Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Evictions are not an easy thing. When I first came in, my objective was to be able to provide people with the tools so that they could obtain, maintain, and retain their housing. Eviction does not fit within any of those priorities of my own. It is a last resort. It has always been a last resort for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation. The process we go through is, first of all, the local housing organizations work closely with the tenants to try to get them to deal with their arrears and set up a repayment plan. If that follows through, then the process is stopped, and then we just deal with the tenants and work towards them paying their current rent and dealing with a payment plan on their arrears.

If the repayment plan is not followed through or people refuse to enter into a repayment plan, then, sad to say, we do take them to the rental officer, which does sometimes take a few months to get through. The rental officer then provides an order, and usually it's telling people, if it's around arrears, to pay their rent and make a repayment plan. If it's around damages, that might be a different order. Most of the people actually adhere to the rental officer's orders. The last process within the step is when people do not enter into a repayment plan, do not work with the local housing organization, and do not adhere to the rental officer's orders; then we will start the eviction process.

The process specifically in the winter, there is no process. When I first came in to take over as Minister for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation, I was shocked at the amount of arrears people had. My direction has been: after two months of not paying rent, start the eviction process. It is a lot easier for people to pay a couple of months' rent than it is to let it build up for a whole season and have thousands of dollars that they cannot get out of. That is my direction, and I stand by it. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.