This is page numbers 3449 – 3474 of the Hansard for the 17th Assembly, 5th Session. The original version can be accessed on the Legislative Assembly's website or by contacting the Legislative Assembly Library. The word of the day was income.

Topics

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

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

Robert Hawkins

Robert Hawkins Yellowknife Centre

Mr. Speaker, a few short weeks ago, a number of MLAs went to the Yellowknife Aurora College campus, and we were there to hear from the students. As we expected, we heard a number of various concerns, and if I might rightly

put them in different categories, I would call some of them city issues, ECE issues, and certainly Aurora College-specific issues.

While listening to these concerns it came to me: Has the college ever undertaken an opportunity to listen and certainly meet these students? So I posed the question, has anyone met their Board of Governors to talk about their concerns? Not surprisingly, but disappointingly I must admit, there was a resounding no. I was informed that they only have one student as student rep on the Board of Governors who yet has to still be appointed, and this one student rep to the Board of Governors represents all three campuses. An impossible task, if I may add.

I undertook to write a letter to the Board of Governors suggesting that they should meet with these students, they should talk to them and hear their concerns. As promised, I wrote the letter. So, what do you do with the letter? You try to send it. So I go to the Aurora college website and I looked for the e-mail of the Board of Governors. Impossible to find. I called the president’s office. What do you think they say? They say, well, there are no e-mail addresses for the Board of Governors, but if you have a letter to send us, send it to the president of Aurora College.

This is failing the public and certainly failing the students. When you have to send a letter of inquiry to the Board of Governors and it has to be vetted through the president’s office, the first question that came to mind to me was: What level of accountability is this? Are they screening letters? Who knows? Their intentions may be good, but they do look terrible up front.

If you’re a student at this college, if you’re a person of the public and you want to reach out to your Board of Governors, it’s impossible. As the stewards of this institution, an important institution to our territory, we must be able to endow these governors with an e-mail. There must be some level of accountability to these students. There must be some level of accessibility to these students to hear their concerns.

So, I would tell Cabinet and I would certainly tell the Minister of ECE, let’s start by appointing a student rep who is only appointed for one year, and let’s get these governors’ e-mails so they can communicate with these students, because right now they’re anonymous. This style of business may be everyday business in Ottawa, but I can tell you it doesn’t hold water here in the Northwest Territories. Stop failing our public and help our students. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

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

Norman Yakeleya

Norman Yakeleya Sahtu

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Some time ago I sat down with an elder in Fort Good Hope and listened to the elder. One of the phrases I got from the elder, after listening to the elder, was “our land is holy.” I was trying to figure out what the elder was meaning.

Some time ago over the past several months, the Sahtu people have lost three dearly loved elders and a young mother and a young grandmother. These elders passed away some time ago, one last week and certainly the young mother from Deline, and they returned back to the land.

I recall when I was a young man in Tulita when the elder was talking to me, he knelt down and took the dirt from his hand and he said, “This is our blood.” I couldn’t understand what he was talking about, but now I can understand a little bit, I think, that our elders return back to the land. When our elders go back to the land, our land is holy.

In our small communities, especially in the Sahtu and other communities, we’re a family and family grieves together. So, back in our communities, I want to say to the families and all the volunteers, to help out the loved ones on the passing of their elders or their mother, grandmother. We need to support each other. The traditions that we had at one time were very strong, so now we need to remind ourselves and pray for each other.

Sometimes in this life we need to sit back and say, this is important, this can wait until tomorrow. I have a lot of issues for the Sahtu that I want to raise. That will happen tomorrow.

Today I want to pay respect to the elders, to the young mother and grandmother in Deline, Tulita and Fort Good Hope and say what they have done for us to be here, standing and talking freely is truly appreciated and I thank everybody in the Sahtu for helping these families through their hard times. I ask everybody to send prayers to the people in the Northwest Territories who also lost family members or friends since our last coming to this session. Mahsi.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

Thank you Mr. Yakeleya. Item 4, returns to oral questions. Item 5, recognition of visitors in the gallery. Mr. Moses.

Recognition of Visitors in the Gallery
Recognition of Visitors in the Gallery

Alfred Moses

Alfred Moses Inuvik Boot Lake

Thank you Mr. Speaker. Joining us today is my constituency assistant, Weronica Murray from Inuvik. She’s going to be here for the first week understanding our consensus government style and participating in some of the work. Welcome, Weronica.

Recognition of Visitors in the Gallery
Recognition of Visitors in the Gallery

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

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

Recognition of Visitors in the Gallery
Recognition of Visitors in the Gallery

Bob McLeod

Bob McLeod Yellowknife South

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to take this opportunity to recognize all of the deputy ministers of the Government of the Northwest Territories that are here today. These are the people who help make all of our directions come into effect. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Recognition of Visitors in the Gallery
Recognition of Visitors in the Gallery

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. I’d like to welcome everyone in the gallery here today. Thank you for taking the time to take in our proceedings. Thank you.

Item 6, acknowledgements. Item 7, oral questions. Ms. Bisaro.

Wendy Bisaro

Wendy Bisaro Frame Lake

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to address my questions today to the Minister of Transportation. I understand that we finally have a signed contract for the construction of the Inuvik-Tuk highway. Apparently it is a guaranteed price. I am very glad to hear that, but I am extremely skeptical that this project will be completed in the allotted budget.

I would like to ask the Minister of Transportation, first of all, knowing that any project endures changes to its original project description, what exists in this contract to protect the GNWT from cost overruns due to change orders as the project moves ahead? Thank you.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The honourable Minister of Transportation, Mr. Beaulieu.

