Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thanks to the Minister. I appreciate that we’re going to have all these various and sundry factors looked at. I think it is high time.

This formula hasn’t been working for quite a while. I’d like to know from the Minister if he can give us any kind of idea when the formula will be revised and when we can see an implementation of a new revised formula. Will it be at the start of the school year for 2013-2014?

As you know, the overall review of education renewal is very complex and comprehensive. We want to reach out to every single individual out there that we possibly can in the Northwest Territories to hear them out. Our target date, of course, is late fall/early winter. That is the target date right now. We are working towards that and we want it completed by then.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Member for Deh Cho, Mr. Nadli.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Earlier today I talked about mine training opportunities in small communities. My question is to the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.

How would someone in Fort Providence currently, for example, access mine training for a job at Prairie Creek?

Thank you, Mr. Nadli. The honourable Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Lafferty.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Part of the process is, of course, through various training initiatives within the Mine Training Society. They have reached out to certain communities and I believe they will be going to the Deh Cho riding, as well, and Prairie Creek, possibly around the Fort Simpson area and surrounding communities. They have done so with the diamond mines and surrounding communities. I believe that is the normal process where they will be visiting

and meeting with the community of Fort Simpson, the largest community, then expanding out to regional communities to deliver those training programs. Opportunity will be there.

I would encourage those individuals who are interested in training to submit their application or resumes to the Mine Training Society, even to my department or the ITI department and we can forward that to the appropriate group, the standing committee that’s out there.

I know there’s been a lot of good work that the Mine Training Society has done, but why is mine training not offered in so many of our small communities where jobs are scarce and unemployment is high?

We’ve heard that when we were visiting the communities that were not impacted, there are some developments that are happening in preferably the Deh Cho riding that we have identified and we need to reach out to those communities. We are working closely with the federal government to expand the Mine Training Society into those areas. We talk about the Beaufort-Delta. How can we assist in those areas with any training that’s required? It’s been brought up in the House here. We are doing what we can to engage and also get support from the federal government on the long-term plan. That’s an ongoing discussion we are currently having. The Mine Training Society is up and running as we speak, and will be reaching out to Fort Simpson and the surrounding communities.

I’d like to thank the Minister for his response. It’s encouraging that the Minister has indicated that there is an engagement process, at least, with the communities. Will the Minister work with the communities of Fort Providence and the K’atlodeeche First Nation to establish local delivery of mine training within the near future?

The overall plan not only of the Mine Training Society but within my department, the Labour Market Development Agreement both from the federal government, we want to reach out to all communities as best as we can. Through the Mine Training Society, the Hay River Reserve and also Fort Providence, and also Kakisa and the surrounding communities, that we can definitely approach and work with the leadership and work with the educators in the communities, as well, also industries. Industries are all partners in this venue.

I will invite the Member to have a more detailed discussion on this particular area, and also with the communities, so I will definitely look forward to those visits to the communities.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Nadli.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Biomass Initiative has been a major significant, positive development in my region, in the South Slave region, but also expanding further north. It’s been on the radar for some time. I wanted to know what level of preparedness has the department entered into in preparing communities that will be affected by a forest management agreement with potential for a plant to be situated somewhere in Hay River? What kind of training has the department, perhaps, forecast in terms of training needs at the community level for this major project?

When we talk about training in the communities, there are certain parties involved, whether it be ENR or ITI. There are interdepartmental committees working closely with the regional groups. There is a steering committee that is established to identify those needs, whether it be the biomass, and areas of training that are required by the Deh Cho region. Definitely, those are areas that we need to identify as part of whether it be a month, two months, however the length of training program that’s required, and then identify those individuals that are interested. It is the grassroots people that we need to work with, the regional representatives, and they’re the ones who will guide us on what’s needed in the region. We will continue to update the Member on the progress itself.

Thank you, Mr. Nadli. The Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The Minister of Finance, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This consensus government is one of the most collaborative, inclusive governments in the country, with the exception of possibly Nunavut. We

collectively work together for six months to do business plans, draft the main estimates, bring a budget together that reflects the priorities of this collective Legislative Assembly, and then it is passed in this House. This is the Member’s sixth budget cycle, if my memory serves me correctly. Then the bill is assented to.

