Good afternoon, colleagues. Item 2, Ministers’ statements. The honourable Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Lafferty.

Mr. Speaker, earlier today the Honourable Jason Kenney, Minister of Employment and Social Development, and I signed a Labour Market Agreement for Persons with Disabilities. Under this agreement, the Government of Canada will provide up to $1.25 million in federal funding each year for four years to the Government of the Northwest Territories to improve employment prospects for Canadians with disabilities and better meet the needs of Canadian businesses. The Government of the Northwest Territories presently contributes over $2.7 million, part of which will be used to cost match the federal government’s contribution to deliver employment-related programming for persons with disabilities.

This is the first time that the Government of the Northwest Territories has entered into a Labour Market Agreement for Persons with Disabilities. Funding through the agreement may be used for education and training, to promote employment participation and opportunities, to connect employers to persons with disabilities and to build knowledge of the policies and programs that can best support persons with disabilities in the workplace. We look forward to working with stakeholders that support persons with disabilities to maximize the benefit of this agreement for Northerners.

This agreement will help us to improve the employment prospects of Northerners with disabilities and at the same time support the needs of the Northwest Territories labour market.

Minister Kenney and I also announced a new project under the Targeted Initiative for Older Workers that the Tlicho Government in Behchoko is currently preparing to deliver. It will be a 12-week older worker upgrading program to train on-the-land instructors. This project will be delivered in partnership with the Tlicho Government, the NWT Literacy Council and Aurora College.

Together, the governments of Canada and the Northwest Territories are investing over $285,000 in this project. It will provide participants with skills upgrading, hands-on experience, and safety training and certification. Graduates are expected to get jobs, such as instructors and guides, in the tourism industry.

Mr. Speaker, the economy of the Northwest Territories is growing, and we expect new jobs and opportunities in the coming years. Both of these initiatives will allow our government to focus our efforts to ensure Northerners have access and training opportunities in our territory’s workforce. They allow us to provide targeted supports for seniors and persons with disabilities, both of whom are key groups within our population. They will help our government to work with our many partners to build on our existing programs and services to achieve our goal of ensuring that NWT residents have the skills, knowledge and opportunities to participate fully as productive citizens in the northern economy.

I’d like to thank the Government of Canada and in particular Minister Kenney and Employment and Social Development Canada for their special efforts to ensure both the Labour Market Agreement for Persons with Disabilities and the Targeted Initiative for Older Workers meet the needs of our territory. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The development of the NWT Economic Opportunities Strategy was an important step in setting the stage for the pending devolution of responsibilities for lands and resources to the GNWT. It is through its implementation, in part, that

the benefits of our new authorities can be realized in the form of jobs and business opportunities.

Putting the recommendations set forth in the strategy is key to its success. I am happy to advise Members today that the partnership established to develop and author the NWT Economic Opportunities Strategy will continue to serve as its governance committee in order to oversee its timely and effective implementation. The partners include the NWT Chamber of Commerce, the NWT Association of Communities, the Northern Aboriginal Business Association, Canada’s Northern Economic Development Agency (CanNor), and the Government of the Northwest Territories Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment.

The committee’s extended role includes identifying and facilitating opportunities to promote or advance the implementation of the NWT EOS as well as any tracking and monitoring initiatives undertaken by partners to implement the strategy. Collectively they will champion the implementation of the EOS within their respective memberships, and maintain an on-line and social media presence to support ongoing public awareness of the strategy and its implementation.

Our work continues to diversify our economy away from a dependence on non-renewable resources. The department is proposing $1.2 million in new funding to initiatives supporting the Economic Opportunities Strategy. Each of the proposed initiatives provides the GNWT with the opportunity to make immediate investments in areas that directly impact NWT residents, businesses and communities.

Mr. Speaker, this includes a considerable investment in tourism initiatives that will attract new markets, develop new tourism products and engage more NWT residents in the tourism sector. It also includes an initiative to establish a convention bureau for the NWT. Together, this will build a more viable regional tourism industry throughout the territory.

The NWT Economic Opportunities Strategy also highlighted the impressive potential that exists for commercial fishing, especially on Great Slave Lake. In the coming year we will work to identify and leverage new capital. When combined with the Northern Food Development Program, this will lend support to attracting new entrants, provide capital investment and facilitate options for marketing and distribution to both the domestic and export commercial markets.

The Economic Opportunities Strategy highlighted the importance of regional economic planning, and in the coming year we will engage residents in the Inuvik and Deh Cho regions in this important economic planning process. We have also earmarked a program to support regional

entrepreneurs and small businesses to draw professional business personnel and service providers to our smaller communities where these specialized services are so desperately in demand.

Mr. Speaker, the Economic Opportunities Strategy will support this Assembly’s long-standing priority to increase economic diversification in our vibrant grassroots sectors. We will develop an agriculture strategy and associated policy instruments aimed at realizing recommended actions to formalize our territory’s rapidly evolving agricultural sector. As recommended, we will provide additional support for the NWT film industry in the form of a pilot program aimed at addressing some of the competitive disadvantages we face when compared to adjoining and competing jurisdictions.

Almost 70 percent of the recommended actions identified in the Economic Opportunities Strategy will fall to the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment to lead. We are committed to working with our partners to put these recommendations in place that will strengthen and diversify the economy across the territory.

Mr. Speaker, we have an extraordinary long-term opportunity in devolution to steer and direct our economic future, but that is only half of the challenge.

We must also connect the opportunities that result from our decision-making to our businesses, our communities and our people, which is the main focus of the NWT Economic Opportunities Strategy. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Lafferty.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Junior kindergarten for four-year-olds is recognized across the country as one of the best ways to provide quality, free and optional care for our children. Junior kindergarten is especially beneficial for parents and caregivers in 10 of our smallest communities where no licenced child care exists. Junior kindergarten will provide young children with a hands-on play-based program offered in our schools to support their development and learning.

