Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask the Minister of Human Resources some questions following my Member’s statement on Aboriginal employment and salaries in the Government of the Northwest Territories. The indigenous Aboriginal is 31 percent of our total GNWT workforce. I’d like to ask the Minister what is the current strategy for recruitment to increase those numbers in the Northwest Territories. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. The honourable Minister responsible for Human Resources, Mr. Bob McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This government developed a human resource strategy called 20/20: A Brilliant North, NWT Public Service Strategic Plan. That strategic plan has been guiding our actions for the past couple of years. We have an Affirmative Action Advisory Group. We have set up some specific affirmative action competitions so that we can begin to get more Aboriginal people into senior management programs. And of course, we have developed a number of leadership programs which Aboriginal people are starting to take a much more significant participation in than they have in the past. Thank you.

I don’t know if the new advisory group had a chance to operate yet, but I think the reality of the situation in our North and some of the issues are that the upper management

is non-Aboriginal and when Aboriginals apply for jobs they’re not getting them. I don’t know, those statistics do not show up, but it happens time and time again. I think it happened in Justice recently, where three Aboriginals were not hired and a non-Aboriginal was, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask the Minister how would the department track issues like that. Thank you.

Human Resources works very closely with the management of all the different departments to make sure that policies are followed and that the candidates that have the most merit and have the highest priorities of this government get hired for specific jobs.

We’ve looked at our hiring process. We looked at our job evaluation process to try to eliminate the systemic barriers that are either perceived or that have seen to be out there to prevent Aboriginal people from getting into jobs at different levels. We’re told that we put in barriers by demanding very specific qualifications or certifications, so we’ve gone through reviews of job descriptions so that equivalencies will be considered.

Also, with regard to competitions, if you’re a P1 and you are qualified, then you have priority hiring. Those are the kinds of things that the Affirmative Action Policy allows us to do. Even with all of those built-in systems, we’ve been stuck at 31 percent Aboriginal affirmative action employment. Thank you.

The stats have been stable for the last 10 years. We’ve had only, like, 30 percent indigenous Aboriginal employment for the last 10 years and the stats aren’t growing. Some of the barriers are systemic, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask the Minister again: in the 20/20 strategy and the new Aboriginal board, is there a mechanism for somebody to appeal a job that they felt they should have got but a non-Aboriginal got it, like in the case of Justice and the Corrections Centre?

There are many other areas too, Mr. Speaker. I get lots of inquiries where Aboriginal people from my constituency applied for jobs but they were screened out, and when you’re screened out you’re not allowed an appeal, Mr. Speaker, and often non-Aboriginals get that job. I’d like to know if there’s a mechanism in our new system that can be used to address that. Mahsi.

We have a staffing appeals process in the government and we’ve been limited by the fact that our legislation, for some reason, is restricted as to only having three staffing appeal positions, but we are making representation to have that changed so that we can have more staffing appeal officers so that we don’t have as much of a backlog.

Not only do we have a system of staffing appeals officers, we also have our human resource officers

that go back and review with those that are interested as to how they felt they could improve upon when they go for interviews and also give them feedback on how they thought they performed in the interview process. Those are the kinds of initiatives that we’re using to give people a better opportunity to be successful in gaining employment with the government. But not everybody wants to work for the Government of the Northwest Territories. You have to keep that in mind as well. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Your final, short supplementary, Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Those that do, I believe, aren’t getting the chance, Mr. Speaker. The word that’s been used in the public is like nepotism, but it’s not really nepotism if it’s someone from your home province. Nepotism is about hiring family and close family members, but it’s more like the buddy system that’s going on. How do we prevent it and how can we track that, Mr. Speaker? Thank you.

Our government has a number of checks and balances to make sure that doesn’t happen. We also have the conflict of interest requirements and all of these checks and balances that would prevent against nepotism. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Great Slave, Mr. Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Minister of Health and Social Services and a follow-up on questions that some of my colleagues have already asked with respect to naturopathic medicine and naturopathic doctors. I want to start off with a clarification question.

Yesterday, when talking to the Minister, the Minister indicated the title of doctor is a protected title and that naturopathic doctors should not be using this title. I just need a little bit of clarity under that. I am curious how an individual who can go off and get 10 years of education and graduate from a federally and regionally accredited institution as a doctor of naturopathic medicine cannot be called a doctor. My colleague Mr. Bromley is a doctor. I am curious how this title being protected is sort of captured in the Minister’s statements. Can we not use the title doctor for individuals that have graduated as doctors regardless of whatever field? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. The honourable Minister of Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.

