Thank you, Madam Chair. It comes as no surprise, I’m sure, to the Minister that I’d like to raise the consumer affairs issue. I think this is an area that seems to be underexplored by this government and whether it’s the lending agencies of the small little loan companies out there, payday loans as they’re often referred to, which I’ve had concern with in the…or even to the gas prices or the cell phone issue that I raised the week before. I’d like to hear from the Minister on how they plan to work with this area, perhaps maybe even bolster it and support it in a manner that it gets out into the public, talks to the public, to all four corners of the NWT and gets people’s feedback and engagement into consumer protection issues. I mean, why have a consumer affairs division if they a, have no teeth and b, certainly fall more anonymous than, certainly, in the public’s eye.
The cell phone issue, as I raised earlier, is a critical issue, but consumers really don’t know what to do or where to go, and I think they feel helpless if not stranded by their government on the anonymity of this particular section. I’m not suggesting in any way that they don’t do work or the work that they do manage to do is of any lesser quality. The reality is, it has become largely anonymous and I think it’s time that in this heightened awareness role of society where people need to know where to go when they have concerns, they need to know that their government is listening, that they’re certainly available, and these are their rights. But right now, as it stands, as I said, it’s more of an anonymous situation than it is a public one. I would challenge the Minister, and certainly the department, to offer ways and suggestions in a creative fashion to show how they could do more with this area, because I think it’s very, very important.
Active living is very important. We see it highlighted in the Minister’s opening comments, as well as we’re all well-versed, very clearly, in MACA’s goal about helping getting youth active, but there’s often a critical component, and I’ve highlighted this, that seniors’ activity is a gaping hole in our public system here where we don’t have a specific mandate to support them in an active type of living. The challenge, of course, I’m proposing to the department is the fact is they need to be able to offer services. There have been gaps in a manner of being able to fill. We’ve been able to reach out and find service agencies that, by the way, get their money from MACA, which is a bit of a paradox. MACA can’t help them but they can give money to somebody else who can help seniors, which seems to be a paradox by itself. There needs to be some recognition that seniors need to be active. They want to be active and they need support mechanisms.
I probably beat my colleague to the punch on this one, but not necessarily on purpose but to further underscore how important it is, which is the 911 system. I know that Ms. Bisaro has raised it even recently, and the Minister has spoken positively to this. I’m kind of glad to hear that it’s in the focus of the department, and I’d like to hear more as to what they can do or certainly how they’re probably trying to drive this to a solution. I know I’ve raised it a few times in the House and I’ve even had good discussions with NorthwesTel about logistics and technical abilities. They have had the ability to provide a tier-two 911 system, and it’s a shame that the government hasn’t gotten behind that. But now the proverbial excuse of cell phones being part of the problem, whereas then they couldn’t do a full implementation has now been relieved from the government as being a barrier. So I look forward to hearing the government providing some input and certainly some proposals.
I agree with Member Dolynny that the programs offered for community ambulance services or extension of emergency services are probably very weak, and the fact that communities are doing the best that they can, and they certainly need the support of equipment, training, as well as the financial authority to go make the right call. I mean, I’d hate to think that someone hesitated to go rescue a person in need on a highway and it all came down to simple things like authority or they didn’t have the money to do it. The government needs to be standing shoulder to shoulder with these Good Samaritans who are willing to join these community services programs. They’re largely volunteer so, in other words, they’re underpaid and probably under gratified in the sense of the work they do, but it’s so important to the community that they’re there if they need someone in an ambulance or a fire service. That work is absolutely critical. It’s just one of those things. I
wish we could pay them but we just, obviously, don’t have the money to do it.
I just want to restate seniors programming and funding for seniors to get them active. I think that’s very critical, from my point of view, although I’ve probably overused the word critical. It’s trying to stress how important I think it is. I have a large seniors’ community in my riding. I would say, to some degree, not unlike anyone else, but I’m there regularly at the Baker Centre with the Yellowknife seniors, and even at times we see people and we speak with them from the territorial seniors’ point of view, and it’s so exciting watching them engage into lawn bowling or types of participation that keeps them healthy. It becomes one of the fundamentals that if they’re not active, it starts having a ripple effect or a trickle effect against their general health. I mean, it’s wise for our government to find new ways to get our seniors active, and if the department was clever, they would probably try to link it to some type of youth programming where we get the seniors to take the youth out for a walk or a brisk walk in some manner or we get the youth to take the seniors out. I mean, there’s got to be a neat way to get them engaged. I mean, that would sort of speak to the fundamental type of government we run and maybe the territory we live in, which is we always want to talk about linking the youth to seniors, and here could be a new, innovative way that the department could come up with a program that, you know, get granny walking but maybe granny’s out spending some time with the young folks being active as well. It could be a great way of doing things.
That said, that seems to be all I would feel at this time I’d prefer to comment on. I will leave the rest up to my colleagues. I will have further questions page by page.