Since junior kindergarten was announced at the start of this session, some questions have been raised about how junior kindergarten will be funded. Mr. Speaker, as with all government programs, we must be fiscally responsible in how we make investments in important and necessary programs such as junior kindergarten. As previously stated,

the department will be re-profiling existing K to 12 school contribution funding in order to implement junior kindergarten. This re-profiled funding will come from readjusting the current K to 12 pupil-teacher ratio, or PTR, for communities that have more than 120 full-time students.

We chose this approach to ensure that our smallest communities do not experience a reduction in their overall funding for teacher staffing because of junior kindergarten. This is important because small communities already experience unique challenges that are not as common in our larger communities, like having one teacher teaching multiple grades in one classroom.

Mr. Speaker, the legislated territorial PTR is 16 to 1. Over the past several years, the K to 12 education system has been funded above this level by approximately $11 million annually. This represents a territorial PTR of approximately 13 to 1. This means there is already flexibility that will allow education authorities to redirect funding to implement junior kindergarten without significantly affecting the K to 12 education program. We project that once junior kindergarten is fully implemented across the territory in 2016-2017, the territorial average PTR will remain under the legislated 16 to 1 and will be closer to 14.5 to 1.

As is to be expected in a territory with widely varying community sizes, the proposed changes will not impact all education authorities the same way. The two Yellowknife education authorities – Yellowknife Education District No. 1 and Yellowknife Catholic Schools – were projected to have their respective funding reduced in a way that would mean they, individually, would exceed the territorial average PTR level of 16 to 1. It is important to note that the Education Act speaks to PTR at a territorial level, not at an education authority level. But it is true that Yellowknife schools would have a greater challenge than other schools in implementing junior kindergarten.

Mr. Speaker, in an effort to make the implementation of junior kindergarten a success in all of our communities, this government will commit to ensuring that the funding provided to each respective education authority meets or exceeds the territorial PTR level of 16 to 1. Anything above and beyond the 16 to 1 PTR level will be subsidized by the Department of Education, Culture and Employment. This will ensure that the introduction of junior kindergarten does not threaten the success of our K to 12 education program. We will continue to work with our education partners to make the implementation of junior kindergarten a success in all our communities.

Mr. Speaker, we are committed to doing what is right for the children of this territory, and junior kindergarten is clearly the right thing to do. We all agree on that. This government is also committed

to operating in a fiscally responsible manner, because even doing the right thing costs money. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Item 3, Members’ statements. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We are three weeks into what is our traditional annual six-week budget session. It’s not one of my favourite activities, I must say. Our Finance Minister goes out there, he stands up in this House, he makes a budget address. We all go out in the Great Hall; we have a media scrum. They say, what do you think of the budget? What, like as if we didn’t know, what was in the budget?

The way consensus government should work is that way before the budget address is given, we, as committee members, who oversee different departments of this government, have an input into the budget through business planning, through a review of those business plans and those main estimates before it ever gets to the floor of this House. However, on a $1.6 billion budget, there are things that we would like to highlight, profile and give some enhancement to, which represents a very, very small fraction of the budget. I won’t state the exact amount, but it’s less than 1 percent of the whole budget.

To achieve that end, we are prepared to defer, hold up, stall this process so that we can make our point. My point is we have so many other ways to do that. I would seriously rather stand up here and devote an extra hour of question period on every department in the government and let the Minister stay there and answer the question to the benefit of the public so the public can know what the issues are.

What we do in Committee of the Whole, as you know, is we spend hours and hours and hours… I mean, even the media goes home. They don’t even stay in the media booth when we go into Committee of the Whole. I mean, let’s be honest.

I don’t know; I’m a get ‘er done kind of person. Not to take away from the hard work of some of my colleagues on this side of the House, but you know we can’t add to the budget, and even if we could, we’re not in a fiscal position to add to the budget right now. We know that, we all know that. Let’s be real.

So if you have something to say, stand up and say it. If you’ve got a question to ask, ask the question, but this haggling over half of a percent of the total

$1.6 billion operating budget, I just think we could be doing something better with our time.

If I had my way and it wouldn’t offend the Members on this side of the House, I’d stand up and move a motion to accept the full budget as it stands. Let’s get on with it. Let’s talk about some things that are important to the people of the Northwest Territories, but this ain’t happening in Committee of the Whole. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The honourable Member for Range Lake, Mr. Dolynny.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. How do you follow that Member’s statement?

---Laughter

Mr. Speaker, in support of this government’s aggressive plan to increase our population base over the next couple of years, one must start to gaze into our future, and this future begins with our children, but more importantly those about to embark on their post-secondary education journey.

For years the Government of the Northwest Territories has praised its Student Financial Assistance Program as the key in supporting northern students’ return to the NWT upon the completion of their post-secondary education.

So one must ask, if these various grants and competitive interest rate loans are so compelling, why then do so many of our students choose not to return to the Northwest Territories? The answer is relatively simple. We are no longer competitive as we once were and the rest of the world has become more aggressive at building what I call better mousetraps. Let me explain.

If we look at the basic grant of $5,400 to $8,600 a year a student receives, which is referred to as a non-repayable benefit to assist with the cost of tuition, books and travel, this would barely cover 60 percent of the post-secondary schools in today’s dollars.

Now don’t get me wrong, we are still talking about a large sum of money here, but when it truly costs most students from $12,000 to $35,000 a year to go to school, the premise of $5,400 to $8,600 falls into perspective rather quickly.

I know that repayable loans are available at rates of 1 percent below the Bank of Canada prime business rate, but keep in mind that our very own students, many who are in hard to find positions in our territory, are being wined and dined by private industry and other very creative jurisdictions around the world.

Many private industries and creative jurisdictions offer full repayment of student loans, offer one-time bonus situations, cars, home down payments, spousal hiring guarantee, free daycare, vacation travel allowances and bonus weeks of vacation, just to name a few.

Let me use one example to illustrate my point. So ask yourself, you’re a student who goes to school for four years and gets a degree, you rack up a non-repayable benefit of $21,600 and a repayable loan of $20,000. Then you sit on the sideline waiting for a full-time position to open in the GNWT for six months, all the while picking up causal work not even remotely related to your field of study. You get a call that this full-time job is in a remote community with no housing and you have to get yourself there.

Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to conclude my statement.

---Unanimous consent granted

Or this same student, headhunted for their marks and skill proficiency, is offered a hot market employment agreement and a signing bonus during their third year of school from a private company. This hot market agreement means they agree to go anywhere this company places them. Upon graduation, they are guaranteed a full-time job at comparable earnings of what they would have received in the Northwest Territories, is offered a clean slate for their outstanding NWT loans for a return of work service agreement of two years, is given a signing bonus of $10,000 and two flights out a year anywhere in Canada and is placed in a province where the cost of living is 25 percent lower than that of NWT. Oh, and by the way, they are guaranteeing a job for your soon-to-be spouse as well.

The question is: What option would you choose?

These are the realities we face as a territory. Yes, at one time our non-repayable benefits were very attractive incentive for our students, but today we are facing pressures to stay competitive and a work that has lapped us many times over.

Clearly our HR department has work to do to keep our current academic students here in the Northwest Territories and it starts with what I consider a revamp of our SFA program. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. The honourable Member for Hay River North, Mr. Bouchard.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Dolynny did a great speech.

I believe, as well, that we need to increase our population with our students, the students who are out at post-secondary education.

In 1993 I returned back to the Northwest Territories after finishing my degree and I had a guaranteed job to come back to in the Northwest Territories. I have stayed here since then, but colleagues I went to school with had an opportunity to stay in the South and some of them have never come back.

We need to find jobs for our students who are coming back from post-secondary education. We need to find and set up interim positions for them, knowing when they are going into their last year of education that they will have a job coming back. That will draw them to come back to the Northwest Territories, find spouses and start to increase the population of the Northwest Territories.

---Laughter

Mr. Speaker, we need to support these students. We need to find them jobs. As we know, a lot of the vacant positions we’ve talked about over the last two weeks need skilled individuals like these students that we have. These students need our assistance.

As my colleague talked about, other jurisdictions are doing this. They are supporting them financially. We know that financially we are getting somewhere around $25,000 per person, that comes to the Northwest Territories and stays here, through our federal funding agreement. So we need our students to come back and stay in the NWT. It’s easy to draw them because they know how great it is here. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Bouchard, and good luck.

---Laughter

The honourable Member for Deh Cho, Mr. Nadli.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I also wanted to rise and talk about the population of the Deh Cho First Nations. I wanted to talk about the commitment of the federal government and the Government of the Northwest Territories to work with the Dehcho First Nations to develop a regional land use plan.

People might be aware the Dehcho has been working towards advancing work towards the completion of a land use plan for some time, since 2001. The committee is a tripartite committee and it’s trying to balance the efforts towards setting the stage for development and then balancing it out with conservation mechanisms to ensure that we have a legacy at the end of the day for future generations.

Also what’s important is the region or tribal alliance comprises about 10 communities. There’s a common language that links all those communities at the same time. There is a cultural affinity of people working with each other, intermarriages, families, just a kinship and culture that profiles the region such as the Deh Cho.

In 2001 the Government of Canada and the GNWT signed an interim measures agreement that set forth to establish a tripartite process. Prominent was the traditional land use and occupancy map that was laid out as the foundation by the elders of the day.

Elders such as Joaa Boots, Paul White, Gabe and Mary Cazon and Leo Norwegian, to name a few, worked on that land use plan. They believed in the work they were doing to ensure that the past was never forgotten. The elders passionately laid their imprints of traditional knowledge which is encapsulated now into the Deh Gah Got’ie language as Nahe Nahodhe gondie.

Through the work of all parties, including this government, a draft land use plan was developed in 2006. That plan was rejected by both governments because there wasn’t a balance. Consequently, the federal government pushed to eliminate the Dehcho Land Use Planning Committee altogether. However, a last minute effort to restore the work was put together through a terms of reference, which now guides the process to revise the regional land use plan.

My purpose in highlighting this is to point out all parties agreed to work together to ensure that work continues. I hope that that work will continue and the good relationship will also at least guide the process. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Nadli. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.

Mr. Speaker, in the wisdom of this government, they developed a unit called shared services for financial transactions and procurement in the wake of implementing the new financial system.

When the government announced this initiative, they said it would be a positive benefit that would flow from this model such as the department being able to focus on core business and people will be able to receive high quality and timely services. They also said employees will benefit from a shared service organization by clearly having the career progression path developed for them and they can enjoy special new skills. Employees’ contributions are critical to the success of the services, and the

employees will be trained to match these needs for the future.

But instead, I’m hearing from places like Yellowknife and certainly Fort Simpson where several dozen of these real employee-shared services are being affected and the latest reorganization out the door. Many of them are only being given a few hours to sometimes make life-altering decisions on where they will go by this government. Certainly their being affected really hurts them very deeply.

Approximately half of these, who have a quarter century of dedicated service in this government, were notified in writing three weeks before Christmas. I’d like to know who that Grinch was and talk to them. They were told that this government, even though you have a quarter century of dedication to the government, will only search for possibilities for you for eight weeks. Boy, is that disheartening. After 10, 20 or 25 years of dedication, it’s all boiled down to an eight-week search to try to find a placement for you.

A few weeks ago we heard the words from the mouth of the Finance Minister that this government is looking for 571 positions. They’re actively searching. Well, my goodness, here they are. Look no further. However, most of these people were given grim, if not pathetic, choices or options and they’re scrambling to decide how to put their life together and save some dignity. Some have been given all this on short notice, then others were told that they have short-term training, but of course, there’s no promise of a job.

The truth is this is a terrible way of treating people who have many decades of service to this government and to the territory as a whole. Many employees would describe it as they now have carpet burns because it was pulled out from under them so quickly.

I want to finish by pointing out some of the words highlighted to me in a particular constituent’s own voice. They said it feels like they’ve been tossed out of a plane without a parachute, but told to flap their arms. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today, like some of my colleagues, I want to address something mentioned in the Finance Minister’s budget address, and that’s the government’s plan to attract and retain 2,000 new residents to and in the NWT over the next five years.

