Thank you, Madam Premier. Are there any other questions? I will go to Yellowknife North.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I am wondering what the metric we are measuring this against is. If you actually look at the labour market forecast, we are going to lose far more than 125 jobs in the next four years in the small communities. That's just the economic reality that we are facing. When we see "increase by 125," do we mean that we're actually, despite the projected loss of jobs, going to increase 125, or are we just talking about ITI going out and creating programs that then offsets the projected loss by 125? What are we pegging this against? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member for Yellowknife North. Madam Premier.

Thank you, Madam Chair. We have a small community fund, actually, that we provide to communities to start their own jobs or skill development. I think that I have said already in this House, when I was the Minister, my difficulty was -- and I have said that vocally, and I will keep saying that -- we tend to throw out money. It's like, "Here's $5 million; spend it," and then people would get two weeks here and two weeks there, and so I have been saying for the last year or so, when I started to realize that this wasn't a good idea, I have been talking to communities and saying, "Instead of hiring that truck driver to haul gravel into your community for two weeks, why don't you buy the truck, so that you can hire the truck driver that always has?"

We're trying to move into a more sustainable model of small communities using the money that we have, instead of just saying, "Here's the money, spend it, and make sure you give me a report on who you hired for every two weeks," because that model is not working. We're not seeing the benefits of that, other than short-term employment, and that should not be where we're looking at. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Madam Premier. Member for Yellowknife North.

Yes, thank you. This just, once again, goes back to that accountability piece. It is going to be very easy for us to, you know, create 125 new jobs if we create some programming and then claim those new jobs that emerge, but my question is, you know, is this taking into fact the labour market forecast, the needs assessment, which says we're going to be losing jobs over the next four years? Is this a net increase of 125, or is this just 125 that can be directly correlated to GNWT projects and programs? If there's not an answer to this right now, I am glad to have ITI or someone come back to committee. I just need to know: are we expecting to outpace the labour market forecast in all of the projections we have right now? Thank you.

Thank you, Member for Yellowknife North. Madam Premier.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Our commitment is to getting 125 jobs in small communities. This is not talking about Yellowknife or bigger regions. We can't control the market and who's going to move and come, but what I can say is that there is a lot less mobility going south, people, residents, leaving from small communities than there are from Yellowknife or larger centres. This goal is specifically for small communities. There is less migration out of small communities outside of the territories. They tend to come to Yellowknife or Inuvik. Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I think the Minister wants to say something.

Thank you, Madam Premier. Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I wanted to comment on the increase of employment in smaller communities. Coming from a smaller community, there is a limited amount of employment that is existing. Looking at this initiative, I was looking at the partnerships that could be created. Being the Minister of Northwest Territories Housing Corporation and putting houses on the ground, we are looking at employment and training and creating employment for the residents in the smaller communities that way.

Also, looking at partnerships, speaking to my colleague for Minister of Lands and identifying that we do have protected area strategies that are under way as we speak now, and they do have program development where we end up entering into partnerships with the GNWT and the smaller communities. Looking at forecasted projects that are coming forward, I wanted to just comment on the Tulita bridge that is under way. We do have environmental assessments and planning going forward, and that is going to create employment in the smaller communities area for the Sahtu region. I just wanted to be clear on that. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation. Madam Premier, did you have something to add?

Thank you. Just a quick note, Madam Chair, if you look at the second thing, it says, "support new employment in collaboration with Indigenous governments, including opportunities associated with established and candidate protected areas." With the protected areas, there's opportunity for recreation and culture; for tourism; the guardianship programs; the housing Minister talked about apprenticeship programs. There is opportunities for small communities to have sustainable jobs. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Madam Premier. We'll go on to Member for Hay River South.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I guess when it comes to employment in small communities, that's something I guess I want to see. I want to see opportunities there for the people who are living there. When we look at that, it's more than just saying that we're going to create jobs. We have to look at the programs that we currently have in place and the institutions. We have the BIP. We have to use that properly. We have ITI programs, SEED, et cetera. We have the BDIC. We have community futures. We have the NWT Metis Development Corporation, which isn't part of the government. There are federal programs. There's Education, Culture and Employment with respect to training. We have Infrastructure, which does have projects and supplies available work.

