so that we are able to assist them so when they are released, at least they have the tools to identify their problems and the means to deal with them. There was a program that was developed through the Tl’oondih Healing Society with the Department of Justice looking at a program that integrated people back into society. They take a program prior to their release from a correctional system. It was a pilot project and there were results from that. I think it’s important that we build on that. Because of decisions with regard to how Justice is being funded, those programs don’t really exist. You have wilderness camps on your list of things that can be considered. I know that issue has been here as long as I have. I know at one point Fort Resolution and Aklavik were designated for these type of wilderness camps for the Department of Justice. That’s going back to the 13th Assembly.

Nothing came of it. We continue to look at the wilderness camp in the confines of having individuals choose if they want to go there or not. A lot of times that’s the downfall of the program for the individuals who want to provide that type of service or program for inmates and people who invest in these camps.

I think we also have to look at the First Nations Policing Policy in light of First Nations governance in the Northwest Territories. It should not be considered only a Government of the Northwest Territories issue; it should be an aboriginal issue. It is to provide First Nations policing in the confines of

what happens in the rest of Canada where there is First Nations policing on reserves. You have First Nations in large aboriginal urban centres. I think there’s no difference than that in the Northwest Territories where 50 percent of our population is aboriginal. I think that we, as government, have to not only look at it simply as a policy where you can train people but also a policy where you can really make a difference between the First Nations governments, the RCMP, the Department of Justice, all working together to improve justice, policing and enforcement in our communities. I think it is something that this government has to seriously take hold of and expand, especially when we are in the process of renewing that contract now with the federal government. I think also we have to see if there are other federal programs we can tie similarly to programs that are on First Nations reserves in southern Canada and see if we can bring them to the Northwest Territories, which are basically dollars that are accessed for First Nations communities.

Again I would like to raise an issue that I raised in this House before; it is the whole complaints process that we have in place. I think the government has to do or the Department of Justice and the RCMP have to do a better job of promoting the system that they use dealing with complaints. It has to be publicized. It has to be posted in communities so the people know that there is a system in place that people can file complaints in regards to an officer or in regards to an incident that occurred or an individual feels that their fundamental human rights have been violated. I think, again, as the Department of Justice, the more checks and balances that you have, the more transparency and openness that we have of our justice system, I think the more that we are able to allow the people and the public, the people in our communities, to feel that they are a part of the justice system and not the other way around. It is them and us.

With that, Mr. Chairman, I look forward to asking him a few questions as we go through the budget.

Thank you, Mr. Krutko. Next on my list is Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to raise a couple of issues and also give the Minister and the government a pat on the back as well, I suppose. The improvements to community policing, such as in Wrigley, is very well applauded and the community is very happy about that and the establishment of even right now they are calling it a patrol cabin, but it is absolutely a start for the community of Wrigley. It is something that we have been looking forward to for some time. The return of professional services to a small town like Wrigley will certainly increase…I am looking at

the population increasing again, because a lot of people were actually moving out because of lack of services. This is one way that our government and the federal government are helping our community.

As well, in the budget, it speaks about the Deh Cho staffing in the community of Fort Liard. The staffing there is very welcome. Increasing the complement also means increasing the ability of the officers there to do their job. Often they get conflicted because there is holiday time and training time that members are out of the community, and having additional resources certainly goes a long way to community policing and the many struggles that the community does have. That is a big thing. I will thank him on behalf of my communities.

In the other small communities that don’t have detachments, the issues are still surrounding response time and the ability of RCMP visits. If I would say anything, in general, for me as MLA for the Nahendeh riding -- I have six small communities in my riding -- is that we are increasing patrols and public and also in the schools, some exposure in the schools, that go a long way in showing the community that community policing is alive and well. Just having a resource to get out to the communities goes a long way.

