This is page numbers 2895 - 2924 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 mandate.

Topics

Cory Vanthuyne

Cory Vanthuyne Yellowknife North

Thank you to the Minister for the update. Mr. Speaker, I have said before that reviewing policy and changing it is a good, productive step, but often policy and regs are only as good as those who adMinister them. I wonder, can the Minister let us know what he actually hopes to accomplish with this review?

Robert C. McLeod

Robert C. McLeod Inuvik Twin Lakes

Mr. Speaker, the plan is that the review should somewhat modernize the sale and licensing of alcohol in the NWT and provide the NWT Liquor Licensing Board with the necessary tools to do their jobs in a fair and transparent manner, as well as addressing concerns raised by licensees.

Cory Vanthuyne

Cory Vanthuyne Yellowknife North

hat also is good news. I am happy to hear that from the Minister, and providing good tools will be welcomed. I would like to get down to something a little bit more specific, Mr. Speaker. As the Minister is aware, my constituency is home of the NWT Brewing Company. It is the only liquor manufacturer in the NWT, and they have frankly been denied the ability to deliver their product directly to licensees. This decision has made the cost of the NWT Brewing Company’s product economically unviable for local bars and restaurants to access. Can the Minister tell me what he is doing to address this issue?

Robert C. McLeod

Robert C. McLeod Inuvik Twin Lakes

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we thought that the existing liquor regulations had enough leeway to allow for the sale of beer by the NWT Brewing Company directly to licensees. The board, as an independent quasi-judicial body, did not agree with that interpretation of the regulations and would not allow direct sales. To be fair, Mr. Speaker, the board can only make decisions using the existing legislation and regulations. If they are out of date and no longer relevant, it falls on us to change them. I have directed the department to draft regulations that allow for the sale of NWT Brewing products directly to licensees, without having to go through NWT liquor warehouses and paying the handling fees.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.

Cory Vanthuyne

Cory Vanthuyne Yellowknife North

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and cheers to that. This is great news, Mr. Speaker, and will be well-appreciated by many – by all, in fact. Certainly, I might find myself at the brew pub later today celebrating. Just to that, as well, if I can just get additional clarification: can the Minister inform this House when the Brewing Company can expect these regulations to be in place so that they can sell their products directly to licensees? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Robert C. McLeod

Robert C. McLeod Inuvik Twin Lakes

Mr. Speaker, I expect the regulation will be in place by the end of October, and the NWT Brewing Company will be able to begin deliveries if I am in a position to sign the regulation. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

---Laughter

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.

Kieron Testart

Kieron Testart Kam Lake

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I hope I get as good answers as our last round of questions. The funding for the NGO Stabilization Fund has not increased in the last seven years. It is also oversubscribed by about three-quarters of $1 million. During the same time period, the NWT inflation rate has increased by an average of about 2 per cent per year. Will the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs commit to working with their Cabinet colleagues to put additional funding to support NGOs into this fund, and support NGOs in delivering services and their core functions? Thank you.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Masi. Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs.

Caroline Cochrane

Caroline Cochrane Range Lake

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As a Minister, I work with all of Cabinet, actually, to put forward our needs for finances. As stated earlier by me many times, actually, is that every department and Minister sitting here would like to have more money. The reality is that we do have to live within a fiscally-responsible environment considering the economy and, therefore, I do put my concerns forward. Unfortunately, the money tree is not as deep as I wish it would be. I can only cut off so many branches before the tree dies. So I do put forward my needs as every other Minister does, but we are all trying to be fiscally responsible. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Kieron Testart

Kieron Testart Kam Lake

I thank the Minister for the gardening lesson but I would like to really get at this. This issue, this fund, has been called on to be supported for many years. Nothing is going on. Can the Minister comment on why this government is persistent in disregarding the concerns of the Standing Committee on government operations, and continues to fail to respond to our recommendations?

Caroline Cochrane

Caroline Cochrane Range Lake

It is important to note that this, the NGO Stabilization Fund, is not the only funding available to non-profit organizations within the communities. As a non-profit administrator for many years, this was actually supplementary funding. This was not the core funding that we received, so it is supplementary funding. it is about a state of pride and stabilization funding to non-government organizations that provide a critical service for the Government of the Northwest Territories that if we didn’t have them, we would have to provide those services ourselves.

Kieron Testart

Kieron Testart Kam Lake

The Minister has revealed some information that I said this morning in my Member’s statement, and has failed to answer the question why the standing committee’s concerns and recommendations are not being addressed. I would like to ask the Minister how this program that is currently housed in sport and recreation is supporting volunteerism in the Northwest Territories.