Youth are a very important segment of our NWT society. I hear that said all the time in this Assembly. When we’re looking for skilled workers

for the GNWT, who better to serve our residents than those who have grown up here and know the issues and the culture?

The GNWT has had varying degrees of success in attracting and retaining our youth to the public service. There are some wonderful successes and I’m looking at many of them here in the House. Over half of the Members of this Assembly are homegrown. But there have also been significant losses as our bright and talented youth are denied in the North, take up positions in the South and then are lost to the NWT.

The government has to review the practices we’ve used over the years, look back to see what particular strategies have been successful in the past and that we no longer use. In years past the GNWT had liaison workers on several university campuses, the University of Alberta and the University of Saskatchewan, to mention two. Those people were there to specifically look after NWT students. It helped keep them in school, keep them in touch with family and, yes, keep them in touch with jobs at home while they were away from home.

One of the biggest reasons our young people return to live and work in the NWT is because family is here. We need to ensure that the connection to family is maintained while they’re away at school.

We have considerable data about students available to us through Education, Culture and Employment through the SFA system. SFA currently tracks students in terms of loans, when they’re due, when they’re in arrears and so on. Surely we can also track them for employment purposes. We can know their field of study, when they will be finished their schooling, and match them to job vacancies in the GNWT public service at graduation.

Creating mentoring relationships has proven to be another effective strategy for supporting new young staff in a variety of workplace settings. It currently exists in both nursing and teaching and it allows us to hire our smart, knowledgeable but inexperienced young people and mentor them into a position that called for experience when it was vacant.

Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to conclude my statement.

---Unanimous consent granted

I’ve mentioned but a few of the tactics that we should be putting in place if we’re serious about keeping Northerners in the North.

The Finance Minister has said that the government is working on some things already to accomplish the 2,000 in five years goal. The Minister has today been given a number of suggestions by me and others which can be incorporated into whatever plan the government has. Members need to hear just what that plan is and we need to hear it sooner

rather than later. I look forward to critiquing that plan, hopefully in the near future. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Moses.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In the budget address the Minister of Finance states that the most effective way we can grow our revenues is to grow our economy and our population. He also states that over the next five years he wants to grow the NWT population by 2,000 people.

I also agree that our economy does need to grow and develop, but I also have a suggestion here that maybe over the next five years we invest that into the people of the Northwest Territories by investing in their education and training in the small communities and the regions where a lot of the economic things are happening. Right now we’re not meeting the economic agreements with our northern workforce in some of the diamond industry as well as the oil and gas, and this is an opportunity for the next five years to train our northern residents so that they become taxpayers and we get some of those tax revenues back. Also, there’s an opportunity that some of these guys will have to go off social assistance, so we will be saving some money there that can go into other areas to the people who do really need it. It will also reduce poverty because, obviously, healthy people, educated people who are trained and in the workforce will become taxpayers, and it will also boost the economy of the people in their communities and in the North.

It all leads to a goal of a self-sustaining Northwest Territories where we have everybody in the NWT working, being a taxpayer and being a member of society. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Moses. Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The NWT is a fantastic place to live. People that were born here love it and visitors who come for a few days end up spending a lifetime. Yes, some people are leaving, but my sense is that many are leaving reluctantly.

But an increase in population should not be a goal on its own. We should not look at every resident as a cash machine or as part of a funding formula. Rather, a decreasing population is an indicator. It shows we are failing to meet our people’s needs.

First of all, spending to build our numbers by 2,000 over five years is a waste of resources. Most provinces, especially our neighbours, as we’ve heard today, are desperate for workers and they offer a much lower cost of living, job and travel opportunities, proximity to family, and the option to base there and work here.

In recent years this government has invested big money in large and costly infrastructure, gambling that mines and power lines will be attractive to provide more jobs and sustain our economy. Clearly, it is not working. Will we learn something here?

The current mines cannot meet their northern hiring targets. Every qualified Northerner who wants to work in a mine already is. Most remaining people are either not qualified or they don’t want to work on a two-in/two-out rotation, and mines do not attract people to live here. Increasingly, workers fly in and out again.

Syphoning off key program dollars to mega-infrastructure projects does not serve. In contrast, my colleagues today have made many practical suggestions to address real needs with real solutions that will encourage people to stay in the North. If daycare was affordable, people would stay and work and pay taxes. If power and heating bills were affordable, people would stay, invest, raise families. If our social safety net actually helped people get out of poverty, they would thrive. If we invested in educating versus just training them for entry-level mining positions, people would be engaged. With jobs and business opportunities in their home communities, they would choose to stay.

Let’s get real and start by getting our house in order first. Let’s build on our strengths, our vibrant communities, our progressive diverse cultures and beautiful northern land, and let’s restore our quality of life. Let’s invest in a society that treats every resident with respect, reduces our dependence on expensive imported food and energy and is a responsible caretaker of the northern land that is our home.

Mr. Speaker, the population issue will look after itself. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have also been thinking about the question in the budget statement where the Minister wanted to look at how we increase our population. Actually, the number was 2,000 in five years. When you look at it from an economic standpoint, the less amount of population we have in the North we get a decrease in our revenue. So, to increase our revenue, we need to

have more people coming into the Northwest Territories.

I thought about that and I said to my colleagues here, first things first. Let’s get our northern people, who are trained and educated in the Northwest Territories, up to a level where we know that once they finish Aurora College or some education institution in the Northwest Territories they are actually guaranteed to go into a path of their career choosing. Let’s put them into schooling where they know they’re supported.

We still have nine communities without full-time nurses. We have to focus on them. You know, what makes them go to school. Actually, this week is Aurora College Week. Those students are going to school under some pretty tough challenges, as we already heard from the past meetings with Aurora College just at the Yellowknife Campus.

