Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just a few comments to the Minister. I do appreciate Housing’s list of seniors units into the small communities, and Fort Good Hope being listed as one of them, and the community of Colville Lake being listed also for a unit up in their area. The homeowners in our communities, there are quite a bit of them in our region: 38 percent, according to the stats that I’ve got, in Norman Wells that own their own homes; 41 percent in Tulita own their own homes – I’m just doing some of my work here – and 36 percent in Deline own their own homes. You can see that there are a high number of homeowners. Fifty-seven percent in Fort Good Hope own their own homes, and in Colville Lake the number is quite high there, too, at 86 percent. But also in Colville Lake there’s 77 percent, just the latest numbers. It might be better than 77 percent of their households in Colville Lake are in core need. When you look at core needs, you look at three criteria that fit the core need. Tulita, 37 percent of core need. These numbers are still 55 percent of households in Fort Good Hope are in core need. When you look at and examine the core needs of these houses, they are quite high and I understand that there are programs set out for them and to lower the core needs in our smaller communities.

I guess what I’m saying is some of the people, either in homeownership or in the public housing units, sometimes it’s quite difficult to get equipment and material in there, and people are pretty busy, especially in the last couple of months with the cold weather coming in and freeze-ups of pipes, water pressure pumps and sewer pipes. On top of that, you have leakage on the floor. Is there an annual really in-depth inspection of these units with the wood floor chipping away because of leaks in the bathroom or the kitchen dripping water throughout a continuous period of months or weeks? I would like to know if each household gets a pass inspection from the health that there is black mould, or people don’t really know sometimes if it is black mould or just something else.

I get calls. There are repair units that people are living in that sometimes you see boards over the floor that is rotten. The boards are there and they show it to me. Things like that they have in some of these public house units.

My point is there is a high percentage of homeowners, also, that get quite challenged by having to purchase their own material and supplies because you can’t pick up the phone and ask Housing for the guy to come up with a van and work. They have to do it themselves. In small communities it’s quite expensive, so they would like to see some kind of relief, especially for the older people to have someone they can call in the community. It would be good if you have that. I know it is quite difficult, but it is also nice to have somebody from the government, a maintenance person, to come and help these people to have their equipment. I had to do that over the holidays and get my own equipment when it’s 55 below outside. It’s not fun.

I want to ask the Housing, is that something that is discussed or talked about? One of my neighbours across the street, who does he call? He is an elderly person. He owns his own home. If his pipes are broken, he has to buy his own pipes from Norman Wells or from outside the community. Those are just some of the unique challenges. I’m not too sure if it is being put into any type of discussion with the Housing Corp.

You have enough houses already to look after; it’s a lot of housing. This is added stress, but it’s also more for the people who own their own homes. I’m very interested in having the Sahtu be considered as one of the hard to house because we have some people in Deline who are very challenged and it makes it quite hard for them to get into a house. Actually, we have a young man – I just talked to and let the Minister know – that is living in his own shack. He made his own house out of crates from the housing packages. This young man is challenged because he is disabled. The doctor said he can’t be out in cold weather, but he’s so bad in

arrears that he just kind of gave up on life and that’s what he was trying to do, but he survived. Now he is in a little shack in 40 below. It is really difficult, because of our policies and programs, to get him into a unit. He has to wear a scarf over his face. It’s too dangerous for him to be out in the cold weather and he’s still in that situation. I guess for myself, I am requesting a hard-to-house unit in the Sahtu for this one, look at a community that I would ask that he be given some consideration.

I brought up this black mould and mildew because I had a couple of people from my community come and talk about that. We weren’t too sure. They’ve taken some pictures. It is very difficult to get the nurse involved because she doesn’t really get involved with that type of situation. Is there an environmental or health person that comes around and says, I want to inspect the houses, not just the housing, but I want to do it from the South, inspect the housing around our small communities, looking for black mould or mildew? How do we clean that up? People get sick. I’m really concerned about that.

Overall, when I look at the Housing operations and their efforts to help those with all the unique challenges in our communities, especially in the Sahtu, they have come a long way. It’s not bad planning they have, trying to capture everything we could do with the money that we have. I look forward to seeing some of the infrastructure being built in our small communities. I think that people in the communities would appreciate it.

I guess the bottom line is, is there any type of an apprenticeship program that we can increase in our communities for electrical, plumbing, pipefitting, to maintain a house that we can get our young people to work? Does the school offer any type of training so the kids can learn the trade and they can help the elders out or help their grandparents out? Thank you, Mr. Chair.