Thank you. Thank you, Member from Frame Lake. Mr. Testart.

Oh, thank you, Madam Chair. I was just reminding colleagues that you may speak twice to an item if the chair allows. But once my time is sorted out on the clock, I will begin.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, who likes ice cream? I think you'll find most people do. It takes a real curmudgeonly character to not enjoy a sweet treat. And much like that sentiment with this mandate, there's a lot to like in here. It's an aspirational document that speaks to how the government is going to take the priorities of this Assembly seriously and deliver on them. What it's short on is detail and tangible outcomes, and that is largely my issue with this document. I look to the business plans, which the previous Speaker, my friend from Frame Lake, spoke to is 280 pages. And within those pages, you will find concrete and tangible outcomes. There are some spending targets and commitments identified. There are timelines for legislation. There are numbers of houses to be built, those kind of details. Without that, this document remains comfortably in the stratosphere of an aspirational document, which is fine to have. I think these kind of documents are important, this kind of language is important, and to remain hopeful and collaborative is important as well. But is it useful as a priority setting document? I don't think so. I think it's pretty clear we have -- we worked collaboratively to develop those priorities, and what we want to see is tangible outcomes to make them a reality so we can go back to our constituents and say this is what this government did. If I go back to someone now and say, you know, we've increased investment certainty and create opportunities for the private sector by streamlining administrative processes and ensuring regulatory systems and decision-making are consistent, efficient, and predictable, that's a nice principle to have, but how do we do that? What is the what? You know, that's the objective; how are we going to get there? And we still don't -- and the answer is in those business plans, and that's what requires more scrutiny, I think, from this House to really see if we're achieving these things. And I guess when we speak to process, because process is important to any government and any governing institution and certainly legislative institution as well, we have to -- I have to ask, is this the best process for this Assembly? If this isn't a really useful accountability tool, if it's not a useful tool for setting mandates, because you can already -- we're already setting mandates through business plans and mandate letters, then what is it really? And I think we could have skipped this step and gone straight into the business plans or straight into the mandate letters. And I'm just concerned that if we continue on this path, you know, we have this commitment to take more risks, we're going to see a government that creates a risk secretariat that's going to evaluate risks and give the government policy guidance on what risks to take and what risks not to take, and we're going to establish a new process for that. We need to just govern. We need to just give, you know, a clear Budget Address that has these priorities in it that shows how we're going to invest in them, and then, you know, ask Members to support it. And yeah, so I just wish we would be a little less cautious in even how we go about the business here. It's taken us a long time to get to this point and, you know, we're still waiting to pass our first real budget that's going to have tangible outcomes. And I don't think everyone's happy with that budget. So it's going to take negotiation. It's going to take back and forth. I think we're slow on that process as well. And, you know, the clock is counting down, not just on my time but on our time in this Assembly as well. So I want to see us succeed. I want to see us work together to succeed. But I also want to make sure we're maximizing our time effectively. And I think sometimes we get bogged down in process like this when we could just be moving forward with something more concrete and tangible.

So that being said, I support everything that's in here a hundred percent but I do want to see the how, the why, the what, how we're going to achieve these things, and that -- for me, this document leaves more questions than answers. So I look forward to tomorrow's review of business plans and we'll have more to say about that. But until then, I think I've said everything that needs to be said from my perspective on this document. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member from Range Lake. Is there any other Member that would like to speak? Inuvik Boot Lake.

Thank you, Madam Chair. And thank you, Premier and Cabinet, for the mandate, issuing the mandate, tabling the mandate. I appreciate the work that's been done on it. I concur with some of what's been said with my colleagues in that, you know, it's great to have the mandate, I support the mandate, it is a good document, it's a high-level document, but as we know where the rubber hits the road will be in the business plans. And that's where we -- as we said, we have things that are deliverable and measurable and things we can look to do to what we need to do to get our work done. And, you know, I get it, like everyone gets it. There's only so much budget to go around. There's only so many things we can do and, you know, we all -- there's many things in there that we know we need to get done, and I appreciate that we're looking at that over four years. I appreciate that the Premier has his 50-year plan as well which, you know, I know we want to look to where we have to get in the future.