When you look at this whole situation, you learn a lot from animals. You know, what attracts the animals to a place where they can eat, live and continue on around that area. It’s the environment. What type of environment do we have in the Northwest Territories that would attract people to the Northwest Territories? For example, in Quebec they have a $7 a day subsidy for families with child care. We should be seriously looking at something like that, and coming together to a think-tank and putting out some suggestions and asking the people in the Northwest Territories what we can do to attract people, attract Northerners to come back. Is it…(inaudible)…our fishing, our trapping, the oil and gas? Whatever it is, we need to know how to attract these people.

I’d like to say, let’s get our house in order by first tracking our own people to come back north and stay here and raise their families.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Blake.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to also join my colleagues on this theme day today on population growth initiatives.

As I mentioned earlier this week, we do have to do a lot of things different to try to get our people to stay here in the North. One of the things that we really need to do is find a way to keep our cost of living down in the territory. As any Northerner knows, the cost of living here in the North is very great, and I believe that’s why a lot of people from the South just come up here to work and fly back every two weeks.

Over the last week I believe some of the mining companies have made some positive changes as they work with the government to find ways to encourage people to stay here in the North, to work

here and live here in the North as they work in the diamond mines.

We also have other opportunities that this government could partake of, and that’s filling a lot of the positions that need to be filled here in the Northwest Territories. We have a lot of people that are going to university and college down south. We have to encourage those people to come back, work in the summers, make sure they’re very familiar with the positions they want to take on once they graduate, and ensure that they know that those positions are available to them once they do graduate university or college.

As I mentioned earlier this week, we also have to increase our infrastructure in a lot of the communities. Yes, most of the regional centres do have facilities for recreation, yet in the small communities it’s very challenging. I know we do have the infrastructure funding available to communities, but I believe that over the next couple of years we have to increase those funds to ensure that communities can build what they need in the communities to attract Northerners and the people to come and work in the communities. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Blake. Item 4, reports of standing and special committees. Item 5, returns to oral questions. Item 6, recognition of visitors in the gallery. Mr. Bouchard.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to recognize Wally Schumann, a good friend of mine and president of the Hay River Metis Association. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bouchard. Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to recognize Bob Wilson, a long-standing member of the Weledeh riding. Welcome to the House. I’d also like to recognize a couple of hardworking Pages, Linnea Stephenson and Harvey Fells, and thanks to all of the Pages that are serving us here today.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to acknowledge Mr. Wally Schumann, who is also the owner of Poison Painting. It’s good to see him. As well, I wish to acknowledge Mr. Bob Wilson who is a good friend and certainly a dedicated Yellowknifer and an amazing photographer as well. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I, as well, would like to take this opportunity to thank the Pages and recognize two

from my constituency, Mr. Ryan Dumkee and young Mr. Ian Gauthier, who are here and their dad is also here with them as their chaperone. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. The honourable Premier, Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I, too, would like to recognize a Page from Yellowknife South, Carson Asmundson. He’s been here a few times before, and I also want to recognize all the Pages that are here today. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Welcome everybody here in the public gallery today.

Item 7, acknowledgements. Item 8, oral questions. The Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment. We’re having somewhat of a theme day today on how we’re going to grow our population, retain and grow our population here in the Northwest Territories. I’ve been kind of talking about that pretty much since the beginning of session on a day-by-day basis. I didn’t have a Member’s statement on that today, but I do have some questions.

When we talk about raising the population and we talk about what this government can do, we’ve been very focused on how we can get NWT residents into the public service, but not everybody can work for the Government of the Northwest Territories, not everyone can work for the government. We also need to think about people who have skills and interests that would lead them into working either for small business or for big industry, or working in the private sector in general.

I’d like to ask the Minister of ITI what initiatives that he’s aware of have been undertaken by the GNWT to work with the private sector to enhance their hiring capacity of Northerners. Thank you.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Government of the Northwest Territories has the Come Make Your Mark Campaign and I know the Member spoke of working in partnership with industry and businesses across the Northwest Territories and that’s integral, and thus attracting 2,000 people here over the next five years is something that we have to continue to do. Through

the Come Make Your Mark Campaign, we had partnered with over 60 businesses and organizations around the Northwest Territories in our efforts to promote the Northwest Territories as a place to live and work and we will continue to focus our efforts on that partnership model. Again, it’s very important that that happens. We also have been in steady contact with the operating diamond mines here in the Northwest Territories. Work continues to focus our efforts on how to attract people to live here in the Northwest Territories. Thank you.

That’s very interesting to hear. I personally was not aware that the Come Make Your Mark program had worked with 60 businesses. On an ongoing basis, I’d like to ask the Minister what is the vehicle for continuing that liaison with the private sector when it comes to recruiting and retaining people in the North. Thank you.

It would be through that campaign, and we do need to focus our efforts on that campaign, again, working with the operating mines here in the Northwest Territories and the fact that we are going to require a workforce if we are going to open seven to nine new mines in the next decade, we are going to need more of a workforce here. So it’s important that we continue to work with the mining industry on efforts to get people to live here in the Northwest Territories through the Cabinet committee of Employment and Economic Development chaired by Minister Miltenberger. We are begging, again, a dialogue in earnest with the mining companies to see what we can do to attract people to live and work in the Northwest Territories. Thank you.

It’s also been mentioned in this House, suggestions to the government of where we can hire summer students from university who can then get some experience in the area that they’re studying in, but I’d like to ask, and again, that works really well in the public service, but I’d like to ask the Minister what is in place right now for the government to partner with the private sector so that the private sector could also have the ability to identify the post-secondary students and so on who could come to work in their businesses. There used to be a program, and I’m not sure of what the status of that is now, where the government would actually cost share part of the wages for summer students. I’d like to ask what the status of that program is. Thank you.

Workforce development falls under the mandate of Education, Culture and Employment, and certainly the Member is right. I think going forward it’s incumbent upon the government to work together, all the departments, all the Ministers and this government to come up with a game plan. I’ve heard many Members talk

about our young folks that are out at school and trying to get them back here to the Northwest Territories and not lose them to opportunities in the South. That’s something that’s very important to me and I know it’s important to the government. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Final, short supplementary, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So, I understand that any such a program would not fall under the Minister’s mandate. That would actually fall under Education, Culture and Employment, but I’d like to just ask the Minister is he aware that there still is an ongoing summer program where the GNWT partners with the private sector to create employment for students? Thank you.

