Thank you, Mr. Chair. I welcome the Minister and his colleagues and his staff to the House today. As I have done earlier with other
departments, I just want to highlight some of the concerns that came out of the Beaufort-Delta Regional Council meeting where our Minister’s staff was in attendance.
First of all, just the high school in Sachs Harbour. The leadership of the region was concerned and wanted to see how we can get graduates in Sachs Harbour right out of Grade 12, rather than having to send them to Inuvik to a boarding school. It is the same with Paulatuk. They want to try to increase some of the education programs, and include some type of adult education and utilize the school to get some of those programs. I just want to get that on the record. That came out of the Beaufort-Delta regional leadership meeting that was held last January.
I am also interested to hear some of the comments that the Minister stated in here. It looks pretty good. Like I said, I will try to keep my comments short. When we get into detail, we will get into some of the specifics.
In the opening comments I didn’t hear anything in regard to the e-learning program, long distance learning program. I know there’s a pilot project that is going on out of Inuvik right now. They have been pretty successful in terms of the succession rates of students that are passing their advanced courses. Actually, it’s really upping the statistics for some of our smaller communities that have always had low passing grades. I just wanted to mention that and see what the plans are in the future for this e-learning program. Just even talking along those lines, the Minister did state with the official languages, some of the money going into there, but even with the e-learning program in the small communities, we do have some of our well-known language speakers that would be able to speak, say in coming out of Fort McPherson, they might be able to teach other people in Aklavik, Inuvik or Tsiigehtchic with this e-learning. That is an opportunity as well.
Under heritage, I’m not sure if the Minister and staff might have heard earlier this week – it might have even been yesterday – when I asked the Minister of Justice about creating some type of museum or some type of heritage structure for the RCMP “G” Division. They have played a big role in contributing to the North. They have a big role in what the North is and who we are. There is a lot of history there and it would be great to celebrate that, to acknowledge that, and to educate our residents on the history of the RCMP in the Northwest Territories.
Just one last little note here before we get into the real detail, and that is just in terms of income assistance. I know in the past year, and last year, actually, I even noted it in some comments and suggestions, and possibly even questions in the House here, about the increase of income support
and income assistance in the Beaufort-Delta region. I think we’re starting to see that now. With the slow economic activity that is happening there, we are getting more and more people that are starting to rely on government and applying for the income assistance. It is costing government a lot more money now. I’m not sure if that is reflected in the detail. When we get to those budget line items, we will see how much money was appropriated for that program itself.
Just some things that I didn’t see in the Minister’s opening comments. When we will get into detail I think we will be having a few more questions in this department. I commend the work that’s recently been done in the Department of Education, Culture and Employment and I look forward to getting into detail with this budget. Thank you, Mr. Chair.