I’d say that we’re absolutely going to be flexible and open. We have some of the most generous leave policies here in the Government of the Northwest Territories and we encourage our employees to maybe take some time to go participate in these types of events.

As Cabinet members, I know we’ve all had an opportunity to travel to the Sahtu and many of us did participate in the hand games when we were there previously. We do see the value of these types of activities and we encourage involvement. We will continue to encourage our employees to take advantage of these opportunities as they present themselves.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. On page 3 of 3 of the Minister’s statement he said, “so far have been in the right direction and that we are

a national leader and role model in advancing diversity in our workplace.” I’m with the Minister on that. I want to ask the Minister how I can support him. Can he write some kind of directive or initiative that would support cultural awareness, such as participating in regional hand games, when the opportunity is available to our workers.

We, obviously, want a public service that represents the population that we serve, and as such, we have put in a number of these programs to help us attain that. I’m interested in what the Member has to say and I’d be happy to sit down and have a conversation with the Member to see what we can do, and discuss it further with committee as well.

Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In follow-up to my Member’s statement today, I have questions for the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs. Back in November my colleague Mr. Dolynny made a very good statement on this very same topic. I believe that since then, the report of the unfortunate and tragic incident that took place in the Yukon has progressed further, and their government, the Yukon Government, is looking at putting in place measures to avoid this very preventable loss in the future.

I’d like to ask the Minister what our government has done to date to address the issue of carbon monoxide detectors in buildings in the Northwest Territories.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The National Building Code requires that all structures built from 2008 now have to have CO

2 detectors. Any structures built prior to then, it wasn’t a requirement at the time. However, with the incidents that took place in the Yukon I think there are a lot of people who are starting to install CO

2 detectors.

The department, working with the NWT Fire Chiefs Association, had a very good awareness campaign and I believe they were even handing out free detectors to those who wanted them. We are trying to raise public awareness. There are some requirements for it in the National Building Code to have these installed after 2008.

That is very good news, both the mandatory installation in public buildings, the public awareness campaign, and the handing

out of carbon monoxide detectors. The potential problem is all too prevalent in our residences.

I’d like to ask the Minister if there’s anything that our government could do further to step up the efforts to ensure that people have access to these detectors in their homes. I understand that they are not that expensive, and in our communities they are probably not readily available in some of the small communities in stores. Is this government prepared to go further with this?

I can assure the Member, and all Members of the House, that we will do whatever it takes to try and ensure that all our residents across the Northwest Territories are covered. The National Building Code that I pointed out before does apply to residents also. That protection is there. We are monitoring the legislation that the Yukon is planning to enact and see if there’s opportunity for us to enact the same type of legislation. We’re monitoring that quite closely. Once that’s all done, we will have discussions with committee and Members of the Assembly.

That is very good to know. Is there anything that we as a government could do legislation-wise? New construction I understand. What about existing homes? Is there anything we can do, from a regulation and monitoring perspective, to ensure that people have carbon monoxide detectors in their homes?

Other than trying to wear public awareness and that, I suppose we would have to look at trying to work out some regulations. I do note that if they are renovating a home that was built prior to 2008, then the new requirements would take place where they need to install a CO

2 detector. If renovations are being

done, then it would be mandatory to install CO

2 detectors.

Again, I can assure all Members that we will do whatever we can to ensure all members of the public are aware of the dangers of carbon monoxide and work with the public in any way that we can. If it means handing out CO

2 detectors, then

we would have to explore that also.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final supplementary, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I for one would strongly support handing out these. We take a lot of measures, as a government, to address public safety, everything from making sure we wear our seatbelts and our kids wear seatbelts. We do a lot of things by regulation and by law to ensure public safety. I would like to see us address this and would certainly support an allocation of funding to purchase carbon monoxide detectors and give them out to anybody who would be interested.

We appreciate the Member’s support and look forward to working with all Members to try and raise awareness out there. I think the event that took place in Whitehorse, unfortunately, was a sad way to make the public aware of the danger to carbon monoxide detectors. I do know our NWT Fire Chiefs Association is working very hard on this issue because they recognize the importance of it too. I think, in partnership with all the stakeholders, we’re doing all we can to make sure our public is well protected.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are addressed to the Minister of Finance. I would like to follow up on my statement and ask him questions about whether or not we have policies in regard to our use of social media. I know we have some policies that apply to individual employees. For instance, Facebook is blocked on employees’ computers. Cell phone use, I know, is listed. There is a policy on cell phone use. I’d like to know from the Minister, in terms of the development of Facebook sites and websites, and in terms of the maintenance of Facebook sites and websites, do we have any policies or any guidelines that people follow?

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The honourable Minister of Finance, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Apparently none that I’m aware of.

I didn’t hear the answer. Thank you very much, colleagues. To the Minister, I would like to know whether or not this is something that, as a government, I feel that we need to remain impartial and I would like to know from the Minister whether or not he thinks there’s a policy gap here and, if so, is he willing to do something about developing some guidelines and some policies to handle Facebook sites and websites.

I’ll commit to review the matter with the appropriate officials in the departments and if there is deemed to be a policy gap, then we’ll, of course, take the steps to close that gap.

Thanks to the Minister for that commitment. I appreciate that. In the absence of anything right now, if we have Facebook sites which have likes on them, a particular business that has been liked which indicates that the GNWT likes this business and not another one, for instance, what is the Minister going to do to try and monitor Facebook sites and website that we have that may

have particular preferences for a business or organization?

I’ll commit to put this matter on the table for Cabinet strategy tomorrow, and where all the senior officials are, as well, and we’ll discuss the best way to make sure that we are impartial in all the appropriate areas as it pertains to government policy.

I appreciate the commitment from the Minister. I guess I would just like to say I appreciate this is coming before senior management and Cabinet. I’d like to suggest to the Minister that we don’t have to reinvent the wheel. There are lots of governments out there that, no doubt, have policies and guidelines, so I would suggest to the Minister that we copy them more than develop our own.