Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have been approached by a number of businesspeople asking why their WSCC rates are going up. Unfortunately, I cannot answer their questions with certainty. Therefore, I have some questions for the Minister responsible for WSCC. Can the Minister explain why the rates are going up annually? Is this due to increased costs for administration of programs, a need for more staff, or is this cost related to injured workers? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Minister responsible for the Workers' Safety and Compensation Commission.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The mandate and the work that the WSCC does is to continue to promote workplace health and safety, as all Members know, and I think all Members can attest to and support the work that we do within WSCC. The increase in 2019 provisional rates, which is the rate used in deriving detailed employer rates, is attributed to the increased cost, as all Members would be aware, of the treatment and care of our injured workers, and we will continue to provide those services and work with our employees, as I mentioned, focusing on promoting workplace health and safety. The increase is attributed to the increased costs for the treatment and care of injured workers across the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is my understanding that the Government of the Northwest Territories pays 88 cents per $100 on their payroll. It seems to be very low, especially when we look at departments such as Infrastructure, Health and Social Services, and Justice, in other words, Corrections. Can the Minister confirm that the departments are broken down into their own industry codes, or is the GNWT as a whole classified as one code?

As the government, the GNWT has one employer for all of our workers and people who do work on our behalf. It is classified under a single industry code, that code being class 81. Being an employer, GNWT as one employer, we are just focusing on that class 81.

That gives me a bit of a concern, when we have such a variety of people working for the Government of the Northwest Territories. If we did break down each department into their own code, similar to what we do with businesses, would we see businesses rates go down?

The employer base across the territory funds the system for anyone who needs treatment or care under our class 81. Changing the allocation of how that system works would obviously, for one thing, probably have a lot of administrative work that would need to go into that. If the Member is asking specifically on each department, some probably would go up. Some would probably go down.

As you know, we have employees who do different types of work, and it would really be based on each department. Some would probably go up; some would go down. That is why, with the GNWT being the sole employer, we follow the industry code, being class 81.

Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, thank you very much to the Minister for giving information and clarity to some of these questions. I still have some concerns, though. I can't see our rates going down too low for our secretaries and that, but with hospitals and corrections, I could see it going up. My last question, Mr. Speaker, is: is my understanding that the Minister's role is to ensure that everybody pays their own fair share, including the GNWT? Can the Minister explain what his role is with WSCC? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Minister has an arm's-length role working with the WSCC. As I mentioned, and as he said in his recent comments, with each department, and he mentioned a couple in terms of Justice, Corrections, Health and Social Services, compared to, you know, administration, the costs would be up and down. My role, like I said, is at arm's length, but we also have a governance council that does oversee the conduct of business and management of the WSCC. That is my current role, at an arm's length, but also working with the governance council to make sure that workplace health and safety for our employees is administered. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.

Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Our role would be as partners and supporters of Indigenous governments to do this. We are very interested in working closely with Indigenous governments and their development corporations, our federal partners, the federal government, to achieve the shared goals of economic empowerment, for sure. It is a conversation that has already started rolling out. We had an economic summit in Inuvik last fall. The Premier had one. Myself and the Minister of Finance were there. We are committed to continuing these types of conversations. I think the summit was a good starting point to have these discussions, and we are very interested in helping Indigenous governments who want to go down this road to be able to participate in this manner. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you to the Minister for that reply. That is good information to start to get an understanding and a handle on sort of the direction that we are going and some of the first steps that could be understood from a number of interested parties. I would like to maybe expand upon that a little bit and just ask the Minister: many Indigenous companies, as I have mentioned, provide services to the mines. What ways can the government support them as they prepare to take next steps towards equity ownership?

I will give you a few examples of what we are doing already. As many people in this House know, we have our regional mineral development strategies that we are working with the regions on this, developing them, for those who want to participate in that manner. We are doing two, I think, in this budget cycle again. Our government is already bringing Indigenous governments into the fold as we reach out to the investors of the Global Resource Conference. That is another good example, but we also have funding available from our government to support capacity-building in these areas. We believe that these have proven out to be effective to help the Indigenous governments that want to participate.

Thank you to the Minister for his reply. This is good information. I would like to take it another step further and ask the Minister if the government is working on any kinds of strategies at all in terms of what strategies can the government use to encourage to possibly even incubate communications and partnerships between Indigenous companies and the resource industry?

As I said, we have our regional strategies. Those are good over the long term, I think, to help the Indigenous governments on where they want to go on this. Our own mineral development and petroleum strategies lay out concrete actions to support Indigenous governments. They are clearly laid out in that. Ultimately, it really comes down to engagement. It is something that we have proven that we are very good at encouraging. We have seen that at Round Up already, the last two times that we have been down there. We have a defined structure that is already in place with the public and Indigenous governments and industry to work together, and we will continue to work on that. That is a solid foundation that puts us head and shoulders above the rest of the country, I believe. With our competitors around resource development, we will continue to encourage that and work with the Indigenous governments that want to pursue this.

Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you to the Minister for his rely. This all seems to be very positive information. In the past, we have set some degree of precedent in this regard. This is not new to the Northwest Territories. Many will recall that the Mackenzie Valley pipeline was also one third Indigenous-owned, and so I would just like to ask the Minister: how can this government continue to work toward developing these types of Indigenous equity partnerships in the future? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I think we have clearly laid out that we know, to encourage development in the Northwest Territories, that we have to work with all our partners and all our residents across the Northwest Territories in collaboration. I think, with just a quick thought in my head when we are talking about this, it goes back to the announcement we just made with the federal government around the Taltson project. It is quite clear that this government is focused on bringing Indigenous governments into the fold on how we want these projects to move forward. This gives you a very good example of how it laid out the financial support that is going to be laid there to see how they want to be able to participate in these things going forward.

Darrell Beaulieu and his group have had a couple of economic symposiums. There were some great speakers who also took place there. You know the First Nation Major Project Coalition was there. Dr. Ken Coltson talked about how these projects, right across the country, how Indigenous governments can be able to participate and how they could help support all the Indigenous governments together on how they can figure out how to do this.

Equity is a big challenge on some of these things, but there are a number of things going on on a number of fronts on trying to figure out Indigenous participation and resource development can take place in this country. We will certainly keep our ear to the ground and figure out we can do this for the groups that want to do it. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Oral questions. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.

Marsi cho, Mr. Speaker. In my Member's statement I talked about the cost of living mandate. I have questions for the Premier. I would like to ask the Premier if he agrees that retrofitting homes for energy efficiency would reduce the cost of living for people. Thank you.

Honourable Premier.