Mr. Speaker, I am really actually kind of glad the Minister read that because that is the point I was trying to make. These individuals are not calling themselves medical doctors in any way, shape or form. If you look at where they are licensed, they are licensed as NDs, naturopathic doctors, which is a completely different education. These people are highly educated. They would never suggest to anybody that they are medical doctors. This goes exactly to the point, Mr. Speaker. There is uncertainty out there, but what these roles are and these individuals do, we need to get legislation in place. The NDs, the naturopathic doctors are requesting it to protect their title so that people understand their role and so that patients of these individuals, people receiving services, are safe.

This is a safety issue, Mr. Speaker. This is about public safety. This is about safety of the provider. The Minister doesn’t seem to be getting that by saying, hey look, everybody can practice, yes. Anybody can practice. Anybody can go up to the Northwest Territories and say congratulations, I am a naturopath, and open their doors and provide any kind of service with no licence whatsoever, with no parameters of scope of practice. How are we going to address this concern? How are we going to get these individuals covered for the public safety and for the professional safety of residents in the Northwest Territories? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I want to assure the Member I get what he is saying. I get what the Members are saying, Mr. Speaker. This is about a capacity issue. It is about a priority issue. It is about the traffic jam we have with the legislative office.

Mr. Speaker, we have, as I stated, outstanding that we have been working on to regulate licensed nurse practitioners who we need to regulate. We need to regulate psychologists who are numerous in numbers who do a lot of work in the Northwest Territories. We need to regulate emergency responders and we need to regulate chiropractors. I said, and I will say it again, I get it. I am saying that

we are reviewing the possibility of including that. I fail to see the issue here. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, excellent. That is good. I am glad the Minister gets it, but all I hear is that we are going to look at it at some point. We are suggesting and what the people are demanding -- it is not just the naturopathic doctors and the registered massage therapists that are demanding it, the public is demanding this as well -- there are concerns about individuals coming and claiming to be something that they may be, but through a certificate off the Internet as opposed to four, 10, eight years of education. We need the Minister to commit to putting this on that list of four and increasing it to a list of five or six.

The Minister keeps saying that there is too much baggage for this airplane. We want the Minister to commit. Will the Minister commit to, rather than just talking about it, adding it to the list and including it in this umbrella legislation? Two more positions: RMT and naturopathic doctors.

Mr. Speaker, I repeat, we are reviewing the situation. I want to assure the profession that they are allowed to practice in the meantime with the licence they have, we are looking at that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to follow up on the Minister’s statement this morning or earlier today on the traditional economy, the Minister of ITI. I want to start by agreeing with him that the traditional economy is indeed a critical part of our total economy. I support the Minister’s statement on this. I am wondering how much we are doing in the way of measuring this. If we really value it, we should be measuring it. Are we measuring the importance of berries, mushrooms, garden produce, fish and trade of the same between families? I am thinking not on those things that are actually sold and bought but the sort of under the table, not under the table but the domestic economy, if you will. Are we measuring those parameters? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The honourable Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. Bob McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Member is correct; we have been basically making some broad estimations and I think that this is an area that as we put more resources and more funding into developing local economies and with regards to food and country food, we are going to paying much more attention to statistics now. For

example, we have been estimating the value of country food at about $30 million for the Northwest Territories. For the compensation process, we allow the harvesters to factor in the value of harvesting as part of the calculation of the YMIR. This is an area that, as we go forward, we intend to improve our recordkeeping and statistics. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I very much appreciate those comments from the Minister. In fact, the domestic economy is recognized generally as being even larger than the market economy and yet we still don’t have these important statistics on it, so I really appreciate that intent. I look forward to working with the Minister on that.

Will the Minister agree that if we are going to know or talking about here and balance off the various options that we have in development and market economy, will we be measuring the value of child care and home care, the value of education and services provided in the domestic economy so that when we lose those, we know what we are trading off? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, perhaps I can speak to the Member to get more information about the detail. In the past we have had difficulty in getting this type of information because a lot of the people that would provide it were questioning what that information was going to be used for. There are some concerns whether it could be used against them and so forth. I think it is a matter of figuring out what information we need and how we go about collecting it. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.