Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The honourable Premier, Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Since May 20, 2014, the public has had an opportunity to go online and review existing devolution legislation. We have encouraged all interested parties and Northwest Territories citizens to take the opportunity to learn about it a bit and understand the new authorities exercised post-devolution by the Government of the Northwest Territories. We have had two advertising

campaigns, in May and November 2014. The review period was extended to enhance the opportunity for citizens to examine and comment on the legislation. Thank you.

Thanks to the Premier for telling us what has been done. I asked what kind of a plan the government has going forward to review devolution legislation. It sounds from that, that maybe we’re done. I would certainly hope not.

These are very complex pieces of legislation. The education and the advertising campaign that were done, I think that’s great. We needed to advise people of that.

I’d like to know from the Premier, what consultation with groups has been done, or hopefully will be done, because I don’t think it has been done. So, what consultation is planned in order to gauge the interests of the public and organizations with regard to the changes that are required? Thank you.

There have been 2,091 legislative review website views. There have been 272 visits to the Q and A and comment page. Only two questions have been submitted for response. So in our view, the level of response, we don’t foresee any immediate changes to the legislation as a result of the review. Our expectation is that the responsible departments will review the 26 different married regulations and acts associated with devolution in the Northwest Territories. Thank you.

Thank you. So I gather we have no plan. We’re going to turn the legislation over to each individual department. They will do what they will do. I’d like to suggest, again, this is very complex legislation, and I would also like to suggest that not everybody has access to a computer and asking the question by the computer does not lend itself to making suggestions for amendments to a complex piece of legislation.

So can the Premier indicate to me, if we turn this legislation over to individual departments, what kind of a time frame are we talking about? Can he give me any idea as to when we can expect some sort of a schedule, or an estimated time frame for amendments to these seven pieces of legislation? Thank you.

I should point out that the advertising campaign was focused solely on northern papers. I should also point out that devolution has only been in place for 10 months and previous devolutions when we’ve devolved and evolved, normally it would take about a three-year period. I know that we do have a process already for dealing with legislation and I expect it would go through that process. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. To the Premier, then I guess I would like to ask him to advise me and the public. I know there was a lot of concern about the legislation and that changes were needed. So can the Premier tell me and tell the public how they can get their views to the government, to individual departments so that legislation can be amended as necessary? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, we have already launched two advertising campaigns where we strongly laid out that the objectives of the review are to encourage the general public to better understand the legislative process associated with devolution and give them an opportunity to review the legislation and to ask questions of clarification.

We also have communicated an evolved process and the review was to gather initial public responses, questions and suggestions and also to provide the general public with an understanding of the legislative process for amendment of existing bills and development of new legislation.

We will be bringing forward a final summary report. So, all that information is available online. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise today as a follow-up to a statement we heard in the House from one of our Ministers on corrections and on-the-land programs, otherwise known as wilderness programs. I do agree with the Minister that these programs do help our people heal, reconnect with their land and culture and values. But I’m saddened to hear that after all these years we’re still unable to select a qualified contractor. So with that, I do have questions for the Minister of Justice

It is well documented that the proponents who have offered wilderness programs in the past had serious issues with liability, liability in terms of safety of the inmates, safety of the providers and safety of the public.

Has the department considered all of the liability options from the past dealings with proponents and have there been corrective actions as we wait for an expression of interest? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. The Minister of Justice, Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I mentioned earlier and again yesterday, we’ve had a number of proponents from around the territory that have expressed interest. That doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to parlay into them

being a service provider. At the end of the day, there are a number of things they have to have. The Member talked about liability, we have had camps in the past. We have learned from those experiences what we want to see happen and we are going to work with the folks that have expressed interest. The Sahtu was one region were we got four expressions of interest. We hope to sit down with these folks as soon as we can, sometime this month, in an effort to get the program up and running somewhere in the Northwest Territories this calendar year, and that is our objective because of the benefits that it brings to the inmates and the healing that can happen through a wilderness program and an on-the-land type of experience. Thank you.

I’m not sure if I got a response to that question. We are right now in a position of a holding pattern. We’re waiting for proponents to come forward. We’re looking at expressions of interest and it has been clearly documented that this government has an opportunity to review, during its so-called quiet period, those issues of liability, maybe better guidelines or framework of action or, in essence, a better framework in place so that when we do have proponents in place they can be operating at efficiency.

Can the Minister indicate, has work been done to look at guidelines, look at framework, look at policies and look at regulations to make this system better? Thank you.

I thank the Member for the question. The answer to the question is yes, absolutely we have. We’ve taken this time that we’ve had to ensure that when we go forward with an expression of interest and we get to an RFP stage that we do know exactly what we’re getting ourselves into. I don’t have that level of detail here with me, but I’d be more than happy to share the work we have done with Members of the House. Thank you.

I appreciate the Minister’s offering on that. We know that from past use of this tool, which is an on-the-land tool, that the costs per inmate were quite substantive and it was quite variant in terms of as high as $1,500 per inmate to as low as about $500 per inmate per day. We know that the average costs for an inmate incarcerated in our corrections facilities is around $378 per inmate per day..

Does the Minister foresee that we’re going to be looking at a fairly large substantial cost should inmates start choosing this as an option and is his department prepared for that? Thank you.

Again, we’re working through all of these details. That is certainly one that we are paying attention to and I’m thankful for the Member bringing that up today. Again, as we get closer to working with a proponent on delivering

this service in the Northwest Territories, we will be back having a briefing with the Standing Committee on Social Programs and Members that are interested in this to show them what we’ve come up with, who we’re working with and how this is all going to roll out. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Minister’s reply on that. As we’ve been told, we’re waiting for an expression of interest from a number of proponents. We are not sure whether or not there will be a sure list of candidates or candidates at all.

Does the Minister have a plan of action should there be no succession planning in finding a proponent? Is the department prepared to take this initiative as a program themselves? Thank you.

Anybody that knows me knows I’m optimistic all the time. We are optimistic at DOJ that we are going to find a proponent to help us deliver this program in the Northwest Territories. We’ve got several who have expressed interest, five from the Sahtu and others. Until we get an opportunity to sit down and talk with them about our expectations, what they’re looking for, I’m sure we will find one of those groups that we will be able to work with and get this program back up and running in the NWT. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I raised concerns with regards to security at the seniors home in Fort Providence. My questions are to the Minister of Public Works and Services. Currently I wanted to ask the Minister if, within his portfolio, he’s become aware of an assessment of the seniors home in Fort Providence and the deficiencies including security considerations. The building was constructed in the mid-70s. I just wanted to see if there’s been an assessment of the building including perhaps an eye of assessing the security for shortcomings as well. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Nadli. The honourable Minister of Public Works, Mr. Beaulieu.