Thank you. Last summer the Government of the Northwest Territories hired over 300, I believe, summer students. We have had programs in the past and I believe they were partially funded through programs through the federal government, but I could get that level of detail for the Member. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. The Member for Range Lake, Mr. Dolynny.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Earlier today many have spoken about creating some real solutions here on making the NWT a more attractive place to stay, and especially for our own future, and that future is our own students. Our NWT students are clearly not returning to the North, as we’ve heard, for a variety of reasons and I think it’s an important thing to bring forward here.

There are many questions as to why and where we should start to look at this issue. So for today we will start and I’d like to start with the Student Financial Assistance Program. My questions today are for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.

We have seen small increases and minor changes over the years for our post-secondary students to access the basic grant or what is referred to as a non-repayable benefit of our SFA program.

Can the Minister indicate if his department recognizes our current shortfall of competitiveness and is willing to consider a full review of the SFA program? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Lafferty.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. We recognize that there are challenges

within our Northwest Territories, along with other jurisdictions, as well, but as the Member indicated in his Member’s statement, we have one of the best SFA programs throughout the country. We improve our programming every now and then, changing our existing policies and enhancing through the review. We just conducted a review of SFA and part of the recommendations brought to our attention was some of the challenges that we’re faced with. So those are the discussions that we need to have as we move forward.

As indicated earlier, I believe it was yesterday, that within our income support at that time, but SFA reviews are always undertaken and if we need to further re-evaluate our situation, we need to do that. I’m working closely with the Department of Health, other departments and re-profiling all the data that’s available on the students so we can have that compiled information and attract those students back to the Northwest Territories. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Can the Minister indicate how his department and the Department of HR work together to try to find new ways of enhancing our student financial program, especially within the recruitment framework of the Department of HR? Thank you.

We recently had a meeting with a newly established committee in the employment development area and that’s my portfolio as well. So I have to work closely with HR where once we identify these students – obviously we can’t mention names because of confidentiality – we can, based on the area of the studies and the year that they’re in, working closely with the Human Resources department, what kind of jobs are available for a fourth year student or if they’re completing their diploma programming, if we can slide those individuals – there was a discussion here about direct appointments, enhancing the direct appointments. Those are the discussions that we are currently having with all of the departments that are here today. Mahsi.

Thank you. I appreciate the Minister’s comments on that. The basic grant or the non-repayable benefit of the SFA has a wide range of thresholds. In some cases this threshold creates a disparity between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal students who qualify for SFA funding.

Is this Minister committed in seeing that the disparity of thresholds are minimized for a more fair and transparent process? Thank you.

Part of the process of why it was established as different and diverse programming that we have, the threshold in various regions in communities is to attract those individuals into small, isolated communities. Most students that are graduating are university, post-secondary, college. So we can attract those

individuals to the remote communities where they are very challenged because of a lack of job opportunities.

There are a variety of ways of dealing with the remissible loan in other venues that we have, but that’s the very reason why we want to attract those individuals into the small, isolated communities.

Again, there needs to be a review of that through these departments that we’ve been talking about just recently, but that’s the discussions that we’re going to be having. Mahsi.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Minister offering his comments and thoughts on that. Earlier today the Minister indicated, and just now, that they are working on a review within a framework of a number other departments.

Can the Minister indicate to the House here when Members on this side of the House might be able to see the findings of this review. Thank you.

Like I said, we had one particular meeting with the newly established committee and it’s very preliminary at this point. My department is compiling all of the information on those particular students, over 1,400 students that are out in the post-secondary and their fields of interest and the year they’re in and compiling that with the HR. They have their own data. It is quite a large amount that we need to work with. So, once all that information is compiled between the departments, we will be presenting to the standing committee in due time. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The Member for Hay River North, Mr. Bouchard.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions will be for the Minister responsible for Education, Culture and Employment. I’d like to continue on with students, but I guess I’m a little annoyed with his statements today in the House about the junior kindergarten being funded by the pupil-teacher ratio. I guess my first question is where this 16 to 1 pupil-teacher ratio came from, because that’s not what I’m hearing in the community. The community wants more teachers, more assistants. Where does this number come from?

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

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. This ratio 16 to 1 has always been there. It’s part of our legislation. We’ve been working with that with

the school boards throughout the years. At the same time, we’ve been providing an additional $11 million so it can be based at 13 to 1 on the average throughout the Northwest Territories. It is through the legislation that was passed through this House, so that’s what we continuously work with throughout the years.

It’s not that I don’t support junior kindergarten, it’s the fact that how many times can this government use pupil-teacher ratios as an excuse to download more things to the DEAs.

When will there be additional funds added to the DEAs so that they can implement these programs that they keep downloading to them?

As I stated in this House earlier, through our engagement with the Aboriginal Student Achievement Initiative, early childhood development, the discussions that we’ve had, engagement with the general public, and education renewal and innovation, we’ve been hearing from the general public, the parents, the grandparents, the educators that we have to think innovatively within our department. We have to think strategically how we can deliver the most effective programming in the community schools. That’s one area that we felt the PTRs, which under legislation are 16 to 1, so we figured we can access that through the work with the education authorities. This is an area that we are currently accessing to provide the quality junior kindergarten programming into our school system. It will benefit those 10 communities that do not have licenced child care programming. Those are just some of the areas that we’ve been told by parents to pursue it, and we are pursuing it.

Again, I am not against junior kindergarten. I am just wondering that this money and the fact that we have these hardworking teachers and people in our public education system that are trying to do the work but they keep getting downloaded that more and more things have to be done with less money, but they’re strung out already.

When are we actually going to increase the budgets and figure out the formulas to these DEAs?