I’ve got one particular issue with Trout Lake. They wanted to actually sit down with the RCMP to discuss their particular policing needs. This is one community -- I am sure there are others throughout the North -- that has a community initiative of actually following traditional culture of banning individuals who are troublesome. They are looking for a way to do it. I have raised it previously, but due to mobility guidelines and federal legislation, it just doesn’t work. But I believe the Government of the Northwest Territories can provide means and ways of supporting our cultural aspect of actually not having people in the community that are disruptive or harmful and, in some cases, dangerous, because it does happen once in a while. I think it is the ability of the community to say, look, this is how we have always addressed it culturally and we would like to address it again. It is about addressing that concern that we really have to look at.

As well, the community justice as a whole in our small communities is still looking for support. They are looking for training opportunities and workshops about the role of our justice committees. I know, at one point, we put full resources behind it and now it is somewhat limited but still needed in our communities. That is something that I would urge the department is a concern in the communities. The communities are looking for the resources for their desire to make their community healthy. This is one of the justice committees that did work and they want it to work again. I continue to support

that. I’m glad to see that there are some resources, but not enough. In the coming new year, I would urge the Justice ministry to look at that and evaluate it and do their best with the resources that they have to assist the communities that do want to move on with their community visits.

I just wanted to touch on those few issues that are particular to my riding, Mr. Chair. I would like to thank the Minister. I look forward to working through the budget. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. I have no other Members on my list. Is the committee agreed that there are no further general comments?

Okay. I will allow the Minister an opportunity to respond to general comments. Minister Lafferty.

Mahsi, Mr. Chairman. Certainly I appreciate the members’ concerns, remarks, ideas and suggestions to our Department of Justice. There are certain areas that have been touched on. First of all, Colville police detachment that the Member from that region alluded to. There have been some great works in our department where we have identified an additional resource for Fort Good Hope to deal with Colville. I know it doesn’t solve having a detachment in the community, but I think this is a great start. Sure, I would love to have police detachments in all communities. Some day we will be in a position to open a detachment in Colville and other communities that are without a detachment. I am looking forward to that as well.

The Community Justice Program, Mr. Chairman, certainly that is the area that we tend to focus on continuously, because I see that as part of a preventive measurement. Working with the community elders, working with the RCMP, the judge and the committee and coordinators at the community level there, we can make great strides in this program. So we are currently reviewing the program, what is working and what is not working, pros and cons, and how we can strengthen that. We have heard over and over how we can strengthen this program, so we are doing that as we speak, Mr. Chairman.

With regards to the Arctic Tern facility, we will certainly get into more detail at a later time on how the facility is operating, the cost of it and so forth. The review has been undertaken. The review has been passed on to our department from PWS as well. Our department is currently reviewing the technical aspect of the report. It is an ongoing discussion that we are having.

Mr. Chairman, I’ve heard about thinking outside the box. We currently don’t have a box that we work with. I erased that box when I first got on board, so it doesn’t exist. My staff has been very creative and innovative in dealing with various issues. We will continue to work with the Members and with the general public on the particular items.

The land program, as the Member from Sahtu alluded to, has been very successful in that region. We want to continue delivering that program. I am happy to say, for the Member for Sahtu, that there will be e-mails going into your region this coming Thursday. So we are making progress on moving things along. That has been in the works for some time now. At some point in time I would like to see more of these programs into the regions. That is one of our mandates on a moving-forward basis. Certainly it is one of the focuses. Yes, it was a great story opening Sachs Harbour detachment. It has been a great story for the Northwest Territories, for the community, for the elders in that particular community. We are looking forward to more opening of detachments. Gameti, Wrigley and other communities such as Colville are ones without detachments.

The Special Constable Program, Mr. Chairman, has been brought up on numerous occasions every time we visit the communities. Now it is referred to as Community Policing Program. The Northwest Territories has been identified for three out of 32 positions, so we are very lucky. We are happy that the federal government allocated three out of 32, so that was a huge initiative undertaken by this government. We continue to voice our uniqueness and our concern working with this system. We rarely get these kinds of numbers from larger jurisdictions. I think they are slowly listening to us, our needs in the North. We will continue to pressure the federal government in that respect. We appreciate the three officers that will be coming into the communities to serve as community policing officers.