Caroline Cochrane

Caroline Cochrane Range Lake

This program, as stated earlier, is about helping stabilize non-government organizations that provide a critical service that the Government of the Northwest Territories would have to provide if it wasn’t in effect. It does support volunteerism in that the majority of non-government organizations are managed by volunteer boards, which is actually part of their society’s act. So it is something that does support volunteerism to the heart and to the core.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.

Kieron Testart

Kieron Testart Kam Lake

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Minister has laid out what this fund does quite well and I agree with her 100 per cent. The core funding NGOs receive from other sources are used for their core delivery of programs and services. This stuff is for other things to help stabilize their operations. They don’t have to dip into those resources, so if the Minister is not going to put more money into it; the Minister is not going to encourage it be moved out of MACA; the Minister is going to continue to ignore the recommendations to the standing committee; will she at the very least adjust the fund so it rises with inflation and keeps pace with the growing cost of living in the Northwest Territories? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Masi. Minister of Municipal and Community

Caroline Cochrane

Caroline Cochrane Range Lake

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, this fund is not meant to provide core funding. This fund is meant to provide stabilization to non-government organizations so that they can provide critical services for the Government of the Northwest Territories. There are requirements that are application-based. I would like to say that we wish that we could give to everyone. There are requirements though, etc. such as societies that apply for this fund have to be current. Those are some of the guidelines that we have. I will adhere to those guidelines because it is important.

As stated earlier, I wish I had billions of dollars, Mr. Speaker, because if I had billions of dollars, we would not have food poverty. We would not have housing issues. We would have roads to every community. We would have schools and we would have proper health centres and legal services. The reality is that we are all living within a fiscally responsible environment. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh

Marsi cho, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in my Member’s statement, I talked about the alcohol impacts of small communities. I’d like to ask the Minister of Health and Social Services what is the department doing to address mental health and addiction issues in small communities. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Masi. Minister of Health and Social Services.

Glen Abernethy

Glen Abernethy Great Slave

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it’s a fairly broad question but I’ll do my best to stick to youth and younger people as the Member’s statement focused in what I thought was mostly about youth. We are coming forward. We have just tabled more recently the Youth and Mental Health and Addictions Action Plan which articulates and outlines a number of things that we need to do as a government and as an Assembly to support our youth who are struggling with either mental health issues or addictions issues.

One of the key things that we’re looking to do is providing some quality counselling supports to our youth. Traditionally, a lot of this has been done in the school system. We’re looking at a new way of doing this with community counsellors that are working in schools but also are year-round employees rather than seasonal or school-based employees. It’s pretty exciting work. I think by working together, we could really make a difference in people’s lives.

In the Member’s statement, he talked about the healthy family programs. I think it’s really important to recognize that a child’s development starts long before birth and that we need to continue to do things to help families be healthy, help families be strong in raising their children. We have healthy family programs in 17 communities in the Northwest Territories providing high-quality programming to help expectant parents be ready for their child’s birth to make sure that they’re in a strong position that they’re living healthy lives and that they’re in a position to provide supports to their children.

There are a large number of things we are doing between the action plan, the child and family committees, as well as treatment option counselling and everything else that’s available to residents. I would strongly encourage the member to encourage youth in his community, youth around the Northwest Territories to take advantage of the help lines, the Facebook pages we have to provide support, and to talk about these issues that people are facing. We need to not be silent about the challenges people are facing, whether it’s mental health or addictions. We need to be working to get the message out there. I applaud the Member for his statement. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh

A very good answer, Mr. Speaker. Where can the people, I guess in general and I don’t expect the Minister to know specifically which place to go to in the small communities, but in general where can the individuals that are struggling with alcohol or struggling with mental health turn to when they’re trying to address their issues in the small communities?

Glen Abernethy

Glen Abernethy Great Slave

Mr. Speaker, there are a number of places. They can go to community counsellors. The Member will point out that there isn’t a community counsellor in every community in the Northwest Territories, but we have them in most communities in the Northwest Territories. Where they don’t exist, they can be reached by telephone. Those numbers are usually available at the community level in the community health stations or other places, so please encourage your youth to look at those.

As we move forward with the new community counsellor program, I think there’s a real opportunity to enhance what’s available to our young people whether they’re in school or not in school. We can’t forget technology, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, our youth are very adept, more so than some of us, at utilizing technology which is why we’ve opened up and done some work around having some Facebook pages available where there can be some group sessions, individual sessions. They can work with client leads to help them identify what programs might be available with them, both at a local, regional, and territorial level. Between that and the help lines, there are some things that young people can engage in directly right from their homes right away.