Thank you, Mr. Chair. Previously, the department indicated it was doing work on the NWT Child Benefit to bring it in line with the New Canada Child Benefit. If the Minister could update us on the work to date? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Debates of June 6th, 2016
This is page numbers 363-408 of the Hansard for the 18th Assembly, 2nd 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 going.
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Consideration in Committee of the Whole of Bills and Other Matters
Consideration in Committee of the Whole of Bills and Other Matters
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Alfred Moses Inuvik Boot Lake
Yes, we did go before committee on this one as well. We are doing the work that's needed to be done. There are some regulations that need to be fixed within the Income Assistance Regulations. We’re hoping to have a lot of this work completed when the federal government puts their plan in place, which is July 1st, and we're hoping to have some of the work ready in August.
Consideration in Committee of the Whole of Bills and Other Matters
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Kieron Testart Kam Lake
Thank you, Mr. Chair. If the Minister could give us a firm date in August? Thank you.
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Alfred Moses Inuvik Boot Lake
It will be August 1stwhen we start doing the assessments of the income that was brought forth in July when the federal implements theirs. Thank you.
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Kieron Testart Kam Lake
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Does the department have an idea of what the new NWT child benefit will look like in terms of the benefits to northern residents? Like, will it be enriched? If we get an idea of what northerners will be getting out of this to help with their cost of living and parental needs? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Consideration in Committee of the Whole of Bills and Other Matters
Consideration in Committee of the Whole of Bills and Other Matters
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Alfred Moses Inuvik Boot Lake
There is going to be significant increases throughout the Northwest Territories. I did make comments in the House on this last week and, as well, going to be making another statement moving forward on how we are going to be implementing this program. There will be benefits for low to moderate income families. For more details, I can ask my deputy minister to get into a little bit more detail. Thank you.
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Stewart
Thank you, Mr. Chair. So there's two components to these changes. The one is the change, as the Minister talked about, to the Income Assistance Regulations to make sure that we're not counting Canada Child Benefit as well as the NWT Child Benefit, as well as support payments to families on income assistance in calculating that level. That'll take place in, as the Minister mentioned, August 1stassessing July income, so that'll have that impact.
In terms of the NWT Child Benefit, there's a couple changes that are needed. One is changes to legislation, specifically the NWT Income Tax Act, so we'll be working with committee to try to expedite those changes so we can make them as quickly as possible. Then we'll need to work with the federal government to tweak their systems as well.
In terms of the sort of description of the overall benefits, the increased NWT Child Benefit will apply up to an income threshold that'll be in the range of $30,000 and then the benefits will start to go down, similar to how the federal system works. We expect families up to $80,000 income will receive some NWT Child Benefit. There'll be differential rates for whether there's children under six or between six and 17 years of age. All of that detail will start to get rolled out here now that it's been announced and we'll get the members more detail on that in the upcoming weeks as well. That's sort of the general characteristics of the program. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
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Kieron Testart Kam Lake
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Is that individual income or total household income, the $80,000 ceiling I believe the deputy minister indicated? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
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Kieron Testart Kam Lake
Thank you, Mr. Chair. So the federal government, when they rolled this out as an election promise, they could say the maximum this benefit is worth, I think it's around $530, something like that. Can the department provide that level of detail today, what the maximum benefit will be to families in a dollar amount? I respect that there's a lot of legislative work that needs to be done, but can we get a sense of what the new benefit will be worth to northern families? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
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Stewart
Thank you, Mr. Chair. What we're looking at now is for children under six, one-child family, this would be the maximum amounts, would be around $1,164. For two children, that would go up to around $2,088; three children, $3,000 and so on. For children six to 18, the amounts are a little bit less, $931 for one child, $1,670 for two, and so on. But we can get that detail to the Members, the exact calculations that'll be on that. It follows a very similar pattern as what the the federal CCB is using. Our income thresholds are slightly different than the federal program, but, again, the reduction rate as that family income goes up is pretty similar to what the federal Canada Child Benefit will do.
Consideration in Committee of the Whole of Bills and Other Matters
Consideration in Committee of the Whole of Bills and Other Matters
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Kieron Testart Kam Lake
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Finally, just this is more of a comment, but when this program rolls out or when the new benefit is, having something like a calculator available on the ECE website and sharing that with the public would be, I think, a step in the right direction to let people know exactly what their benefits were, in fact, beforehand. If you know what the calculations are going to be and the it's just a matter of going through the legislative changes, communicating that with the public I think will ease a lot of the economic burdens that people are going through right now, so good peace of mind and I think a good exercise in communicating the benefits they're going to get from that. So I would encourage the department to look at developing a tool like that and generously communicating it with the public. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Consideration in Committee of the Whole of Bills and Other Matters
Consideration in Committee of the Whole of Bills and Other Matters