Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Minister McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We will look at opportunities to try and get out into the regions as much as we can because it is quite important, but for those who come here, it is the community government that pays. I believe now their coming for training is eligible under the gas tax funding. So there are opportunities there too.

The Member makes a good point, though, and we’ll try and ensure we do what we can to try to make sure that we bring the training to the community where they will be needing it the most. We have some examples and the deputy minister just pointed out equipment operator training that was brought to Tulita. So there are opportunities there, we just have to ensure we’re on top of it. Thank you.

It sounds like the Minister is aware of the issues in the small communities, because their funding is always tight and the Minister has heard that from many members, too, in the communities. It is about the amount of money it takes to travel out of the communities to get to Yellowknife. It sounds like he’s willing to move some of the training closer to the communities, especially about governance and management. In the small communities there is a high turnover of people that manage the communities, so they find themselves training more. Like I said, it’s quite expensive.

This gas tax funding for training, it seems like there’s some flexibility there. I don’t know if that gets out to the community as well. Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Chair, there are changes to some of the criteria for the gas tax funding. We use every opportunity we have to share it with communities if we can get them to get it through NWTAC AGM and that. We’ll ensure that all communities are updated on some of the changes to the criteria. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Minister McLeod. Committee, we’re on page 6-25, activity summary, School of Community Government,

operations expenditure summary, $3.252 million. Agreed?

Page 6-26, activity summary, School of Community Government, grants and contributions, $680,000.

Page 6-27, information item, School of Community Government, active positions.

Just a note, 6-29 is land administration with the new department. Taking us all the way to page 6-33, activity summary, sport, recreation and youth, operations expenditure summary, $5.42 million. Mr. Dolynny.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Again, as a Member, it is sometimes difficult. We end up critiquing many things in the budget and sometimes we don’t take a minute to say thank you for some of the great things that are being done in this government. In my humble opinion, this division – sport, recreation and youth – is definitely under thanked many times, even though we get to see them in action out in the communities, especially our Youth Ambassador Program, by watching the kids do such a fantastic job, especially in the Summer Games and we are waiting for the upcoming Arctic Winter Games in Alaska. I just want to, again, commend the department on doing a great job here. If I could find money, I would definitely put it in this area. This would be a definite return on our investment. Given our obesity rates that I keep talking about and everything else that is kind of a barrier for us to become healthy, this is one area where we should be spending more money and more attention.

I do have a question. Most recently, the Yukon launched their sport school. This is a school that involves an accelerated version of the academic component and integrating it with a number of different sports to create, in essence, a kind of “own the podium” within the framework of education. I have asked similar questions to the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment and there seemed to be a willingness to consider some research in this area.

My question to the Minister and delegation here is: Has the department considered and done the research? Have they seen exactly what the Yukon school has offered? If so, is there a likelihood that we could see something of similar value instilled here in the Northwest Territories in some of our communities? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Minister McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We appreciate the Member’s comments on some of the good work that this division does. I think we see the results. I am always proud of the fact that when we go to the Arctic Winter Games, in the last couple of games that I’ve been to, 27 of the 33 communities are represented by athletes. I think it speaks volumes to the fact that our folks are getting the programming out in the communities and they’re going from community to community and having all of these Get Active programs. We appreciate the comments.

You can’t say enough good things about the Youth Ambassador Program. I totally agree with the Member there.

We have had very preliminary discussions. Actually, I just had a meeting with a couple of folks over at Sport North last week I believe it was. We made some preliminary discussions. We were just chatting back and forth. In our discussions, I think some of this is tied in with the fact that Northwest Territories, Yellowknife in particular, is going to be hosting the 2023 Canada Winter Games, so there are opportunities there for us to have a look at programs like this. We haven’t seen the Yukon model yet and I’m sure we will have opportunity to look at that. So we have to ensure that we do all our homework and put a program in place that is not only best for the Northwest Territories but what is good for the kids and their own personal development. I think there is some merit to it, I just think we need to look into it a little further and be prepared to own the podium in 2023. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister McLeod. Next on my list I have Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’m sorry; I have the wrong page up.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Committee, we are on page 6-33, activity summary, sport, recreation and youth, operations expenditure summary, $5.42 million.

Page 6-34, activity summary, sport, recreation and youth, grants and contributions, $3.607 million. Sorry; that is all the way to page 6.35. Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just wanted to comment on the high performance athlete grant for $100,000. I know that is super appreciated by our athletes that are now competing, and winning, at the national and Olympic level. I am wondering if there has been any thought to increasing that, given the levels that our athletes are competing at and the number of athletes that we are starting to see. You know, just in the last year I can think of constituents that have won Western Canada and national championships in their sports. I know many of us could say similar

sorts of things, so is it time to relook at that and see if there is opportunity for an increase there? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I totally agree with the Member that we are seeing a number of our athletes compete at a higher level now, and again with the fact that we do have the Canada Games coming in 2023 – and it seems like a long time away, but as we all know, it will come awfully quick – I think there are opportunities there for us to develop a lot of our high performance athletes, starting with the community level and as they go through the system.

During the upcoming business plans, there are opportunities there for us to have this discussion as to whether we could increase this or not, because I think the last list I saw we had quite a large number of our athletes were accessing this program. I think we had four or five of them that were competing at almost the international level, then we had a number of them that were competing nationally, so I think we should use the business planning cycle that is coming up to have discussion as to increasing this amount. We are always willing to increase it with committee’s support. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, thanks to the Minister. I guess I agree that it would be worthy to have that discussion. What would be useful would be to know the number of applicants we have had in recent years and the amount that they have applied for, just to get a trend and see what’s happening. I think the Minister started to provide that information in a general way, so it would be good to have that in advance of those discussions. That’s all I had.

[Microphone turned off] …provide some of that information. I can tell you in the last couple of years we had 35 applicants in 2012-13 for a total of $105,850, in 2011-12 we had 34 athletes come out with $98,050. I think as we go into discussions during the business planning cycle, we could probably break them out there. I’m not sure about providing the names, we’d have to check on that, but we can provide whether they are competing internationally. We’ll try to provide as much information as we can so we can have a pretty detailed discussion. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.