Masi. Minister for Education, Culture and Employment.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In any cases as such that the Member brought forward, I'd encourage the Member to set up a meeting with our CSO at the office. Any families that find themselves in that situation obviously want to provide the best overall supports to the families so that they do see this benefit, but in any cases as the Member has stated, I'd like to encourage the Member to talk to the families or even have the YWCA to explain to their families, come talk to us at the department, speak with the CSO on how this can be addressed, and I'm sure we can find a solution. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I'm wondering if the Minister can tell us if this issue can be addressed by paying food and clothing allowances until the Canada Child Benefit is available.

We have a lot of clients that are on the Income Assistance Program. Obviously it's by a case-by-case basis. I've mentioned about the net income of the whole family, how many children are in the house and the ages of those children when we do the assessments. In this case, like I said, it seems very unique and in that case any families that do find themselves in that situation, I encourage them to come talk to the CSOs to find a solution.

Thank you to the Minister for that answer. Another situation that's like this that I'll bring to his attention is mothers with newborns. They often will take months of waiting to get the money paid, to get on with the support of the Canada Child Benefit. The other problem I want to bring to his attention is timing. So food and clothing allowances used to be paid at the beginning of the month. The Canada Child Benefit is paid in the last half of the month and people end up at food banks and other food security places earlier because they run out of money. Can the Minister say how people should be budgeting the lesser funds to make them stretch further?

From my understanding, the amount of the cheque that the families get at the beginning of the month includes everything in it and there has been an increase. In terms of tail end, of families getting cheques at the end of the month from our office, I'll have to confirm that, but my understanding is families receive an increase in their payments and an increase in cheques at the beginning of each month. I'll have to confirm with our department, but I'm pretty sure that all families get the full payment at the beginning of the month. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife Centre.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'll look for to that confirmation from the Minister. Finally, I'm going to repeat the question that commentators and frontline service providers as well as I have been asking: will the Minister recognize that taking away the food and clothing allowance for children under 18 was the wrong thing to do and to reinstate that allowance immediately? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. When we were moving ahead with the Income Assistance changes, we got recommendations from clients, we got recommendations from our partners in the NGO community. Moving forward, a lot of those included that we no longer claw back income that's intended to help parents with the costs of raising their children.

In order to understand the improvements, I think, to the Income Assistance Program, Members must look at the overall benefit package and not at each item in isolation from one another. As a government, we give a whole suite of programs and services to help families in need, low-income families. All departments, most of our departments, do that. We've made those changes within Education, Culture and Employment.

When you put the community cost adjustments and that we're no longer clawing back income for children, are families are receiving more money, Mr. Speaker. Any other concerns can be brought forward to the department, but I thank the Member for bringing the concerns that she's been hearing to the House. I feel they're being addressed with the work that we've done with our changes in Income Assistance. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, public safety in our downtown core is always of great concern to the people of Yellowknife. I'm wondering if the Minister of Justice can answer some questions today. Recently, Nunavut has made a decision to allow their sheriff's officers to provide for escorts from the courthouse to the correctional facility. Here, in Yellowknife, the RCMP are responsible for that function, and it keeps the RCMP off of patrol duty at peak times in the downtown, which puts additional pressure on the RCMP to provide public safety.

Can the Minister make a commitment to review the situation here, in the North, and commit to empowering our sheriff's office to do that job and get the police on the streets, where they belong? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Minister of Justice.

Mr. Speaker, I can commit to reviewing the situation. I don't know whether I could really commit to having the sheriff's officers conduct the duties suggested by the Member opposite as I believe that would require a significant change of legislation. So I am prepared, certainly, to look at the overall issue, but I don't think I can make any commitment as to any certainty as to whether we would be increasing the duties that the sheriff's officers already have. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

When was the last time the Minister reviewed that legislation? Because my understanding of it is that sheriffs are able to do this function; it is allowed by legislation; it's just not being done.

It is some time since I've reviewed the legislation, and, in fact, I may have never reviewed the legislation. I will, however, undertake to the Member opposite that I will review the legislation. I was under the impression that we would either have to enact new legislation in the form of a police act or something along those lines to allow the sheriffs to take on these additional duties, but I will certainly undertake to look into the matter.

Thank you to the Minister for agreeing to look into it. If not the sheriffs, then can G Division officers be used for court duty rather than Yellowknife RCMP officers?

Mr. Speaker, I don't know if I entirely understand the question. The question is whether G Division officers, who are in the RCMP, could replace other officers within the RCMP? Either way, it's still RCMP officers, Mr. Speaker. I may have misunderstood the question. Thank you.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and perhaps I'll clarify. Instead of using the local detachment resources, which would be the Yellowknife detachment, the territorial level resources for this function, so pulling officers who are not involved in patrol duty in our downtown core. That's really the crux of the issue, and that's what I'd like the Minister to consider. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, certainly, we are always looking at new ways of being more efficient. I'm rather concerned that moving officers around in the manner suggested by the Member opposite might actually involve a greater loss. RCMP budgets or, rather, our portion of it, which is 70 per cent, has been growing exponentially over the last five or six years, but I certainly will, as I mentioned earlier, undertake to the Member opposite to look at this whole issue. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Oral questions. Item 8, written questions. Item 9, returns to written questions. Item 10, replies to commissioner's opening address. Item 11, petitions. Item 12, reports of special and standing committees. Item 13, reports of committees on the review of bills. Item 14, tabling of documents. Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment.

Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the following document entitled "NWT Mineral Development Strategy: GNWT Implementation Plan, 2014-2019." Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Tabling of documents. Minister of Health and Social Services.