You know, having said that, I mean, the government -- I mean, to set that path to prosperity, I guess, we need to continue to look outside the box. We need to continue to look at different solutions. I like that in there you see a lot of working with Indigenous governments, with NGOs, and municipal governments. I think it's so important, as I've said previously to, you know, to look at redundancies and where we're spending our money and where money can be spent otherwise. Look at, you know, opportunities to access funding that maybe we would not have been able to access, you know, without that. So I think that's also very important and that we continue that. We sat around as 19 of us before we sat in this House, and we talked about those things. We met for two days with the Indigenous governments, and we talked about those things, about how we can look at redundancies and how we can think outside the box. You know, so I think it's -- and I've stated that many times.

I've spoken many times about our whole-of-community approach. Well, I think that also, you know, translates in the whole-of-government approach, not only us working together as a consensus government and doing what we need to do and working with other governments as well within our territory. You know, and we'll touch on this in the business plans a little more tomorrow but looking at the economy, we need revenue, we need to grow. You know, we need to look, again, outside the box, ways we can grow. And, you know, one of my colleagues talked about people. It's very important, about recruitment, about getting people that -- getting people to work in the territory and getting people that are working outside the territory potentially back in the territory. And I think that's so very important for us. And not just for -- you know, people talk about the transfer payments but for the other things, the income tax, the work that -- you know, the work that people do, the rent they pay, the groceries they buy, the hockey coaches they provide, those things are all important to us as a territory as well.

As I said previously -- sorry, I just lost my thought. One second. Yes, that whole-of-community approach.

Anyway, Madam Chair, when we do get to the business plans tomorrow, we'll be able to discuss some more of that and we'll look at, again, talking about the economy. You know, we don't touch on things that are happening in the territory. We need to focus on, things that what's happening in my region where the Inuvialuit are leading the charge on developing natural gas up there. And as we know, you know, we have the third largest reserves of natural gas in the world and, you know, we rarely -- that's kind of something we hardly hear spoke about here. We talk about the mining industry, which is super important to us, but there's also other industries full of potential here. The world still needs natural gas, you know, we still need that product yet for a while so it's important, I think, that we look at that. We look at the Inuvik satellite station in Inuvik and the things that are going on there, things like that, outside the box, thinking that can provide some of that revenue for our government.

So, yeah, I think I will leave it at that. Again, thank you. As my colleague from Range Lake has said, I support this document. I appreciate the document, but much work to be done, and I look forward to going through the business plans. Thank you.

Thank you, Member from Inuvik Boot Lake. Any other Members? Seeing no more -- Member from Yellowknife Centre.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. I was trying to decide if I wanted to speak to the mandate or not. I mean, you heard largely what my colleagues had said and -- I mean, just working backwards, I mean, it's really tough to disagree with this. I mean, because the statements are so high -- high level. You know, I often feel that the public wants more and expects more, and this is the fault of consensus government, which is we can't be specific. And the only reason we can't be specific is because it's us. We choose to be that way.

If I was in charge of a mandate by myself or was able to sort of, like, pry my Members -- colleagues to agree, I mean, we'd say simply, as I said earlier today in my statement, which is, you know, we would mandate a hundred new homes for social housing. You know, and we'd work towards that goal. We would commit the forces, like a team, an army, to meet these challenges. We'd say, for example, today we're going to -- we're going to work to get 150 kilometers of the Mackenzie Valley Highway done by the end of this term. And to me, those are the types of things that the public's looking for.

