Thank you. Perhaps I could ask the deputy minister to answer. Thanks.

Thank you, Minister. Deputy minister.

Thank you, deputy minister. Member for Kam Lake.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and I see my time is dwindling, so I will be very quick. One of the things that happened is that I, like probably many people, have a lot of essential workers who live in the constituency that I serve. A lot of them were nurses and had to work 12-hour shifts. They ended up, some of them, losing their childcare, and they had to either hire high school students to step in for them, for their children who were no longer in school, or they had to bring family up from down South at a significant cost to their families. There was a fund that was set aside for essential workers that they were not able to tap into if their children were not in a licensed day home, and so, if this money was set aside, or some of it was set aside, for essential workers in order to be able to help them. Some of them had bills all of a sudden upwards of $3,000 for their family, and so that was quite significant. That is an extreme concern for some of the people who live in Kam Lake, was all of a sudden bills went up and there wasn't a way for them to tap into that fund. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member. Minister.

Thank you. The money was distributed to the day homes and childcare centres that ECE has contribution agreements with. It was not designed to provide support to situations like the Member is describing. In a perfect world, there would be enough childcare spaces with enough availability that no one would have to worry about it, but it was a unique situation. We put the resources we had in the places we thought it would help the most. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Member for Great Slave.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I don't have, really, too many questions for the Minister or the department. I just wanted to say that this is an area that, in the future, should he be looking to increase funding, I would be well in support of. There are lot of studies around the first five years, how the brain is forming for infants and children. Once they already have reached later education parts, they may already have been set up to fail or to have challenges. That's just more of a comment, that I would like to see a real push to have some of this increased and sort of echoing the comments of my colleagues about flexibility and access to funding. Again, trying to figure out a way that we can be flexible and adaptable when it comes to stuff around the building codes, et cetera, for some of these spaces. I am assuming there are some restrictions or regulations that make it prohibitive for people to have homes or to take in one or two kids to their homes. More just comments than anything. Thank you.

Thank you. Did you want to respond, Minister?

Sure, and I thank the Member for her support. I agree; if we want to make a difference in the long-term future of the territory, this is the place to invest the money. Jurisdictions that have universal childcare programs, they see returns on their investment. I think Quebec sees probably a $6 return, or something, for every dollar they spend. Don't quote me on that, but I think it's in the neighbourhood. I agree. I'll just leave it at that. I appreciate the Member's support, and I share some of her concerns, as well. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Any further questions? Member for Thebacha.

Thank you, Madam -- I was going to say Speaker. Madam Chair. It's getting late.

---Laughter

I want to go back to the childcare subsidy. I listened to some of my colleagues, and talking about 12-hour shifts and for people who could afford to probably pay the daycare. I also believe in universal daycare but when the time comes. In the meantime, there are low-income students of the future polytechnic university who have to pay the regular daycare as it is if they are going to go to school or otherwise. This is one area that I feel should be based on the threshold based on income, and the childcare subsidy should go to future polytechnic university students who should be subsidized. I think that's the way it should go because we are also trying to make sure that we get the education and the knowledge department much to the level that we want and, to me, that only makes sense. I also wanted to ask, Madam Chair, for him to comment on that first, maybe. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member. Minister.

Thank you, and I appreciate the Member's comments. While it would be great to offer everyone free or heavily subsidized childcare, perhaps the money could be better spent in a more focused approach. I know the federal government has announced quite a bit of money for training, and perhaps that's an opportunity to expand some of our early learning training programs at the college and create some sort of partnerships whereby we can use that to add additional childcare. There is nothing solid in place right now, though; I can confirm that. This is a very fast-moving file, and it seems to have picked up speed recently. While there is nothing right now, who knows what the future holds. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Member.

Madam Chair, $60 a day for daycare at, say, any childcare facility or anything like that is a lot for a polytechnic student. First of all, they don't get very much in financial assistance, and so then they are trying to manage both things or they have to bring grandma in. That's why I want to ensure that the childcare subsidy to future polytechnic university students is a priority with this Minister. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member. Minister.

Thank you. I recognize that it is something that is needed, given the demographic makeup of Aurora College students and a lot of the income levels in the territory. It is a priority. It doesn't have a budget line associated with it right now, but I recognize the need and hope to be able to make some inroads in the next few years on that. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Member.

Madam Chair, I was looking at the active positions on page 43. You have 11 positions in headquarters and then one, one, one in each region. This is a good area, also, because we are all very concerned about early childcare. We should at least add one to each region, one more position to the South Slave and one to the Sahtu and one to the Beaufort-Delta. I would appreciate, in future planning, that the Minister consider this change. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member. Minister.

Thank you. If we succeed in increasing childcare spaces across the territory, I expect that we will see a number of positions spring up in different communities throughout the territory, not necessarily GNWT positions, but definitely employment opportunities. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Member.