Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Housing Corporation recognizes the importance of having as many local people doing the contracts as possible. That’s why we ventured into some negotiated contracts with local contractors to help them build up the capacity so they can compete in an open market. We see that in the case of some of the ones that we’ve negotiated contracts with in the past. They are competing in the open market.

The Member says that there was $800,000 in negotiated contracts. Some of the numbers I have put that number a little higher. I mean, the one particular contractor, almost $1 million since 2004-05 in negotiated contracts. They also won some publicly tendered contracts which were quite high. In another community where there was about $1.6 million in negotiated contracts from 2007-08, and they’ve also won publicly tendered contracts. So that indicates to us that helping to build the capacity to compete in an open market is obviously working. Thank you.

The information that the Minister provided definitely doesn’t illustrate the picture he’s trying to portray here. There’s been five years of negotiated contracts with the Housing Corporation expending over $12 million in capital investment. Only $800,000 was expended in five years in my

riding. Out of that, $9.67 million went to companies outside of my riding. That’s the point I’m trying to get at. We have negotiated contracts, policies and procedures, we have sole-sourced, we have a whole bunch of opportunities we have to use. So I’d like to ask the Minister why is your department not using those tools and implementing those policies that we have as government to build capacity in communities.

Thank you. We are using those tools. We try to support local business as much as we can. There are some folks that enter into joint ventures with contracting companies to bid on the work that’s required in their community or possibly negotiate the work that’s required in their communities. So I know what the numbers are; I know the numbers that the Member is quoting, and from the numbers I’ve seen and the assistance that we’ve provided to the local contractors, we were able to help them build up the capacity so when public tender comes out they are able to bid and be successful. Thank you.

Thank you. Again, this Minister and his department totally disregards the policies and procedures of this government when it comes to negotiating contracts, sole-sourced contracts, contracting guidelines we have in place for government projects, government capital to be expended in communities. There are support letters given by the MLA, there are support letters given by the bands, the municipal governments, but yet this government totally refuses to acknowledge that. Those are efforts by community governments to show that they need these opportunities to build capacity in their communities. So why is this government and this Minister not living up to the wishes of those community leaders by those support letters to have negotiated contracts in their communities and continue to refuse them?

This government and this Minister do not disregard policy. You can’t, obviously, go against policy.

We understand we’ve gotten letters of support. We’ve entered into two more negotiated contracts with contractors in the Member’s communities, two in one community, even though both have requested a negotiated contract, and according to the policy, if two or more request a negotiated contract, we could have used that as an opportunity to go public, but we recognize that we need to help the local economy. So we entered into a negotiated contract with two companies in the same community and we did put three of the duplexes out to a public tender so everybody has an opportunity. They have an opportunity to bid and they proved to me and to the corporation, at least one of them, that they can be successful in an open market.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final supplementary, Mr. Krutko.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, it took political will and lobbying to the Premier to get this Minister to move on this effort so that he could back down from his reluctance to negotiate contracts. It took public influence to get this Cabinet and government to agree to two projects in my riding.

There were letters from Fort McPherson and Tsiigehtchic. None were approved to Cabinet. The only reason that went to Cabinet is because the Premier was speaking to the public individuals in the communities by the community leadership so that we can see some benefit from these projects in our communities and not see the wealth go to the other regional centres. I’d like to ask the Minister, since you’ve become Minister how many negotiated contracts have you taken to Cabinet in the Northwest Territories for housing.

Four.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement I talked about the possibility of the homeless people in the Sahtu communities and other communities who face the issue of the eviction notices and termination of public housing units. This is all due to a number of attempts to collect arrears payments to the units. I want to ask the Minister, in his review of the Shelter Policy for the NWT Housing Corporation, if there is going to be a policy where tenants like these that are very high in arrears can have some other options such as working off their arrears or looking at some garnishment for payment to make towards the arrears or volunteering their services in a monetary amount to work off. If there is anything that would keep them from being evicted and keep them in the house and learning also at the same time what it takes to maintain a public housing unit.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Well, first of all, the obvious one is pay your rent and you won’t be evicted. We’ve come to cases where folks have received termination notices and they need to work with the LHO. The LHO tries to work with them. The whole eviction process is almost a year-long process and it comes to a point where eviction is the last option. We’ve had a few cases of those. It’s not something that we like to do. We want to be able to work with the tenants.

I can point out to the Member again, and I have said in this House, we’ve seen a great improvement

in the public engaging with their LHOs and trying to enter into repayment plans. Not only entering into them but also honouring the commitment they made, which I think is the most important first step.

I have some information, thanks to the Minister, that he passed on to me. That’s what I want to look at in terms of one of my communities, where if a number of people do not do anything, they will be asked to leave their public housing units; a total of 10 adults, not counting the children. I want to ask the Minister in this regard, we will have a homeless problem in Deline. Can the Minister in any way, through his leadership and direction, look at putting a little more emphasis and resources to working with these people? There are 10 adults that need to see where they’re going to be housed. Right now they’re going to be in the warehouses or tents. I know it’s an effort between two parties. What else can we do to keep them in their units? Is there anything possible for them?