I mean, if I was to quote President George Bush, I mean, I'd say mission accomplished with this little chuckle, because the mandate itself looks like it's largely completed already. And the problem is the Cabinet's hearing this as a criticism, but it's not a criticism. The problem is these things are written as so wide. I mean, you know, better streamlined admin process, engage public, I mean we do that every day now. You know, sometimes better, sometimes worse. But in all fairness, we do this, you know, open transparent government. I mean, we try those things. We do those things. I mean, none of this is new. That's the problem. I mean, every government, including the ones, the 21st Assembly, etcetera, and on and on and on, will be struggling with the same phrases. How do we break free from the static position of -- you know, of -- the static truth of mandates, which is they're just -- they're statements that, you know, nothing is groundbreaking. I mean, I -- I'm not advocating for party politics but, you know, when a government comes into force, I mean, it says I'm going to make highways, or I'm going to set up a bottle depot in every community, or -- in the sense of recycling. And -- or we're going to build more houses. And this is how many we're going to build. And that's the problem with this process, is we don't -- you know, we're almost afraid of our shadow to make those commitments. And I don't know why that it continues to be this way. I mean, I can keep advocating for more, be specific, and I will -- will continue to advocate. But it's an unfortunate symptom of the way we do work. I mean, I believe in empowering the Premier to lead the Cabinet, but we don't do it that way. I believe, and they should be able to make decisions, but yet we -- we tie ourselves up into these ball of yarns that are fought over by kittens so they're quite a mess, unable to follow a line of decision-making and process and getting free. I mean, it's such a tangled web of confusion sometimes. And what do we do? We further hit ourselves with more policy and process.

I mean, the general public, I find in my experience, you know, wanted to hear things like we're going to build two more addiction centres by the end of this term. Like, I'm serious. That specific. You know, they would like to hear that. And I know we can't do everything for everybody, but that's the reality of government, which is you try your best, but at least try to -- try.

I don't think my point on another 150 kilometers of Mackenzie Valley being built -- you know, if we only did 149, I don't think people would be angry with us. I think they would be inspired by our blaze and trail of call to action, you know. I mean, when I hear deliver equitable access to sustainable primary health care, I mean that is every day. I mean, I can't imagine someone not attempting to deliver equitable access to sustainable primary care. I mean, it's just -- it's hard to imagine that that isn't the case. And it's frustrating because, like I say, when I talk to people, they want to hear specifics. They want to hear that there is a call to action and one that they can measure us -- every one of us against. And for better or for worse, it at least helps inspires us. Because, I mean, if we said we were going to build another hundred public housing units to help people and, you know, that would be an easy way to rally behind because, I mean, we'd be looking to the left of us and saying how do we help and get this darn thing done, and we'd be looking to the right and say how do we get those things done, and, you know, you do your part because we're all going to do it. But now it's just, well, we're going to work together. That's the mandate. And that's really what it says.

I mean, the last two speakers are right. I mean, of course they support this. I mean, who doesn't support working on addressing the effects of trauma. But, you know -- as an example, or emergency management. Who doesn't support any of these things? I mean, it's impossible not to support them. But, again, Madam Chairperson, you know, the challenge, like I say, is that I think it's -- it largely would be -- it shouldn't be taken personal, and it's not intended to be personal, but, I mean, the public really is frustrated by these challenges, which is what does it really say? And what does it really mean? And what does it really deliver? And for me to go back to them or speak to them at my constituency meeting -- which, by the way, is at 6:30 tonight for all those listening, at Javaroma -- until 8:30. And I mean, the reality is they want to know and be able to sink their teeth into something. And to that, I see the ultimate frustration of, you know, what are politicians really saying, what are they accomplishing, what are they doing? I have nothing to measure them by. And then when it comes polling day, you know, they just -- they're rating you on your personality basically as opposed to the government. Or they're mad at the government and blaming Regular Members, which is often I've seen the case. The government doing this, and it must be your fault. But if you read this, I mean, we've already done it, I mean --

So Madam Chair, yes, I support the public safety initiative statements. I support all the statements. I can run through them all but I don't think I'll do that. So I just say I support them all. I mean, it's hard not to. And that's the frustration about the mandate, is that we've waited over six months to see statements that don't have specifics. And I know if I had my way, like I say, I mean, the government would pick five or six areas, target them very precisely, and show the public we're going to rise to the challenge and if we don't rise, we're darn -- we're going to darnedest do our best. And to that, I suspect every one of us in this room will be rewarded with either the big cheers or good support, at least emotionally, with our communities for having the best interests -- their best interests in our hearts. And that really in some ways is a lot of the work we do here.