In the small communities, though, I see arts and crafts is a big thing. For years, they've been talking about a tanning facility in Fort Providence; never seen anything happen with it. We have tourism. In small communities, there may be opportunities for private housing maintainers and that type of thing. We have requirement for trades, and in Fort McPherson, we have Tent and Canvas, and whether it makes money or not, I don't know. It would be nice if it made money. It may not make money, but it provides jobs. It helps maybe with education. It gives people, I guess, some hope, and it allows them to, you know, show their kids and that that there are opportunities out there, no matter where you are.

I think, when we look at this, it's a bigger picture than just creating jobs. We have to look at everything else that we have in place, and it's housing. You know, people have to have a place to live as well. I think, when we look at this, I think that it's really important that we tie all this in together, but I don't want to be looking at it for four years either. Timelines are good. Try and get something done. It's just easy to go out there and do a few little things and get them going. I am optimistic that something is going to happen, and again, when it comes to business and employment, that's going to be my area where I want to push, and you'll hear lots from me about that. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member for Hay River South. Madam Premier.

Thank you, and thank you, Member, for giving the examples. You're absolutely right. One thing that I would like to say, within our definition of how we would do it, we do talk about Makerspaces. There are a lot of artists in our smaller communities. That will help them as well.

The other thing is that a lot of times these mandates overlap. We talk about increasing childcare spaces. In that way, we're talking about our income support and housing policies that say you can't operate childcare in your house. Those will bring employment in. If we need to deal with the lack of childcare in some of these small communities, we open up the housing policies that say now you can provide licensed childcare provision in your home. Those are small community jobs that will stay there; they're sustainable. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Madam Premier. Member for Hay River South.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I agree. Thank you.

Thank you. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I want to say that I was really pleased about the amending of the policy to the NWT Housing Corporation to allow appropriate home business opportunities with their units. I mentioned during our roundtable before we were assigned our portfolios that we have to help those single parents out there. This is a perfect one. I talked a little bit about humanizing our policies. This is it here. This made me really happy. I am glad that we are moving in that direction, and hopefully we see more of that from the department of housing and the department of health, but that's another battle.

When I look at this, I try to visualize a struggling single parent in their home. The kids are asleep, and they're on the computer, and they're trying to work out their next big thing. I look at these business opportunities for people within their units, and who knows? The next Amazon, the next Apple, the next big idea could be happening in one of those living rooms, and this is an opportunity that made me happy. That's the idealist coming out of me. This is a good start. I want to say I am very happy about that.

My question is to the Premier. I want to talk a bit about the distributions of 125 jobs. We have a breakdown of our KPI, our key performance indicators, from the fall 2020 to fall 2023, but there really isn't a breakdown by region. I know each of us in our own regions, especially for us in the small communities, you know, we could still be jobs alone in our communities, so that's something I think that should be addressed a little more. I will ask the Premier: how is do you project this is going to look by region?

Thank you, Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh. Madam Premier.

Thank you, Madam Chair. This is pretty conservative. Again, I realize that some people are going to be judging us in two years on the mandate to see if it's accomplished or changed, and other people are going to be judging us and trying to take us out of our seats, so I purposely have done that. I know that; that's fair.

There is no way, actually, to say that we will have ten jobs in this one and ten jobs in that one. Once we open up just the public housing alone, it might just flood. We've got people, I know, that are making slippers. I'm going to be careful here, because I buy my wood from Behchoko, and I hide every time the wood is delivered. Once we make these legal, who knows what's going to come out? I think it would be inappropriate to actually give it a number and say this much per region. I want to see as much as possible. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Madam Premier.

Madam Chair, I think the Minister might have an answer. Do you have an answer? Okay, she's going to give you an answer of how many per community.