Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll wait until the next section.

MLA O'Reilly.

Yeah, thanks, Mr. Chair. I want to go to some of the comments from two previous speakers. You know, it was great to get the Minister's statement on changes to income security on February the 27th but there was like a "what we heard" report. But I guess I'm hoping that there's kind of like a report that says "what we're going to do" because there was a lot in there and just not many people pay attention to what happens in here. So I think there's a real need to communicate. Look, that was a very big piece of work. Lots of good changes, things that I've had complained to me by constituents for years, so hats off for getting the work done. And I think you need to toot your own horn a lot louder on it. So I know you got a news release out today about this. That's good. Keep it rolling. But put it together in a comprehensive way.

So I want to turn now to the budget here. So I see that there's an increase in income assistance program funding on page 48. And it's a big increase, and so it should be. 2022-2023 Revised Estimates 38.9; 2023-2024 Main Estimates $44 million. So that's like a -- if I do my math quickly, $5 million increase. That's a lot of money. And that's good. I support it. But how did you calculate that amount? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Mahsi. Minister.

Thank you. We looked at the program, thought about what we'd like to do with the program, and then figured out how much it would cost, and then figured out how much we might actually be able to get. And that's really the way we do everything, is we shoot for the stars and then we get chopped down, you know, at each stage until we wind up with the number that we can get through all of the various stages. Thank you.

MLA O'Reilly.

It sounds like a thrashing machine. Thanks, Mr. Chair. Yeah, well, presumably there's obviously some work in here about okay, if people are not going to have IBA payments deducted from income assistance, you got some sort of way of calculating that. If people are, you know, they're not going to lose income assistance because they lose a job. There's got to be some way of kind of predicting some of these costs. Is that the kind of work that went into calculating this? And more specifically, does this amount also include the benefits for seniors that are going to be rolled into this bigger program? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Mahsi. Minister.

Thank you. And yes, I know my last answer might not have been perhaps as serious as the Member was looking for. But that's what we are doing. We looked at every benefit that we wanted to offer and we costed those out based on the historical realities. We looked -- we removed a number of barriers as well. And so, you know, income assistance clients won't be cut off for certain things anymore. And there is a cost attached to that as well. So we did look at those costs and we factored those in. We looked at the -- exempting all of these, say the IBA payments, things like that, and we costed that out. So, yes, every item in here was costed out. Believe me, I know that, you know, sometimes these numbers just appear here but it is a very, very rigorous time-consuming and resource-heavy exercise to come up with these programs and justify every dollar that we want to spend and then that's analyzed within the department, that's analyzed by the Department of Finance, and then it's analyzed here in the House. Thank you.

MLA O'Reilly.

Yeah, okay, no, thanks; I just wanted to make sure that that's what this number reflects and that the seniors stuff is in here. That's good. Good work. And thanks for sneaking it by your Cabinet colleagues.

Student financial assistance, there's an increase in here to the grants on page 49, and the Finance Minister in the budget addressed -- actually said some of this stuff about how the basic -- and I'm quoting, "the basic grant for northern Indigenous students to fully cover the average cost of tuition, books, and supplies and eliminate their 12-semester limit for the basic grants." Is that included in here? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Minister.

Yes, it is. Thank you.

MLA O'Reilly.

Mr. Chair, the other thing that was said is that proposing an increase to the basic grant for non-Indigenous students who were schooled in the territory to assist with 80 percent of the average cost of tuition, books, and supplies. Is that found in here as well? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Mahsi. Minister.

Yes, that is found in there as well. We've increased the supplementary grant and the remissible loan to that 80 percent threshold, and that's included in there. We've tied those numbers to the market basket measure for food and shelter. So there is something that, you know, we can always refer back to. It's not an arbitrary number. We've removed the number of semesters that Indigenous students can receive the supplementary grant, and that's costed out in there as well. We have looked -- yes, we've also looked at the student suspension. So if a student currently doesn't complete 60 percent of a full course load, they are suspended from income assistance. I don't think we need to -- or sorry, SFA. I don't think we need to punish students for trying. And so we have removed that barrier as well and costed that out. There's also an increase for study grant for students with disabilities so that we are now aligned with the Canada Student Loan Program in terms of the amounts available through that stream. Thank you.

Mahsi. MLA O'Reilly.

Thanks. It was almost like a Minister's statement. All good news. No, seriously, that's good stuff.

I have had one Yellowknife resident who is non-Indigenous ask about why the removal of the 12 semester limit for basic grants is only being done for Indigenous students. Have you looked at -- is that federal money or why is it limited to Indigenous students? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Mahsi. Minister.

Thank you. As it was one of our efforts to advance reconciliation. Thank you.

Mahsi. Mr. O'Reilly.

Thanks. Has the department calculated what it would cost to do that for, say, P2 students? Thanks, Mr. Chair. And what I mean by P2 is students that are actually born in the Northwest Territories. Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Mahsi. Minister.