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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My issue is not with the Norman Wells Land Corporation acquiring the land; I guess it’s the precedent this sets. I’d like to ask the Minister: are there currently any other negotiations going on around the Territory to sell any additional Commissioner’s land? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, the same process would be used if anyone else would have an interest in acquiring Commissioner’s land. They would approach the department and then we will work with them and the community to see if it’s feasible to sell this Commissioner’s land. But all the proper process would be followed. Again, I say, if part of the process is informing Members of fairly substantial land sales, Cabinet was informed, but if informing Members is part of the process, then I apologize if this wasn’t done in the particular case. I will ensure that in the future any substantial purchases, besides the local Member, it would be good protocol to let all Members know. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I too would like to ask questions to the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs and it’s regarding operations and maintenance funding.

Mr. Speaker, I, like several of my colleagues, have had the benefit of serving on a council for at least one term and understand how important MACA is to the communities and certainly the funding of their operations. Undoubtedly, I know other Members realize that too. One of the problems we’ve always had, I remember from serving on council, is understanding the formula and having an appreciation for the formula that’s distributed to communities. Yellowknife, being one of the largest communities in the Northwest Territories -- the largest, by the way -- there was always the concern of proportional or a respectable fair share of the revenues.

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of MACA has given me a briefing note to say that there was going to be a formula update. My question to the MACA Minister is: has there been a new O and M funding formula update done and have you included people from the municipalities on the discussion and development of this formula? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. The honourable Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs, Mr. Robert McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We’re just in the process of evaluating the O and M funding formula for all the communities. Obviously, with something of this size we would have discussion and we would consult with the NWT Association of Communities. I can assure the Member and all Members that we are reviewing the O and M funding formula as it exists today. Thank you.

I appreciate hearing that from the Minister. Does the Minister have any knowledge as to what level of detail is shared with the communities when you talk to the Association of Municipalities? Do they actually get to see the funding formula or do they just hear about the overtones and the spirit and the intent of what the formula is about and how it’s driven? In essence, do they get into the nuts and bolts of how the formula is developed so they have an appreciation to fair and equitable distribution of that type of money? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, we also continue to work with LGA and LGANT. A couple of

times a year we will bring a lot of the SAOs into the community. I’m sure they’re all aware of exactly how the funding formula works. I think they review it with them and that way the communities know on what basis they’re funded for their O and M. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, that didn’t actually answer the question, although it sure sounded close, as in a good try. But what the question really comes down to is does MACA share the specific formula used in the distribution of O and M funding? Do they share that with the municipalities to ensure that they know exactly how the proportion is spread out throughout the Territory to ensure it’s spread fairly and equitably? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, the answer is yes, we do share all the relevant information, all the information with the communities, because they’re the ones that benefit most from these particular formulas. The answer is yes, we do share all the information with them. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. What is the goal of MACA when they do the development and review of the new formula going forward? What is their goal or effort going to be in the context of developing a reasonable proportion? The example I give is that there’s one community one-fifth of the size of Yellowknife but still gets approximately almost the same amount as Yellowknife. I’m just trying to get a sense of what they’re going to do to work and achieve a fair and equitable balance on the distribution of those types of formulas. As we all know, Yellowknife has a very large population and has a very huge infrastructure deficit that they need to continue to work on.

Mr. Speaker, the Member is correct; there are some communities that he may think get close to what Yellowknife gets, but a lot of the tax-based communities have the opportunity to create their own revenue, raise their own revenue and a lot of the non-tax-based communities don’t have that option.

All different areas of the formula funding will be looked at. We try to treat the communities across the Northwest Territories fairly. That’s why we go with a base-plus funding model for a lot of the communities, so you don’t get the smaller communities with, like, 42 people getting $20 when some of the larger communities get a lot more. This is the fairest way and it’s the way we will continue to fund the communities so everybody’s treated fairly.

The formula funding, as I said, we are reviewing it. We talked to the communities. We actually just had a meeting this morning with one community that

had some concerns. We talk to the communities, we’ll get their input and then we’ll make some recommendations. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The honourable Minister responsible for Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I thought that I already stated on Friday, as well as in answering questions this morning, that we have accepted 62 out of 73 recommendations; 62 out of 73 recommendations. We prefaced our response to the report by saying we support the work that the committee has done. We agree with the committee that we need to do more to enhance family support and working with children. We have put explanations on 10 recommendations that we could not accept as they are written, but if anybody would take the time to read those, we explain why and we talk about how we could work with that.

Mr. Speaker, in that way, the committee report and our response is very much in line with the Foundation for Change action plan. The Foundation for Change action plan has many, many different aspects to it: ones to do with wellness...(inaudible)...wellness programming and the state of wellness of our people; we talk about how to increase and improve accessibility to health and social services programs by doing things better, by using technology, by using… I mean, there is just so much to that; and sustainability. This is something that we’ve been talking about for two years, Mr. Speaker. The action plan lays out quite straightforwardly how we want to do that.

We appeared before the committee two weeks ago where we told the committee members that we were on target, but the Member wanted more

information and we will get that. Mr. Speaker, I think the action plan is very clear about exactly how we’re going to get there and what we want to get done. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I am having a very hard time. I guess it is a matter of semantics. But in my mind, I really don’t know how the department is going to accomplish all of the things that they have in the strategic plan that the Minister talks about.

I would like to ask the Minister to tell me... I am going to give an example from the Foundation for Change. The action is: expand respite care for families of children and youth with special needs. The expected result is families and caregivers are provided with relief time. I would like to know from the Minister how those two statements tell me how the department is going to accomplish the expected result.

Mr. Speaker, I say that is a good example of how simply and straightforwardly we put our action plan.

Mr. Speaker, we see a vision in the Northwest Territories where we will have more families getting assistance from this government as to how they could get respite care and get a break. In doing that, Mr. Speaker, we have expanded the respite care program to include NWT-wide. We have enhanced funding and it is in this year’s budget for $75,000, and as Members have stated, we are working on a territorial-wide respite care program. That is new because before we only had a respite care program in Yellowknife and delivered by one agency. We are expanding that program, and in the previous answers which stated where it is moving to, it is moving to, I believe, in Simpson and Fort McPherson. I could be wrong about the communities, but we lay out in what communities we are moving, so we are working on it and we did a presentation to the standing committee where we suggested from models on how we do that.

Mr. Speaker, I think that is a very good example of how much in detail and how methodical where we are going about dealing with an issue that everybody here has asked us to do. I think that is a good example of how I fail to see how the Member could suggest we are not giving enough information. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the Minister for her response. I would like to suggest that all that information in her response should be part of the Foundation for Change. That is the kind of detail that committee is looking for. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I didn’t hear a question there. The honourable Member for Great Slave, Mr. Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to follow up on the questions my colleague Mr. Bromley was asking the Minister of Education, but I want to ask these questions to the Minister of Health and Social Services. The Department of Health and Social Services provides $511,000 a year to Aurora College to deliver the NP program or the Masters to Nurse Practitioner and the Introduction to Advanced Practice, both incredibly important programs. It is our understanding, or rather we have heard that the department plans to cease that funding in 2012. Could the Minister either confirm or deny that for us? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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