Through the education renewal innovation we are going to look at the overall formula funding for our educational partners as well. We’ve been discussing this at the early stages back in 2007 until today, how we fund the school boards, how we fund the school programming, and based on the needs of the communities. This is an area that we’ve been told that we need to seriously look at formula funding to our school system. Currently it’s based on enrolment, and now we’ve been told why couldn’t it be based on base plus and go from there. Those are some of the areas we are contemplating with our education partners. Once we develop an action

plan over the summer on education renewal, those are some of the highlights that will be addressed through the business planning process.

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

Yes, I guess, Mr. Speaker, it’s hard to get some of the questions answered, I guess. I just don’t understand how pupil-teacher ratios can keep being the excuse for more programs being added to these schools and district educations without any additional money. I’m just wondering when the department will actually get some more money into that area.

We have to deal with the overall GNWT funding that’s been allocated to the school boards. With that, obviously, there is a surplus of over $8 million. Somehow we need to think outside the box and strategically how to best invest into our educational system. It is GNWT funding overall, and as we go through the business planning process, this means that as we go through, we’ve identified several areas of interest investment such as we did with the wage top-up. Over $511 million that we’re going to move forward with the new money once the budget’s approved here. Every year we go through this, and I, as the Minister responsible for Education, Culture and Employment, will continue to push what’s best for the children of the Northwest Territories.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I kind of broke rank with my colleagues, but I wanted to ask the question to the Minister of Aboriginal Affairs in terms of explaining the role of the Government of the Northwest Territories in working on the Dehcho Land Use Plan. The reason why I ask that is I think this government has a public interest to ensure that things are progressing at the same time milestones are achieved but, at the same time, explain to the public in terms of the involvement of the GNWT.

Thank you, Mr. Nadli. The honourable Premier, Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I thank the Member for the question. As a government we are very supportive of land use plans. We have land use plans with the Gwich’in, the Sahtu, the Tlicho, and we’ve been working with the Dehcho on the Dehcho Land Use Plan. We’ve signed a bilateral terms of reference with the grand chief where we have been working together without prejudice to find ways to resolve some very complex land issues, and we’re very supportive of the Dehcho Land Use Plan going forward. As I said before, every time I meet with Minister Valcourt I

press the need for appointing a Minister’s special representative for the Dehcho, and also a federal representative for the Land Use Planning Advisory Commission that’s working on the plan. We fully participate, so we’re looking forward to having a Dehcho Land Use Plan very soon.

Part of the ongoing process of negotiations was the concept of the Dehcho resource management authority where a regional structure will be established involving all people within the Deh Cho. On that basis, I know it would be a critical piece in terms of how it is that the land use plan could stand and at the same time be implemented and become operational. I wanted to ask the Minister if that indeed is the case that all parties are striving towards.

I don’t want to be talking out of school here because we’re still going through different processes. The Dehcho are going through their process; we’re going through our process. But I think we just have to be careful here. We are talking about such an authority, but I think we have to make sure that the understandings and definitions of what that authority will be are consistent. I can say that we are discussing that.

In the past this government has been very supportive of regional councils that involve municipal governments and First Nations governments, and I know that the Northwest Territories has regional district administrative centres throughout the NWT, including the Dehcho.

Can the Premier explain how it is that perhaps that could be very consistent and almost a parallel process with First Nations’ aspirations towards self-government?

As part and parcel of self-government negotiations, I think wherever we are negotiating, governance is a discussion that we have in any negotiations that we have, and I think the leaders in the Northwest Territories have been very creative, and I think that as we see more and more self-government agreements are negotiated I think we are going to see much more of that.

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

My last question is: Would the Minister agree that regional administrative centres could become regional self-government models?

There are three negotiating parties at the table, and we have to have some consistency across the Northwest Territories, but we do have a regional administrative system already in the Northwest Territories, so I expect that that’s something that could be negotiated, I would think.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I raised the issue yesterday about direct appointments, and my view is it’s very important to create them in a transparent manner. At no time, of course, did I say I was against direct appointments, but it’s simply based on the transparency of them. In my Member’s statement I certainly spoke about two dozen shared services employees that have been shown the door by this government in its reorg. Now is an opportunity for the Premier to start using his direct appointment authority in an open, transparent, and maybe even a reasonable way.

I would ask the Premier, would he be willing to take all the names of the two dozen shared services employees who’ve been shown the door by this government, and use his authority at the Cabinet table to appoint these folks through direct appointments so their jobs aren’t lost after they’ve dedicated themselves in some cases 10, 20 and 30 years to this public service and are feeling as if they got the cold shoulder.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. The honourable Premier, Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We do have various processes in this government, some of which we’ve negotiated through a collective bargaining process, and whenever there’s a change in organization or a change in approach, there’s a process that we have to follow in terms of filling positions. We also have an Affected Employee Policy whereby affected employees have priority on existing positions. I’d be very surprised if there was as much of a problem as the Member is suggesting, so I’d be willing to hear where he sees the problem is happening.

Many of these employees have 10, 20 and 25 years of experience. They don’t meet their numbers, so in other words, they’re too young to retire, they don’t have enough years in the public service to qualify, so even if they wanted to take early retirement, they don’t qualify. Some are being offered these eight-month training programs and told good luck after that. There have been a few who have been able to hit their numbers and said the only option for them is to retire, obviously.

I’m asking the Premier, would he be willing to use his authority at the Cabinet table to direct appoint these employees that aren’t just Yellowknife employees, there are Fort Simpson employees, they are territorial employees and they’re certainly family people who pay taxes. Here’s an opportunity when we have 571 jobs that the government is actively looking at – 24 people only really represent 4 percent of that workforce – here’s an opportunity for the Premier.

The Member is correct; 24 people were affected by shared services, 20 of them have jobs. There are four that have still not been placed, one in the Deh Cho and three in Yellowknife. I fully expect that they will all find suitable, reasonable employment consistent with what they are doing now.

Would the Premier be willing to ensure that these people are guaranteed a job somewhere in the government if, after their training experience, there is no job opening up for them?

