Thank you, Madam Chair. Yeah, without reiterating everything that my colleague said, I also found this to be a very frustrating and disappointing bill to work on. I do also appreciate, though, that there has been the back and forth with the department and to try and come to some sort of a solution here. But I can't help be left feeling like this is yet again another instance of where a federal program or a federal idea, federal funding, is being pushed on us without proper advocacy from the government to the federal government to understand that it just doesn't work for us here. And there's been a real sense of division created through this bill between parents and providers, between day cares and day home providers, between the department and the providers. And as such, the minimal effects of this bill, or really what's going to be done by this bill in the limited scope, was not worth the damage, I feel, that it's created here. All I hear daily is of people looking for child care spaces. And then I hear there's supposed to be more coming and this is all going to be great, and it's going to help. And yet daily people are telling me about day homes that are closing or how, you know, as soon as they get pregnant, they need to start looking for someplace to put their child and such. And then I hear not only from providers of day homes but also the day care association itself that this doesn't work for them. So then I have to wonder when the department is making statements that everyone's on board and everybody is good and it's going to really have this great effect, but yet all the people executing the work are telling me that's not the case. I find myself in a terrible position of having to figure out who's telling me the truth and given my history in this House, I think I know who is. So my concern here is by passing this legislation in which -- there's even things around complaint processes that, you know, have nothing to do with the federal funding in which this bill was put through under or that was sort of the impetus for it. So when I see that the department is looking to establish a quasi-judicial type system that allows a GNWT employee at a director level to be making decisions about people's livelihoods, I feel it's a very gross overstep of government reach. And I also look at it like when I look at who the providers are, it's women. There's many women of colour. With allegations of that coming from the department as well, that there's been specific targeting of people. You know, I just have to look and question why we're even talking about this bill at this point. Yeah, so I think I'll wrap it up there. But I feel that this has been a, I would say, a complete failure of a legislative process. And, yeah, I'm disappointed with it. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Katrina Nokleby on Committee Motion 394-19(2): Concurrence Motion - Tabled Document 813-19(2): Main Estimates 2023-2024, Carried
In the Legislative Assembly on March 28th, 2023. See this statement in context.
Committee Motion 394-19(2): Concurrence Motion - Tabled Document 813-19(2): Main Estimates 2023-2024, Carried
Consideration In Committee Of The Whole Of Bills And Other Matters
March 28th, 2023
Page 5964
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