Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you for your indulgence in allowing us an extra kind of -- to finish up our statements. I will try to be quick like I was yesterday.

So I left off on ITI and speaking to the economic vision. And just a few thoughts on that. I think I would like to see a timeline. I'd like to see that timeline be short and towards the beginning of this Assembly as opposed to toward the end. If we need to develop a vision, if we need to be implementing a vision, I want us to be implementing that vision, you know, today, and if not today, as quickly as possible, because I think if we're halfway through our term by the time we get a vision in order, it's not going to help us be strategic in our decision-making.

I also want to note about that, like, being strategic in our decision-making, if the vision that comes back is simply that we're going to do everything, I think that we haven't established a vision. The point of the vision is that we're going to have to be focused. We're going to have to make some decisions about what we are and are not doing, the direction that we're taking this territory, and I would really hope that that -- those decisions are based on evidence that we've collected and information that we use to make informed decisions about what's going to work, that we have evidence to support that.

And I think, again, I'm just going to note in this department, a lot of the measurables in here aren't outcome-based. Again, it's numbers of meetings held. This doesn't really tell us what we're achieving. It tells us what we're doing. But you could hold a lot of meetings and not achieve anything in any of them, so what are we looking to achieve in the meetings? Again, there's also kind of speaking in the business plan to supporting a diverse range of economic activities. But, again, what do we mean by this? I think that we need to be targeted and specific. There's some activities that certainly have more value than others. If we simply support everything, we're not really being strategic in the money that we're investing, we're not being strategic in this the directions that we're going.

Specifically in support for arts, again, I'd like to see us -- and this comment stands for the way that we fund NGOs also, but I want to speak to the arts specifically on this. I'd like to see us shift to more of an ecosystem-based approach to our thinking on how we're funding the arts. Recognizing that the number of artists or organizations funded doesn't actually tell us anything about the health of the sector, return on investment that we're getting. And recognition that arts is about culture also. It's not just about kind of growing industry, but that in some cases successful arts organizations are able to leverage a lot of federal funding. And that's not necessarily based on sales. It's based on the activity and the cultural heritage that they're developing. So I think we need to take a bit of a more holistic view of the arts and just note that -- you know, actually, I'm going to save my comments for a Member's statement about the ecosystem approach. But just noting that core funding for organizations is how we build up sectors. If we're just funding individual artists all over the place, we don't necessarily build the sector in a way that makes it sustainable and self-sustaining and give us that multiplier effect of the way funding can be -- the return on investment can be increased.

I'll share some short comments on Infrastructure's business plan. As the previous Speaker mentioned, we're being urged to pick a project. I think this is a wider discussion and -- but bottom line, I just want to note that there is a big disconnect between what we say we're planning to do and what we have the fiscal capacity to implement, and I feel like I'm, of course, preaching to the choir here. I mean, we've been -- the government's been telling us this since pretty much day one. But have we really stepped back and looked at some of these projects strategically and the work that Infrastructure is doing and said, you know, we're going to be strategic and focused about what we're doing, or, again, are we kind of trying to keep a number of things moving. I think that is a conversation that we have to have. I think also it's worth noting that a lot of these projects kind of have a very long timeline ahead of them. And we have mines -- you know, the closure of mines is coming in less than two years. I mean, we -- the downturn in the economy is coming quickly, and I think it's fair to say that none of the projects that are currently in the hopper are things that are going to immediately stimulate activity in the way that I think is being hoped that these infrastructure investments will make. So I think that we need to be kind of looking in a strategic way at that also. I mean, are we maybe trying to do things that are too big? Do we need to be focusing on the smaller pieces? And, again, as I noted yesterday, the foundation of the economy, building the foundation to ensure that we are taking the action to move forward in a positive way.

I'm going to move to Justice. Give me a second here. So Justice has been an interesting one for me to review. And I think there was some comments made today actually in the House when I was asking about this at the in-camera meeting, but I'll just refer to the House comments.

So we're establishing -- you know, reestablishing this territorial crime reduction unit. And you know, the Premier was saying today that we have kind of a high police-to-resident ratio, and I would just note that the numbers are showing an increase in crime despite that. And so what we seeing saying ourselves is that the approach that we are laying out here appears to not be working. And I think that we need to think about that a little bit. In some cases, you know, I'm just hoping that we're using an evidence-based approach to lay out our plans and that we are ensuring that we're putting the resources in the right place to get the results that we're looking for.

I just need to switch back to my other notes here.

Okay, and I'll share some short comments on housing, very high level. Looking at the housing business plan, I think when I first looked at this -- and this is getting a bit into budget conversation, and so I'll save my budget comments. But I was looking at it and thinking, okay, we said that we were prioritizing housing. It's a bit difficult to see in this budget. And I understand that looking at the business plan that the needs assessment is a key step towards obtaining federal funding for a plan. So I would like to see us, as a follow-up to the needs assessment, develop a long-term plan, developed in coordination with partners, and considering the federal funding that we can access, and would like that to become, yeah, the follow-up from the needs assessment. So I want to see us long-term planning. And, again, as opposed to kind of speaking to process in the business plan, what is the outcome that we're trying to achieve. We've got a needs assessment. That's telling us what is needed. And so obviously I'm hoping that the outcome becomes attached to the need that's identified in that, that that becomes the basis for our plan, and then we move forward in figuring out how we're going to fund it.

And another comment on housing, you know, I made a statement about this in the House in the last session -- or the last sitting of the session and will just say it again here. We are simply not funding operations and maintenance adequately to maintain our stock. And I think knowing that, we absolutely need to increase this item. I think if the Assembly wants to make good on our priority putting housing at the top of the list, this has to be on our radar. And we have to acknowledge that if we're not maintaining what we have, we're going to have an even bigger problem with -- how am I putting it? The needs assessment will end up kind of coming back on itself in the sense that we've identified what we need, but things are falling off on the back end. So we need to be maintaining what we have, building new to fill the gaps that we haven't filled, and hopefully wholistically moving forward with our housing plan.

So I'll leave my comments at that for now, Mr. Chair, on the business plans, and look forward to getting into the budget. And just to close, as I've said, I do hope that we, you know, create a process and find a time to dig into these with a bit more detail, being able to ask Ministers and departments questions about them and get through them because, know, it's a big document, and it's an important document, and I think taking a close look at this is a change that I'd love to see us implement, and I think it help us with effectiveness significantly. So I do hope that we can move forward in that way in the future. Thank you, Mr. Chair.