I can tell you some of these folks have been doing jobs like they’ve been doing today for 20 or 25 years, and their jobs have been reclassified and they have been told to go reapply for them. By the way, they don’t qualify for interviews anymore. That’s part of the problem here, so I’m asking what guarantees will this Premier provide this sector and what message is he sending by just letting the process roll out by itself with no protection. It sends the wrong message to our territory and certainly the public service. Thank you.

As a government, we look after all our employees. Our employees are our most valuable asset, so I think it’s very misleading to suggest that we are throwing these employees under the bus. As a matter of fact, we do have an Affected Employee Policy. We will be placing these employees. We have told all of them that they will find jobs. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Is the Premier saying in this House – and I’d like him to be crystal clear about this – after the affected employees are sent off for re-programming, retraining or reclassification, whatever you want to call it, will he guarantee them positions after this? They are told they are out on their own after they have been retrained and good luck. That’s the message they are being told. The Premier is trying to tell me something different in this House. I want him to be very clear. Will these employees be offered employment after their training program has been done? Thank you very much.

Our government is not recognized as one of the 100 best employees in Canada because we aren’t looking after employees. If the Member has a list of employees affected that aren’t being offered jobs and are being shown the door, give it to us and we’ll fix the problem. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to ask some questions of the Minister of Finance today. I’d like to try to make some sense of the budget numbers that we’ve been given. I’d like to try to make some sense of the answers the Minister gave me and Mr. Dolynny yesterday. I’m hearing mixed messages. I’m trying desperately to understand what the Minister is telling me.

I would like to refer the Minister again to page 5-9 of the budget, the revenue summary under the Department of Finance specifically to the personal income and the corporate income tax numbers. It’s about $158 million estimated for the 2014-15 budget year. The 2013-14 budget estimates slightly more in revenues; it’s about $165 million.

The Minister, yesterday, stated personal income tax and corporate income tax revenues will be about $30 million short, and he said that in the budget address. So my first question to the Minister is to ask the Minister to please tell me in dollars, how much personal income tax and corporate income tax revenues are expected for the 2014-15 budget, and please include the anticipated loss of $30 million. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That sounds like a written question to me, so I’ll take it as notice. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. The honourable Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Moses.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have questions today following questions I had earlier this week for the Minister of… Actually, I’ll ask questions of the Minister of Health and Social Services.

I have a question with regard to next week and the report we will be getting from the Auditor General. I just want to get an update from the Minister of Health and Social Services where we are with that update. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Moses. The honourable Minister of Health and Social Services, Mr. Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I haven’t seen that audit and I won’t see that audit until pretty much the same time Members do. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, Mr. Speaker. Sorry, I was a little confused there with my first question. With the government response that was tabled in this House in 2011, there were some immediate actions that could have been taken. Has the report itself been updated since 2011? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I was one of the Members who actually participated in the review of the child and family services delivered by the Government of the Northwest Territories in the last Assembly and I am aware of all those recommendations. Since I’ve become the Minister, I have had an opportunity to follow up with the department to see where we are on a number of those recommendations. There has been a lot of work in the background being done, but there is a lot of work that still needs to be done and, obviously, we still need to continue to make improvements. Thank you.

I would like to ask the Minister, moving forward and looking at what’s going to come out of the Auditor General’s report, I assume it will be a lot of the same things as the recommendations the committee brought forth and some of the actions needed.

Has the Minister, in preparation for this audit report that’s coming out next month, put aside any fiscal dollars to address some of those issues specifically in our small communities? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I think we actually need to see the audit to report first and see what it says and what the recommendations are. I will certainly work with committee to find out or put in place regional responses to those so we can actually improve and continue to provide high quality services to our residents in the area of child and family services. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources. I would like to start by noting yesterday we saw the GNWT sign the MOU on industry development with representatives from Fort Resolution. This appears to be a very positive development.

Could the Minister outline what he sees as the next steps in creating sustainable forestry in the Northwest Territories? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The honourable Minister of Environment and Natural Resources, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Member’s question. I do

appreciate him sending me a note and giving me a chance to open up my binder to double check my briefing notes.

I agree with him that the signing yesterday is a good news story. That signing yesterday was a political agreement. By the end of this month, we will work out with Fort Resolution the time to sign the actual formal detailed forest management agreement that lays out the 25-year agreement, the details pertaining to the areas and the harvesting and all the species to be harvested and such.

With that document and hopefully one to come from Fort Providence in the very near future, then we will have the basis for both the business interests as represented by Aurora Wood Pellets and then the three or four Aboriginal governments, the Metis, the Deninu K’ue Band in Fort Resolution and the First Nations Dehcho and Metis in Fort Providence to be able to start putting their business plans together, their harvest plans. With assistance from ourselves, the federal government and other supports, we are going to work with the communities to help them set up their business.

Aurora Wood Pellets anticipates trying to break down by June. The intent is to hopefully be harvesting trees by next winter. Thank you.

Thanks to the Minister. That sounds like a very interesting project. I’d love to hear another announcement before the end of this session as we had yesterday with the Fort Providence people.

Some people are wondering how a pellet mill will compete with pellet mills in BC and Alberta that seem to have cheaper power, cheaper labour and practically free access to sawdust from onsite lumber mills. So, basically if we’re going to export wood pellets – and that’s basically what I’ve been hearing – what is our competitive advantage here? Mahsi.

In fact, down south, from my understanding, at one point the use of wood waste was considered to be a benefit to the wood pellet producers. It was seen to help the lumber mills manage all their excess and waste, but now the recognition has come that this biomass has value and so the issue of free sawdust and free slabs and waste for pellet mills is now a thing of the past. In fact, there is a fairly high rate of attrition.

We will look at stumpage fees. Aurora Wood Pellets will negotiate their arrangement with their respective Aboriginal governments or business interests representing Aboriginal governments in terms of the wood product. The owner of Aurora Wood Pellets is convinced – and he’s doing his own business case – that he is going to be investing many, many millions of his own dollars that he can provide a product in the Northwest Territories with Northwest Territories trees at a 20 to 30 percent

lower rate than we’re currently paying for products being shipped in from the South. Thank you.