Certainly we can provide the stats on the rehabilitation program, as the Member alluded to. That is the information that we continue to work with. We can certainly discuss further on -- the Member talked about the correction facility -- a non-smoking area. So we can get into further detail on those areas when it comes time.

The communities without detachments providing more services, those are areas that we are focussing on. We are waiting for the federal government to provide us with infrastructure. It takes years but there is another avenue where we can put boots to the ground in the communities with our investment and a federal investment. Without a detachment, we can certainly move along a path. Of course, there will be a partnership with the

federal government. We are happy to see that we will be…The proposed plan is providing three additional RCMP officers in the small communities to serve those communities without the detachments. We are also looking forward to that, Mr. Chairman.

The court worker positions, additional role that has been talked about by the Members of this Legislative Assembly and those are the key roles that have been addressed as well. We continue to work with that and broaden the position as well.

The family violence, of course, we continue to support these areas and other supportive programs. We will continue to do so, as well as dealing with that backlog that the Member had talked about as well. I was just trying to get some more information from my staff but we currently don’t have backlog, but it is something that we need to keep our eyes open for and on a moving-forward basis.

Mr. Chairman, there’s an increase in the wilderness camps. I already touched on that and the complaints process. There are certain protocols that we follow with the RCMP. We do have an agreement in place with them. We will probably go into more detail when the time comes, but I can assure the Members that we work closely with the RCMP “G” Division and we do have a protocol agreement between the Dene Nation and the Metis, between the RCMP and the two groups, so we tend to work with that as well. The process itself is going through the detachment and commander. If the individual that filed the complaint is not satisfied with the outcome of the review, certainly there is another step going through headquarters or another avenue with which they have rights to is file a complaint with the Commissioner of Public Complaints. Those are the areas that we work with the RCMP “G” Division.

Concerns about the response time...I think having three additional officers in the communities that serve RCMP without detachments, certainly that will increase our presence. We continue to pressure RCMP “G” Division to increase their scheduling of visitations to the communities. Mr. Chairman, I will certainly continue to put pressure on them from my position as Minister of Justice.

Of course, community justice, the committee and coordinators, the program itself, the training aspect has been addressed here. We certainly are taking that under review and we certainly want to make some changes in strengthening the program. We will continue to work with the standing committee and the Members of the Legislative Assembly on where we can improve in these areas and we will be coming back to the standing committee to

address how we can go about that. Mahsi, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. As there are no further general comments, does committee agree to proceed to detail?

We are going to defer the departmental summary on page 9-7 and review the estimates by activity summary beginning on 9-8. Before we do that, I would just like to remind committee that we are reviewing the main estimates. Let’s keep questions focussed on the page at hand. Just because you have 10 minutes, it doesn’t mean you actually have to use your entire 10 minutes. To the Minister, I would like to encourage the Minister to keep his answers short, sweet and to the point. Thank you. We are on page 9-8. Mr. Krutko.

Under infrastructure investment, there is $921,000 with regards to small capital projects. Could you give a breakdown on that?

Thank you, Mr. Krutko. Minister Lafferty.

Mr. Chairman, we do have the breakdown of $191,000 for fire suppression at the South Mackenzie Correction Centre. Also, an update on the secure cells, of $150,000, in the South Mackenzie Correction Centre; Inuvik Youth Facility, foundation issues that we have been dealing with of $330,000; North Slave Adult Facility, flooring replacement of $150,000; River Ridge secure stainless bathroom fixture of $100,000. Those are the areas that have been identified. Mahsi.

Could we maybe get a print out of that?

We can certainly provide that. They are also listed in the infrastructure area as well. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Page 9-8. Sorry; infrastructure investment summary, information item, page 9-8.

Okay. We’re on page 9-9, information item, revenue summary. Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have a question under transfer payment, Aboriginal Justice Strategy. In 2008-2009 we received $315,000. There is none in 2009-2010. Is that because the money is coming later in the year or because that money has ceased to...it’s dried up?

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Mr. Lafferty. Ms. Schofield.