Since 2007 when we made changes to the Income Assistance Program, yes, the number of unique cases has risen right across the Northwest Territories. We have been monitoring the statistics NWT-wide, regionally and by community over the last five years and we’ve also been looking at the statistics by age ranges. About 30 percent of our clientele are between the age of 19 to 29. Part of our strategy over the last few years has been to connect the new Canada-NWT Labour Market Agreement which allows us to provide funding to people who are under-represented in the labour force. We’ve actually targeted a lot of our training to the income assistance clients. We do this through our regional service centres. Our career development officers work very closely with our client service officers through a referral process. We have had some specific projects that have taken place in some of the communities that targeted only income assistance clients. So we’ve removed them off of the Income Assistance Program, we’ve been able to provide them with some education and training and also a living allowance. We’ve seen, over the last five years, a difference in the number of youth between 19 and 29, the numbers have gone down slightly. We’ve been able to increase more support to seniors and persons with disabilities. So we’re monitoring it closely and working closely with our labour market programs.
Gloria Iatridis on Committee Motion 2-17(3): Deferral Of Consideration Of Estimates For Education And Culture, Carried
In the Legislative Assembly on May 30th, 2012. See this statement in context.
Committee Motion 2-17(3): Deferral Of Consideration Of Estimates For Education And Culture, Carried
Consideration in Committee of the Whole of Bills and Other Matters
May 29th, 2012
Gloria Iatridis
See context to find out what was said next.