As I said earlier, we give them every opportunity to try and rectify the situations that some of them find themselves in. I can point out to the Member that in the community that he mentioned, the overall collection went from a very low number to over 100 percent now; the collection rate. I understand that we’ve had some of these issues in the past and I think the folks there are getting the message, which is encouraging to the Housing Corporation and encouraging to the LHO, because they’re able to use that money now to do some much needed repairs in the communities.

We’ve had other places where they’ve tried to come up with some innovative solutions on how people can work off. We’re always willing to listen, but it has to be something that benefits both the tenants and the LHOs. We’re always willing to listen to any kind of new initiative. We’ve seen a few of them in the past that have worked. One in one of the Beaufort-Delta communities has worked quite well. There’s a lot of work to it. As I said, we’re always looking to or are willing to listen to any kind of initiatives out there.

It’s encouraging to hear the Minister say that he’s willing to listen and work on some of the innovative solutions. I want to ask the Minister in regard to the eviction list in one of my communities. Is this something that the Minister can possibly look at implementing with Housing as policy? Right now it’s at discretion. If we had a policy that would give more direction to the LHOs to say now we can look at another avenue to have people work on their issues and what it means to be a homeowner or to live in a public housing unit, it will help them in terms of being more independent.

At the end of the day, it is our goal to see our tenants become more

independent and honour the commitments that they’ve made. There’s also, and I’ve stated in the House in the past, an appeals process that we’re hoping to roll out here fairly soon. I won’t as a rule try and dictate to the LHOs what they do. They make their own policies. They’re the ones that actually came to us with some of the ideas they’ve had which they figure work quite well in their communities.

There’s an appeals process that we’re hoping to roll out here. Tenants will have the opportunity, if they feel that the board didn’t follow policy and procedure, then the appeal process is another avenue. We’re obviously trying to work with the tenants to give them another avenue to appeal decisions that they feel are unfair.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I certainly hope that the LHO board clearly hears what the Minister has said. The board is the boss, and their comment that we have to take instructions from the district office is wiped out.

I want to ask the Minister, when he looks within solutions, can the Minister look at the concept of a community rental, community tenant/community liaison person for the housing that could help the tenants and the Housing Corporation so they can work together daily, monthly, weekly, biweekly, so they can help them with the arrears? Certainly that’s what we want to do and we need to work with them. I would ask the Minister if he would consider that possibility.

Most LHOs have tenant relations officers that work with the tenants and bring them up to date on their rental arrears and how they can best address them. They’re called tenant relations officers and they work closely with the tenants.

As far as the district office, I mean, the district offices usually work very closely with LHOs and they give them some guidance and direction. They’re just another sounding board for the LHOs.

We want to ensure that from headquarters right down to the LHOs all policies and procedures are followed very closely, because it won’t work very good if we start doing one-offs and going against policies and procedures as being laid out in the Assemblies before us.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In a similar vein as my colleague Mr. Yakeleya, I have

concerns about the Housing Corporation on how they do view this particular problem and deal with arrears, whether they’re rentals or, certainly, mortgage arrears.

In my Member’s statement today I talked about 76 percent is the collection rate at housing LHOs across the board, that is, to be honest and fair of course, and they need 90 percent in order to break even. Of course, housing arrears under the context of mortgages are at 40 percent. If you add those two stacks of arrears up, that’s about $26 million in arrears.

The Minister just talked about all these avenues to address these types of problems. What is the Minister of the Housing Corporation presenting as an avenue to pay for these types of arrears, and to ensure that people are complying with their arrears and catching up and getting rid of them? What is this Minister actually doing to close a particular file?

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We did recognize, as this whole Assembly did, that this was quite an issue. We’ve come up with a plan to assist our tenants, whether it be public housing or mortgage homeowners, we’ve come up with a plan to help them deal with their arrears. There’s a repayment plan that they can enter into with their local housing authority where they pay so much a month on top of the rent that they’ve been assessed.

Our collection rate as of March 31, 2011, was at 79 percent, which is an improvement. A lot of the local LHOs, I think we have a high of 161 percent. That indicates to me that we have folks that are starting to come in and put more money on their rent and arrears. We have five or six of our LHOs that the collection rate is actually over 100 percent. We’re seeing a lot of improvement. It’s still a work in progress. It’s always encouraging to see tenants starting to step up to the plate and accepting the responsibility that they signed on for.

I think the Minister answered the question, I’d say, quite thoroughly. I want to give him credit for that particular answer. I think that’s only fair.

I would disagree with him on the context of blanketing tenant collection on rents at 161 percent, because I think what that does is present the House with a false number. What I mean by that is, I’m not saying that the Minister is misleading the House, what I’m saying is...

---Interjection