Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Item 4, reports of standing and special committees. Item 5, returns to oral questions. Item 6, recognition of visitors in the gallery. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to recognize a couple of hardworking Pages today from the constituency of Frame Lake: brother and sister Stuart Hamre and Martha Hamre have been working very hard for us this week.

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Item 7, acknowledgements. Item 8, oral questions. The honourable Member for Tu Nedhe, Mr. Beaulieu.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today I spoke about homeownership repairs for elders in Tu Nedhe. I’d like to follow up my statement with questions for the Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation. As mentioned in my statement, when you look at the numbers of units in Tu Nedhe owned by elders, they are not many. I also mentioned the housing issues in this sector of our population should be treated with more urgency. I would like to ask the Minister if he would commit to separating elders core need from other families so that the Housing Corporation can focus on elders’ housing issues.

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The honourable Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation, Mr. Robert McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I can inform the Member that we do have new management in the South Slave and they are in the process of targeting seniors based on visits to the community. They do want to have better communication and a lot of communication with seniors, and they’ll work with the seniors to assist them in processing their applications and provide translation as needed.

To help kick-start this initiative and gather some good baseline information on the elders’ housing situation in Tu Nedhe, will the Minister agree to direct his staff to visit each of the elders’ households in Tu Nedhe?

Mr. Speaker, the staff are planning on targeting seniors and if that means meeting with them, having one-on-ones with them in their home with translation provided, then that’s the direction that they’re going to take from now on. I would like to make it quite clear that this initiative is targeted at seniors and the ones who are not able to get around as well as they’d like to. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, with the short construction season, in addition to Lutselk'e being a

barge community, will the Minister commit to ensuring that the staff get the much needed materials into Lutselk'e to address the elders’ housing issues in Lutselk'e? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, the program intake starts in September and we do use that to try and get the applications approved as quickly as possible and have the materials either brought in by winter road or during the beginning of the barge season. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Your final supplementary, Mr. Beaulieu.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I hope that means Lutselk'e is getting a winter road.

---Laughter

Mr. Speaker, we’re nearing the end of this government and I think it’s important, in the area of homeownership and the area of housing, that we develop some sort of elders’ housing strategy. Would the Minister commit to starting or completing some sort of an elders’ housing strategy to address the housing issues for the elders across the Territories? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I meant delivery to those communities that are accessible by winter road. I thought I would clarify that.

Mr. Speaker, recognizing the importance of housing to seniors and some of the conditions of some of the houses, the Housing Corp has taken some programs on to assist seniors with their housing. This is just another step in the whole process. I think it’s a positive step and I think it’s something that the seniors will welcome, you know, with the preventative maintenance where once they’re on the list, they continue to get the program every year. So we recognize the importance of improving the delivery of service to seniors and we’re taking steps to address that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in my Member’s statement I talked about the elders and the care for the elders. I want to ask the Minister for the NWT Housing Corporation, in terms of a policy review or consideration, would it be possible that if a child or grandchild or an adult exchange a promise of assistance to support the elders in their homes in terms of a cost of rent increase, is that something that can be looked at? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The honourable Minister responsible for the Northwest

Territories Housing Corporation, Mr. Robert McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there are policies set in place for certain reasons, and as much as we’d like to have people in units with the elders looking after them, there is opportunity for them to do that. What we don’t want to get into starting here, and there has been some discussion of this in the past where folks that are working will move in with seniors, realizing that the seniors pay no rent. So we need to get away from that. However, we would like to see the best conditions possible for seniors. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Certainly I’ve considered that also, Mr. Speaker, in terms of the use of the program there is for seniors is for free rent and people, when they do move in, take advantage of this in terms of the free rent. What we’re asking in terms of looking at a policy and maybe with the Health and Social Services or some kind of a program where there would be a subsidy or some payment for provisions for elderly care, maybe a reduced rent but not to look at where the elders would have a huge increase in the rent due to this initiative. This, again, looks at caring for the elders, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I can commit to the Member that we can have some discussions, interdepartmental and myself, and the Ministers of ECE and Health and Social Services to see if there are some options there that we can possibly look at. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Krutko. The honourable Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation, Mr. Robert McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this has been a concern raised by a number of communities because it does happen. I have instructed the department to possibly look at coming forward in the fall with our infrastructure requirements and have that as part of the infrastructure budget in the fall. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I believe that by logistically working together with other departments it will also allow for possible savings in getting a lot of these materials into our communities. We do have fuel resupply; we do have the winter road construction, which they have open roads to ensure that we are able to resupply those communities. So I would like to thank the Minister for that, but how soon does the Minister intend to come back to the House with the assurance that that decision has been made? Are we talking this fall capital session? Will we see that being approved in that session? Thank you.