So I am going to say that's all I have to say right now. But, of course, I reserve my right to reflect differently in a different direction as I spur -- as the moment spurs or as other Members inspire. So thank you, Madam Chairperson. And good luck on measuring these things. Cheers.

Thank you, Member from Yellowknife Centre. Member from Monfwi.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, when Premier made his speech at the beginning, you know, balance the budget and to build good working relationship with Indigenous government, settling outstanding land claims, etcetera, I liked that. You know, and I'm sure I'm not the only one that, you know, was pleased with that statement. There's a lot of other First Nations that didn't settle their land claims were also pleased as well, you know. So which is a good start. I like that. You know, but this mandate here, there's nine pages, and they are right, it is very vague. You know, here, access to health care, deliver equitable access to sustainable primary care in all NWT communities, not in all -- you know, like, I mean, there are going to be some communities -- like, how would you accommodate for a community like Wekweeti, you know? So not every one of them. It's -- there's not going -- we're not going to have this equitable access, you know. So it's just that how they're going to do this is one of the things that kind of missing in the mandate. But I know it's in the business plan, but it's very long. And, you know, something like this, where the mandate, like, nine pages, but it's just that it would have been nice if -- you know, if it was more explanation and details of how they're going to do it. So I have no issues, it's just that it's -- I know this turnaround, this government is doing something different, which we didn't have this mandate, we didn't have this business plan, but we had the main estimate. So main estimate, that's where we ask all those questions. But I guess now that, you know, tomorrow it's -- tomorrow we're going to be discussing that tomorrow and we'll look into it more.

But even with the housing, you know, like, I mean, to -- to end homelessness, especially in small communities -- in larger centre, yes, there's -- more of our people are moving to larger centre because to have a better life. We can have that in small communities if we were -- if we had access to more program and services if we had more housing, you know, because there's not too many people in the small communities where homelessness should not be an issue. And it doesn't say that in here too, you know, that -- they talk about the homelessness, but it's mostly in regional centre, not in small communities. So I do have issues with that.

And mental health services, you know, like, we do have lots of issues there.

And public safety, it talked about here, law enforcement, you know. In small communities, like Gameti, they don't have RCMP. They've been asking for -- to ensure public safety, they do need an RCMP or law enforcement, any kind of -- or law enforcement, some form of law enforcement in that community, and Wekweeti too as well. It's not just them, but there are other communities that are lacking that services. So it would have been nice how, you know, like, they're going to be focusing on crime prevention.

In small communities, there's lots of issues. There's lots of -- we lack a lot of recreation activities. There's not much to do for our young people. So all they do is just -- you know, the only activities that most of these community have is the school activities. There's nothing outside of school in some of the communities. So we do need more, and it would have been nice if that was identified in here too as well, you know, because -- and lately, the crime has been happening due to drug related. So it's just that -- I do like what I see here, but it's just that it would have been nice if it was explained more in detail.

I don't want to talk down the clock, but I think I'm sure there are other Members here that want to talk as well. But I do like what the Premier -- you know, the Premier said in his statement before that, you know, Indigenous government, Indigenous people, having good relation -- good working relationship with them is more important for us, especially from the small communities. So that's all I wanted to say. Thank you.

Thank you, Member of Monfwi. Premier.

Thank you. And thank you, everyone, for the comments; I do appreciate it. I know that this is a departure from previous mandates of this government and of other mandates that you would see in a system where there's a political party who can bring together their apparatus, come up with a plan, and lay that out on day one.

