Thank you, Mr. Jacobson. The honourable Minister responsible for Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Lafferty.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Within the income security area we have made some changes in the past to meet the standards of the high cost of living in the communities. We continue to make changes to meet the needs of the communities. At the same time, we continue to work with the committee that’s been established to reduce the cost of living. It’s under the leadership of Ms. Lee. Certainly we can continue to work in that area and have a clear dialogue about how to reduce the high cost of living specifically in the Member’s riding. We’re fully aware of that and within our income security area, as I stated earlier, we make changes every now and then based on the evaluation of the program itself.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Will this government commit to assisting community governments, organizations, and residents in the communities with no food bank or support services so no child or family goes hungry in this Territory?

I certainly appreciate the Member giving us some feedback from the communities’ perspectives because those are important discussions we are having within the committee that I’ve just highlighted, the committee that’s responsible for reducing the cost of living. Those are the discussions that we’re having. Whether it be reducing the cost of living in communities, how can we go about that area? Not only that, but the food basket area and various other programs that we deliver at the community level. I appreciate Members giving us input into certain areas that we need to improve on. We’re clearly working on those areas.

I may not agree with that, but recognize that this government reviews the cost of

healthy living in the small, remote communities periodically, but I don’t agree with how the costs are reviewed. Will this government revise measures on how the cost of living in small, remote communities can be recalculated?

The last time we made changes to our income security area was recommendations that came down from community representatives that deal with communities that are in a high cost of living. Not only that, but the input from the Members, due to the fact that we made changes to our program, but there’s always room for improvement as well. We’re always constantly making changes to our policies and certainly there is, Members are involved with the isolation costs, the committee itself. So certainly they would like to hear their input and Members around the table as well. We continue to strive for the betterment of the community programming.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Final supplementary, Mr. Jacobson.

I really hope this committee that the Minister’s speaking about could meet sooner than later, because we have people in our communities who are going hungry. It’s not right. Will the Minister commit to do a community tour of my Nunakput communities?

Yes, certainly we’ll take those into consideration. There have been Ministers going into Members’ ridings. The committee I was referring to is, of course, reducing cost of living and also the rural communities, the small communities that Members are involved with. Certainly there’s been a lot of discussion in that area. We’re certainly looking forward to the input of those Members and how we can change our program that will reflect on the high cost of living along with working with the committee that’s leading the task as well. Certainly those are important discussions that we’re having today and certainly take those forward with our consultation.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I mentioned in one of my Member’s statements earlier this week that I was privileged to attend the NWT Association of Communities annual general meeting and conference in Inuvik. At that meeting, during the business part of their meeting, the association passed some 20 resolutions; 19, actually, I think. My questions today are addressed to Premier Roland and I’d like to first ask the Premier, because I know he has received a copy of these resolutions as have I, I’d like to ask the

Premier what action will be taken by this government or by himself in regards to the NWT Association of Communities resolutions.

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The honourable Premier, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I did indeed receive correspondence from the president of the Association of Communities. I have forwarded that to all departments so that we can come back with a joint response to the letter that I received.

Thanks to Premier Roland for that comment. I guess I would hope for a little bit more specifics, but I guess we’ll have to wait and see. Many of these, I shouldn’t say many; some of these resolutions include funding requests. I’d like to know from the Premier whether or not the funding requests that are contained in the resolutions that do have a funding request, will those requests be considered in the development of business plans for the 2010-2011 budget?

There are a number of different levels; the Member is correct. Some do require some commitment towards funding. Others are just the way we do business, carry out. So we’ll have to look at what we can’t do in the short term in the sense of implementing some of the change. Others, when it comes to actual business plan, the timing of that we would work with Municipal and Community Affairs, who would submit their budget requests in areas whether it’s new initiatives or forced growth areas for communities. Work on that basis to see what comes forward.

I want to highlight a couple of resolutions. One of them, actually two resolutions reference the Mackenzie Valley Highway. Basically the resolution stated that we need to get on with it, so to speak. I’d like to know from the Premier whether or not he thinks the power and the urgency behind these two resolutions from the NWTAC, whether or not this government can use it as some leverage or some push to get the federal government to move on the Mackenzie Valley Highway file.

That motion, I believe it’s the 20th motion from the organization, is indeed

helpful for us. The more people we have saying the same things, the better for us when we build our business case. I know that the regional leadership as well have spoken to that and support this initiative. We’ve just received correspondence from the Gwich’in Tribal Council president as well that flows along with this to see how we can work together to come forward with the business case, I would say. So a motion like this is supportive and we hope to include more like this as we build our business case.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Final supplementary, Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. To the Premier, thank you for that explanation. I think he knows I am totally in support of a Mackenzie Valley Highway project. The more we can get it going, the sooner the better.

One other resolution I wanted to mention is the resolution that talks about the protection of NWT waters from oil sands developments. It asks the GNWT to ask the Government of Alberta to halt new oil sands approval until it negotiates an enforceable transboundary water agreement with the NWT. My question to the Premier is whether or not he will commit to forward that message on behalf of the NWTAC to the Government of Alberta.

We’re already engaged in a process with Alberta, with B.C., Saskatchewan, our neighbours in this area, and Minister Miltenberger is also involved and engaged in this area when it comes to the water issues with regional leadership here in the Territories, trying to secure that new agreement and have the federal government step up their mandate in this area. So we’re engaged in this area and we’ll continue to pursue an agreement from my level with the Premier of Alberta. We’ll engage at that level to work out a solution that works for us in the sense of having that agreement move forward.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. The honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Krutko.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is directed to the Premier and is in regard to my Member’s statement. I think it’s so important that this government realizes it’s probably more urgent that the government involves itself in the communities that basically are struggling to deliver programs and services, from policing programs to health care services, and also in regard to being able to recruit and retain professionals in our community from lack of staff housing. The challenges are big and bad in a lot of our communities. A lot of times we approve budgets in this House. Great intentions, a lot of money goes out the door. At the end of the day those services are not delivered in our communities because we either don’t have a police officer, a nurse, lack of teachers.

I’d like to ask the Premier, in light of the challenges we face in our smaller communities, if the government could very seriously consider looking at reframing some of these dollars so that they do go into the communities and expend it where they’re

supposed to and not get bottlenecked at the regional hospital or regional education system and not being able to deliver because of these capacity issues we’re facing from housing to a lack of police services or nursing services or professionals being able to deliver these programs. I’d like to ask the Premier if he would consider looking at that type of gesture in regard to assisting our communities to deliver programs and services.

Thank you, Mr. Krutko. The honourable Premier, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The area of transfers of authorities, programs, devolving responsibilities is something that we’re definitely engaged in. We have many examples of where we’ve tried to do it. Some programs have been handed back to the Government of the Northwest Territories, because communities could not, for their own capacity issues, take on the additional programs or attract professionals to take certain positions. We find that even from within the Government of the Northwest Territories, difficulty in finding the right solution for our communities. We are engaged. We do look at that. It is part of, for example, as well, the negotiations around self-government, depending on what the authorities are and programs that region and the self-government are looking to take over. There are a number of fronts where we are involved looking at trying to make the best use of the dollars and trying to get the programs to the communities in those cases.

We are challenged across the Territory. There are a number of fronts we are involved with and will continue to be involved with to try to make sure we get the programs out to communities and best results for people in those communities. Thank you.