Thank you, Mr. Chair. To open this discussion, I’d like to make some brief remarks on the proposed revised mandate of the Government of the Northwest Territories, 2016-2019.
In June of this year, Cabinet and Regular Members each tabled their respective reports reflecting on the government’s progress on our mandate. These reports provided a critical evaluation of our progress on the almost 200 commitments in the mandate, including suggestions to ensure we continue to work effectively toward fulfilling the priorities of the 18th Legislative Assembly through the second half of our term.
Since June we have engaged in a collaborative process with Regular Members to revise and improve our mandate. This process has required us to listen carefully to each other, find common ground, and compromise when it is in the best interest of Northwest Territories’ residents, all of which are items essential to the functioning of a consensus government. Based on the feedback received from Regular Members, as well as subsequent discussions in Caucus and correspondence back and forth between Regular Members and Cabinet, we have proposed a revised mandate for consideration by Committee of the Whole, which we tabled at the beginning of this sitting. The proposed revised mandate is the product of a great deal of coordination and collaboration between political leaders and government departments, and takes into account Regular Members’ feedback as well as the fiscal and operational realities that our government must face.
The proposed revised mandate continues to follow the priorities of the 18th Legislative Assembly that the original mandate followed, while also recognizing that new information and changing external factors may warrant an adjustment to our approach. To this end, the proposed revised mandate includes new commitments regarding emerging issues, such as the legalization of cannabis, youth suicide prevention, revised wording to clarify existing commitments, and restructuring of existing commitments to allow for progress to be tracked and reported.
Additionally, we have responded to the standing committee’s concern about duplicate commitments by removing or combining copies of commitments that were found under multiple headings. Once the Legislative Assembly has adopted a revised mandate, departments will develop new milestones for added commitments, and revise the milestones for existing commitments to ensure they accurately capture and report on the activities undertaken by government to fulfill our mandate. These milestones will be tracked and reported on the mandate website, which will also be updated to reflect the revised mandate.
I look forward to our discussions today on the revised mandate, and I am confident we will have a much improved document that will guide us through the remainder of the life of this Legislative Assembly. Thank you, Mr. Chair.