The reason that this mandate is sparse in terms of actual deliverables is because I've seen two mandates prior to this government. I've been involved with the Assembly for two previous terms, and each of those mandates had hundreds -- I think the first one had hundreds, the second one had maybe 170, commitments in there, and they were specific commitments. And I did not find that to be a great way to -- I guess to govern. I didn't find that to be the most useful document. As a Regular Member, I rarely ever referred to that mandate. If there were issues in my constituency, I would speak with businesses or constituents and, over time, I would determine whether or not things had gotten better by how people interacted with the system. If people's problems were never solved, then I knew things weren't getting better. You can really get a sense of how things are operating and how the government is doing just through the day-to-day business of being an MLA. So I wasn't too concerned about deliverables in here -- or sorry, measurements in here. But as the Members point out, it is in the mandate -- or in the business plans.

In terms of, you know, these areas being broad, yes, some of them are very broad. So it was mentioned the health care commitment to deliver equitable access to suitable primary health care. And that's one of only four commitments under that area. And so what that does, to me, it says if you're going to bring forward something about health care, you want to -- you bring forward a program or an ask, it better be focused on ensuring equitable access to primary health care. So it's a way to filter out some of the other things that the government does that perhaps don't focus on the priorities of the Assembly.

Similarly, there's comments in there about streamlining administrative processes. So if a program is coming forward, it better have streamlined administrative processes. If there's an initiative, it better be reducing a regulatory burden.

So as much as what we're going to do, this is a signal to the government of what we're not going to do. We're not going to do the same things. We're going to bring forward initiatives that are in line with this mandate. And so it is different. I didn't want to do the same thing. I didn't want to tie this government to initiatives that were created within the first month or two after the priorities were developed because it was only three months ago that the priorities of the Assembly were set. So I know we've been here six months, but it hasn't been six months that we've had the priorities to develop this mandate.

So I won't say much more, but I do look forward to working with the Members and Cabinet and Indigenous government partners, as was pointed out, to really flesh out what we're going to do and how we're going to do it. And we're going to do it by working together. Thank you.

Thank you, Premier. Yellowknife North.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I do make a daily goal for myself of not going other my time limit, and I failed once again. Maybe tomorrow. I just had a few sentences left.

So I was just going to say that I appreciate the renewed emphasis under addressing the effects of trauma. On on the land healing and wellness supports and aftercare support, but there are still some significant gaps in the spectrum of mental health and addictions supports that I think we need to talk more about, including harm reduction and stabilization, including managed alcohol programs, and also medically supported detox facilities, which there's not nearly enough a capacity for in this territory.

And just to conclude, when we embarked on this process of setting priorities, I, like many others, wanted to see a strategic plan type document with measurable and outcome-oriented goals. Now, we didn't get there with the priorities or with the mandate, and you could argue that a strategic plan was not ever going to be part of these documents. It turns out that there are many stages along the way, which is fine, as long as it all nests together and leads us ultimately to that strategic plan. Unfortunately, so far I see a major disconnect between this mandate and the business plan but I'll speak more to that tomorrow. So thank you, Madam Chair, for letting me finish my statement.

Thank you, Member from Yellowknife North. Frame Lake, Member for Frame Lake.

Thank you, Madam Chair, for indulging a second round. And I just wanted to quickly kind of provide my closing comments here. So just a couple more points.

I mean, as I spoke to earlier, I appreciated Cabinet kind of listening to our comments, and I certainly saw mine reflected in the updated mandate document, so I appreciate them listening. And I wanted to highlight just a few things.

One is the statement on page 2 about strengthening collaborations between departments. It goes on to talk about fostering a sense of purpose and well-being and empowering, performance, and excellence and innovation in our staff. There's another bullet point, on page 3, empowering the public service by ensuring they are provided the flexibility to deliver programs and honouring the GNWT's commitments to openness, transparency, and accountability. So those statements, I just wanted to highlight those because I wanted to note that some of those things, I think, some people would say are a pretty monumental shift in how the GNWT does business. And that is something that I was advocating for. I noted in my comments on the mandate that I wanted to see us speak to -- let's see here.