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Minister of Transportation

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We have, as the Member indicated, a contract with the Joint Venture group up in the Beaufort-Delta. No one has ever run a project of this type before with this type of material on this type of terrain, so this is absolutely a new thing for this North and for anywhere in the world actually. We brought in the experts that we think can work with that type of material. As the material is put on the road and embankments are built, it comes down. We recognize that we’re working with a budget that is limited and we have a small contingency. It’s that small contingency that we would rely on to keep this entire highway on budget. Thank you.

Wendy Bisaro

Wendy Bisaro Frame Lake

Thanks to the Minister for that response. The Minister mentions a small contingency, but I didn’t hear him reference basically what would happen if we get a number of change orders and we have used up that small contingency. What then occurs if we have more

change orders or we have more cost overruns that are required? What exists in the contract that can guarantee to me, as a Member overseeing this project and looking after the finances of the government, what exists in that contract that will make me feel better about the fact that we are not going to have cost overruns? Thank you.

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Minister of Transportation

We do recognize that a project of this magnitude does have some risks associated with it. The only guarantee that we do have is that we’ve negotiated with the Joint Venture group, we’ve negotiated with a group of contractors, big contractors actually, that we felt were in the best position to build this highway with the amount of money that we were putting into the highway. That is the thing that we have to back us up. We can’t provide a solid guarantee that this is going to come right in on budget, but at this point this is how all contracts start. We come up with a price, we negotiate a price, the contractors tell us they can do it within that price and we’re confident that they can, so we proceed. Thank you.

Wendy Bisaro

Wendy Bisaro Frame Lake

I guess I have to say to the Minister that that doesn’t give me much comfort. What is the purpose of negotiating a price? What is the purpose of having a guaranteed contract if there is no guarantee that we won’t go over cost?

I understand that there are still a number of financial elements that are being negotiated that haven’t yet been finalized. I would like to ask the Minister what elements of the project are still under negotiation and have yet to be finalized. Thank you.

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Minister of Transportation

We do have a cost for all components. The one risk is that the material that would go on the very last application and the very top granular material is a little further away from the actual road than we would like. There could be some risks associated there, but generally we have our numbers and we are proceeding with the budget in every area at this point. Thank you.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Final, short supplementary, Ms. Bisaro.

Wendy Bisaro

Wendy Bisaro Frame Lake

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I understand that there are risks. My concern is that these risks are out there. Once bitten, twice shy. I went through the bridge project, as did the Minister of Transportation, so I think he knows why I am a little circumspect.

I would like to ask the Minister, knowing that this is a big project, knowing it’s going on for a number of years, if he will be providing updates to Members and to the general public as the project progresses. Will he let us know not only how many kilometres have been completed, but an accounting of how much has been spent and whether the project is on budget? Thank you.

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Minister of Transportation

We have an oversight committee with Cabinet to ensure that our level,

that we are continuing to communicate with each other, staying on top of the project. The project is cash-flowed, so the work that is scheduled is cash-flowed and we anticipate that we will be following the cash flow and the construction simultaneously, and at the end of the day, I am anticipating that the project will finish. If the project, in any way, shape or form, is starting to exceed the cash flow, we are going to know immediately. We also committed to continue to provide updates to the Standing Committee on Economic Development and Infrastructure. Thank you.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

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

Alfred Moses

Alfred Moses Inuvik Boot Lake

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a follow up to my Member’s statement and I have questions for the Minister of Health and Social Services. With the emergency wet shelter happening in Inuvik and some of the research that’s been done in Alaska such as in Nome and Juno, how is the Minister staying on top of this pilot project that has already shown some great success in just over the two months in terms of services being provided as well as a number of residents and a number of things happening in the community such as less call-outs and disturbances, those kinds of things? How is the Minister keeping in contact with the health authority and other partners to ensure that the project is continuing to move in a positive manner? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

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

Glen Abernethy

Glen Abernethy Minister of Health and Social Services

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. CEOs regularly communicate with the Department of Health and Social Services in all sorts of initiatives that are going on within their jurisdiction. This happens to be one of them. I do know that the community was very eager to have this shelter and was a proponent for doing it. We continue to have dialogue with the community organizations who have put this together and we are hearing positive feedback on a regular basis. I look forward to further discussions, or the Beaufort-Delta Health and Social Services Authority having further discussions with those organizations about future opportunities as well. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Alfred Moses

Alfred Moses Inuvik Boot Lake

We’ve said in this House time and time again, I guess you could say we’ve criticized the government and the Department of Health with regard to a lack of programs and services in areas of mental health and addictions, specifically detox facilities. That is something we really tried to get to

the point here. This project itself serves a great purpose in terms of detox under a supervised setting and also doesn’t exhaust resources of the RCMP or the medical staff at the hospital.

With such a great project in place where people can go if they are intoxicated – a wet shelter – and be supervised during the night, would the Minister be willing to commit further funding in future budgets to such a project, specifically the one in Inuvik which is already over the two months due to heating costs and other expenses, have already gone over budget with the money that was provided to them from the initial start-up costs from the health authority? Is the Minister willing to commit future funds to this project? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Glen Abernethy

Glen Abernethy Minister of Health and Social Services

During this fiscal year that we’re currently in, we allocated $75,000 in the Beaufort-Delta for a day shelter in Inuvik, and the community approached us and indicated that they would prefer to actually have the damp shelter that the MLA is talking about. These dollars that were allocated in 2013-14 are ongoing funds, so when the budget is approved for ‘14-15, we will have the same dollars carrying forward. Thank you.