The departments all have the business plans. The Members all are aware of what’s in the main estimates. Then there is the business of government which now is to implement that budget, and it’s done through that business plan, through the strategic plans of the departments. Those priorities become the marching orders for the various departments. There are things that are done. There are variance reports that are done. Our managers manage. The Ministers oversee and are responsible for their departments. We meet with committees on review of various projects and initiatives, either at the request of government or at the request of the committee, to try to track all the work that’s being done. We have a fairly comprehensive program in terms of putting the wishes of this Assembly into practice.

The Minister’s pretty good at putting the theory out there, but I didn’t hear an answer to my question. The government’s priorities are clear. Mineral strategy? We’ll get right on it. Fracking? Clear the decks. It’s clear what the Member’s priorities are too. Early childhood development? Talk to me in November. Renewable energy? We hope to get to it.

Can the Minister tell us, given that Members demand some modest dollars to be focused on their priorities and it becomes approved through the will of the House, how is it possible that a file lies dead for six months until November?

This document here that we’re debating in this House – this is the priorities of this Assembly, and these Members and this government – is $1.6 billion worth of priorities. We take our job very, very seriously. It is filled with dollars, over 60 cents of every dollar going into social programs. We are taking a very careful look at things that are very difficult, things like fracking. We have put together a business plan that reflects the times we live in. We have reflected the input of the Members. This is six months of work into this document.

The Member wants to know what we’re doing with renewable energy. We’re spending millions on renewable energy. We’re going to continue to do that. We are investing 60 cents of every dollar, over 320-some million dollars into Education, Culture and Employment’s budget.

The Member is talking about what happens when we do this budget process, after all this work is done and the Members decide, in addition to all the money that they’ve agreed to here, they want to put

more money in, often that puts us beyond what we’ve agreed to as targets. We’re having that discussion now. We’re engaged in that debate now.

Last year was the first year of this government. The budget was laid in the fiscal year. We acknowledged and pointed out that we would put this money into use but that we were clear that there were capacity issues of trying to get this money effectively into play. We follow the will of the House. We have the debate and we’re going to do that again this cycle.

The Minister keeps holding up this document. I’m not talking about this document. I’m talking about the current year’s budget that we’ve fallen short on. This government has failed, and when the government fails to put the funds to work and those funds can’t be spent as intended, why does the government not come back to committee for input on reallocation? Termination of program development without consulting committee defies our principles of consensus government. This year we might have said move dollars back to Inclusive Schooling until we get a meaningful start on early childhood instead of last minute wasteful expenditures.

Will the Minister work with committee to audit the administration of this current year’s budget with respect to amendments to the budget made by the House in response to priorities raised by Regular Members? I’m talking about the ’12-13 budget.

This document, I’d be happy to hold up from last year’s. It’s about as thick as this one. The same principle that I’m articulating here today applies to last year’s budget as well. There are audits done. If the Members have specific concerns that they don’t think we’ve met, then we’d be happy to come back and talk to committee. We review the main estimates. We review budgets. We are working with and at the behest of committees when they have issues they want to address.

The money the Member’s talking about is the several millions of dollars that were added late in the last budget. The vast majority of the $1.6 billion budget, a billion dollars last year and this year, will be spent as we have agreed to and has been directed by this House. If the committee will articulate the source of their aggravation, displeasure and concern, then we would be happy to have those discussions, absolutely.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Bromley.

Thanks to the Minister for that reasonable response. It wasn’t quite a commitment to the audit, but he’s willing to discuss things with committee. I think committee will take him up on that.

Our record is bad. We need to make it right. Following the passage of this budget, will the Finance Minister work with his Cabinet colleagues early in the fiscal year – by the spring session would be reasonable – to establish priority spending work plans, set up milestones, and monitor and provide regular reports to Members on the implementation of the priority programs that we add through discussion of the budget? Mahsi.

Mr. Speaker, as Finance Minister I can tell you that I think, in fact, this budget, the last budget, every budget that I have been involved in in this House is a good budget. They tend to pass unanimously. We are doing an enormous amount of good work here. There is $1.6 million being put to work and the vast majority of it is spent on programs. It’s audited every year by the Auditor General. There are all sorts of other reviews done on an ongoing basis. We, of course, will continue to work with committee and the Members to make sure that we have the best budget possible dealing with constraints that we work under and the fact that we have a plan that we’ve agreed to for the four years and in the two years coming up, we’re going to be adding money to the budget. But, yes, it is a given in this type of government that we will continue to work closely with the Members and the committees to make sure we do the best job possible for all the people we represent. Thank you.