I was talking about things like implementing results-based management systems, program measure measurement, a reference to changing management structure and practice to better facilitate employee empowerment and engagement. So I was hoping to see specifics like that. And also a commitment to improving workplace morale and employee satisfaction. I would note, unfortunately, that workplace morale and employee satisfaction has been noted to be fairly low in recent surveys of staff. So I just wanted to point out these statements and say that they're very nice to see and hear, and it remains to be seen that we are going to remain committed to these and ensure that we actually implement them with policies, with changes to how things are down, with shifts in the way management is done at the GNWT. And I think those, as I said, would be quite monumental shifts, and I think they'd be very appreciated by a lot of people, including myself, because I think these shifts are one of the keys to ensuring that these mandate commitments actually get implemented.

So I'm just going to share some closing comments that I shared with Cabinet when we were in caucus. I wanted to make the comments publicly also.

Let's be bold. Let's take risks. I think we all know that we're facing major challenges during the term of this Assembly and that status quo is not acceptable, nor will it get us where we need to go. And so I want to encourage Cabinet to take those risks. You've spoken to it in the mandate, and I want to see you do it on the ground.

With regard to the relationship between Regular Members and Cabinet, I think that we often see the differences between our two sides, but the distinction is much less significant for the public who put us in here. I think people judge our success as an Assembly based on the successes and operations of the government. So your success is our success. And I want us to be working together, like you've said, to achieve that.

I also want to speak to kind of just the specific work of MLAs. I want as much as possible our committee projects to align with the mandate and help investigate and make recommendations as to how we can improve our ability to achieve it. So that's my commitment back to Cabinet, is that when working on the Regular MLA side, we'll be scoping out our projects and doing projects that relate to either mandate or business plan items, things that either we have expertise in or we think need an extra lens on to ensure that we are actually making good on some of these commitments, because this is a very ambitious list of tasks and we have a very short period of time to achieve them.

What I want to see from Cabinet is strong leadership to ensure that the bureaucracy is implementing what we're talking about in this room on the ground, particularly with regards to working collaboratively, helping people, ensuring that people perceive the change we're talking about here in their communities and in their interactions with the government.

So that's pretty much -- that's pretty much it from me is -- and when I speak to strong leadership, what I mean is are we seeing change that we're talking about here actually implemented. And so some of you will notice that I haven't been providing questions ahead of time as much as I was in the first session, and that's -- I was saying to one of the Ministers earlier that one of the reasons for that is I want to know what the Ministers are bringing to the table in terms of leadership to these departments. And so I do want to hear the Minister's voice, not just the department's voice when we're asking questions. And so having taken five minutes already, I think I'll leave my comments at that. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member from Frame Lake. Seeing no more comments, thank you, committee. Do you agree that you have concluded consideration of Tabled Document 67-20(1)?

Thank you, committee. We have concluded consideration of Tabled Document 67-20(1). Member for Inuvik Boot Lake.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I move that the chair rise and report progress.

There's a motion on the floor to report progress. The motion is in order and non-debatable. All those in favour? All those opposed? The motion is carried.

---Carried

I will now rise and report progress.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, your committee has been considering Tabled Document 67-20(1) and would like to report progress.

Thank you, Member for the Dehcho. Do I have a seconder for the report of Committee of the Whole? Member from Frame Lake. Thank you. The motion is in order and is non-debatable. All those in favour? All those opposed? All those abstaining? The motion has been carried, and the report of Committee of the Whole has been concurred with.

---Carried

Thank you. Third reading of bills. Mr. Clerk, orders of the day.

Thank you, Mr. Clerk. The House stands adjourned until Tuesday, May 28, 2024, at 1:30 p.m.

---ADJOURNMENT

The House adjourned at 5:02 p.m.