Like I said, what has taken everyone 20 years to do, we want to do it in 10 years. In particular, I want to speak about the Yukon Government. We have engaged with them. Their strategy is quite a bit ahead of us. As most people know here, they have a robust agricultural industry in the Yukon, so we have engaged with them. We are learning from their best practices and experiences, so we are drawing on a lot of that. Plus, we have also sent representatives from the department recently to the circumpolar agricultural conference that was held in Iceland, and we want to continue to build on that partnership and relationship moving this forward.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker, and thanks to the Minister. I am going to give him a few more carrots now. I think we are heading on the right track, but one of the issues that has been on the books for years is the availability of agricultural land. What process is the Minister going to action right now to identify and make available more land for agricultural purposes? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Like I said, ITI cannot do this thing alone. We are working with Health and Department of Lands. In this particular question, the Department of Lands is a key department on moving this whole strategy forward. We are working with Lands on this issue. I believe they informed committee on a lot of the issues on moving forward with the regulations and stuff with that, and we will continue to work with that and be the partners with Lands, how we are going to figure this out to access more land for agriculture in the Northwest Territories.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, on Tuesday, the Premier spoke about Single Window Service Centre Pilot Project with Service Canada. Mr. Speaker, today I will have some questions regarding the statement. With the new duties, does this increase the government service workers' workload and hours of work? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Honourable Premier.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The government services officers record all service contacts they have with community members, and we are closely monitoring the number of service requests in each of the pilot Service Canada partnership communities. We are not expecting a large increase because, prior to this arrangement, most of the GSOs were handling a lot of Service Canada requests, and I believe the smaller communities average about five requests in any work day. If we do notice an increase in workload, we are prepared to look at extending our service hours. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I thank the Premier for that answer. It is great that we are tracking stuff. Do not get me wrong. This is a really great program. I think it is doing what it is supposed to be doing in the small communities. Does the federal government provide additional funds for the cost to run these three positions and offices because of the new duties?

For these three pilot programs, the federal government is operating on a fee-for-service basis. For the six programs that we deliver on for the GSOs, they are paying us an average of $25 per fee, so at the end of the pilot program we will evaluate the number of services and evaluate and determine the bill that was sent to Service Canada.

I thank the Premier for that answer. It is just a basic cost service approach, which is really good. With this being a 12-month pilot project, has the GNWT and the federal government developed an evaluation to see if this project is successful?

The government services officers and the three pilot Service Canada communities are recording all of their contacts, so after 12 months, we will sit down and evaluate all of the requests for the six program areas, and we will determine where we go, whether we go forward or not.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the Premier for his answer. I am actually very happy to hear that we are tracking this. This is a very good tool to help. When this pilot project is successful, and I think it will be successful, do the GNWT and the federal government plan to extend these services to other communities with GSOs in place? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It is our longer-term goal to extend all of these services to all of the 21 communities that have GSO services. After this pilot project, we will evaluate it and we are hoping to extend it, even though, for the other committees that have GSOs, we continue to provide services to federal government programs. We are hoping that we will be able to expand it to all of the GSO communities.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Earlier today, I spoke about apprenticeships, and I take note that the Minister also spoke about a new apprenticeship strategy that the department will be unveiling shortly, with both friends on the systemic committee and social development. Today, I would like to know a bit more about that apprenticeship strategy, specifically if the Minister can share: is there a financial commitment to support any parts of that strategy so we can get some real, tangible results by investing in our trades? Thank you.

Masi. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, we do have a draft strategy moving forward that we are going to be sharing with the standing committee on developments. It entails a lot of items, but before we can table it in the House and really submit information, we have to go before a standing committee, and I encourage the Member to come to that presentation when we do. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I, of course, represent the business community that makes frequent use of trades. I have laid out some of the good work the department is doing already. I wonder if the department spoke with the people making use of this program and agrees that their businesses are unsupported, or not supported as much as they could be. I clock that at 25 per cent capacity of what they get. Does the Minister agree that, by providing more financial resources, we could get more people into the trades and more apprenticeships going with these businesses?

The strategy that we have developed is going to work on a strategy to improve training, certification, employment opportunities in skilled trades, as well as occupations in the Northwest Territories. Yes, we did go out and do our consultations. We did a bunch of one-on-one interviews; surveys with certified journeypersons who are currently working in trades; we have spoken with current apprentices, employers, business and industries that have developed into the strategies that we are going to be presenting to the Standing Committee.

One thing I have heard is that, if the funding followed the apprentice and was paid to the employer, it would be a more flexible program and you could have apprentices shifting employment to various things. For example, if they worked in the mine and came into Yellowknife or Hay River and worked in a manufacturing facility, they could still retain the benefits of government-funded apprenticeships but be able to spread that benefit across the Territories. Does the Minister support that approach, and can he share that detail, if it is included in the strategy?

Yes, those are some of the things that we have been hearing as we were going out doing our consultation, and we will share that detail when we go before standing committee.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.