I am aware that Stanton

Territorial Health Authority, which is one of the biggest, has just completed a Human Resource Management Plan. Minister McLeod is releasing the Human Resource Plan for the entire government and, as the Member knows, many of our health care professionals are employees of the government. I do believe that all of the authorities...and we are working in that area. So I just want to make sure that the Member understands that just because it’s not one that we flagged at the website, it doesn’t mean that we are not engaged in this recruiting and retaining of our health care professionals on a daily basis and as part of our work every day. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. The

honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

In my Member’s statement today, Mr. Speaker, I talked about the Summer Student Employment Program by the GNWT. I’d like to ask the Minister of Human Resources a few questions about that program. What is the process whereby the government determines the level of engagement or employment they will have available for summer students? Is it driven by departments’ requests or is a number set as a goal for the summer? How does that process work? Thank you.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen.

The honourable Minister of Human Resources, Mr. Bob McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Generally, the way the process works is early on in the year, usually February or March, we meet with departments to start planning for the summer and we make representations to the departments to identify summer student positions. Generally, our goal is to try to achieve previous years’ targets. As I’ve indicated in the past, our best years were probably about five or six years ago when we hired about 315 summer students. On average, the last few years we’ve averaged about 282 students on a summer basis. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, does the

Minister know roughly how 282 placements of summer students would compare with the number of summer students who registered looking for employment with the Government of the Northwest Territories?

Last year we had

approximately 580 summer students apply. This year I think we’re up to about 625 summer students that have applied. Thank you.

Thank you. Once the

students take that opportunity to register their resumes and their interest in summer work with the Government of the Northwest Territories, does the Government of the Northwest Territories make that database or that inventory of people looking, do they make that available to any other employers in the private sector, for example? Thank you.

In the past we made it

available to the federal government career office. I don’t think that’s working anymore. We also have programs where we top up or make assistance available to the private sector to hire summer students. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final

supplementary, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, one of the reasons I raise this line of questioning today is in response to some constituents who have raised concerns about fairness and transparency in the hiring process, and Ms. Bisaro mentioned it yesterday too. I mean, I hope that...I mean, people who are, you know, the children of deputy ministers and senior management of the government are entitled to student employment with the GNWT as well; however, if they’re working directly for one of their parents, of course, that’s something that I think needs looking into. However, one of the situations that I heard of in Hay River is that when a certain government department went to the summer employment office to get students, the only names that were sent over

to them to choose from were the P1 students. I’d like to ask the Minister if he believes that the Affirmative Action Policy must apply for summer students who are not going to be necessarily forming a long-term representation...I mean, the affirmative action is to have a representative workforce. Does the Minister feel that only P1 students’ names should be sent out initially to those departments seeking summer students? Thank you.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I

must say, we’re very concerned about some of the allegations that are being made about practices not being followed in the hiring of summer students. Certainly, it’s casting some serious aspersions on our civil service and we don’t take these allegations lightly. In the hiring of summer students, our affirmative action policies apply, but historically we’ve been challenged to hire more than 30 percent affirmative action P1 summer students and the statistics this year bear that out as well. We encourage and we require the Affirmative Action Policy to be applied and when we send out information, we make the whole database available. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The

honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Krutko.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr.

Speaker, my question is in regard to the community of Tsiigehtchic and residents’ homes being threatened by melting permafrost and, more importantly, land that’s starting to move. Because Tsiigehtchic is built on a hill and, apparently, the houses along the edge, along the river, along the bank, are now noticing cracks in the ground and, more importantly, their homes are now shifting where they’re seeing a lot of cracks in the walls of their units. Mr. Speaker, in regard to an individual, Mr. Cardinal, who did have someone from the Housing Corporation investigate and look at his house, said that the recommendation will be to move this individual to another location. I’d like to ask the Minister of Housing exactly what programs are available to people in these types of conditions where we’re seeing that the threat by way of climate change and movement of the ground and whatnot of the homes is affecting the structure of that unit. I’d like to ask the Minister: Does he have any programs to assist people in this matter and also what’s the status on Mr. Cardinal’s request for assistance?

Thank you, Mr. Krutko. The

honourable Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation, Mr. Michael McLeod.

Thank you, Mr.

Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I’m reluctant to talk about an individual’s application in public. We certainly can talk to the Member and the individual that has been flagged as having concern about the circumstances. As to the second question that he asked as part of this, there are programs within our department, under our housing initiatives, that are targeted towards repairs and it certainly deals with health and safety issues and also deals with structural soundness. Those areas of criteria are part of the consideration and a house in that community would certainly qualify, providing they meet the rest of the criteria. I would also add that there are other communities with soil erosion, and that’s something that subdivisions fall under the municipal government’s responsibility and that also has some responsibility through MACA. So we have and will bring this forward to MACA for a look at how they could work with the community. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, again, I’d like to ask

the Minister, realizing that this problem is pretty apparent. It’s happening. It’s in the communities. We’re seeing it throughout the Arctic communities. Also, we’re seeing it because of the climate that is changing; it’s getting warmer. We’re seeing more precipitation by rain and it is affecting the foundations in our communities. I’d like to ask the Minister again: At one point there was a program to enhance the piling program, especially in light of the infrastructure challenges we’re seeing in the Inuvik region, but now this is even worse than that because even the units that are on piles are now seeing the ground moving on those units. I’d like to ask the Minister again: Can you consider looking at a program similar to the piling program to assist these people -- the majority of those people have homes that they have received through the Housing Corporation -- to either move their units or find ways of sounding up their units so they are safe and they are secure in regard to these challenges they are facing today at no fault of their own? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I don’t

believe the NWT Housing Corporation was involved in the program for fixing the situation with the piles and the ones that were identified in the Beaufort-Delta for replacement. This is an issue that has been flagged. We do have programs that can address it. The programs we have are application-based and if there are any individuals in the Member’s community that would like to apply, we’d

certainly have our regional staff talk to them. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, just to remind the

Member, there was such a program in the housing programs that were delivered in the past. You reframe it your program, but the program is still there. I’d just like to ask the Minister: In light of people from the department going into the communities, inspecting houses because of this problem, are you aware of any other houses in the Mackenzie Delta region that are having the same problem?

Mr. Speaker, we did

and continue to do a number of repairs on the piles. There are other communities that have challenges in terms of soil erosion. Most of the communities are trying to deal through MACA to rectify the situation and our focus, of course, is our public housing stock. I certainly can talk to the other departments to see if there are any other communities that are facing the seriousness of the challenges that Tsiigehtchic is facing and provide that information to the Member. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final

supplementary, Mr. Krutko.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr.

Speaker, in regard to the urgency of this matter, I’d like to ask the Minister if he can move this up so that we could try to resolve it before this summer and, hopefully, get an answer sooner rather than later. I’d like to ask the Minister if he can try to find way of moving on this matter in regard to the residents of Tsiigehtchic and, more importantly, the community of Tsiigehtchic in regard to the threat that they’re under. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, the

Housing Corporation is aware of the situation. The Member has raised it. Several individuals in the community have raised it. Some have provided and formally submitted applications. There is some consideration for those applicants and I can certainly share that information in confidence to the Member as things develop. Thank you.