Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I'd be happy to pass it to the deputy minister if the Member would like, but I can also let the Member know that communication is where I came from, and so it's very important to me that we have a communication division that is very well resourced and that we are able to actively and proactively communicate with members of the public, especially when a lot of the programming that comes out of this department is crucial and exceptionally important to residents of the territory. And so I can reassure the Member that the -- I have not had -- been communicated with that there's more resources needed, although I won't be shy to come forward now that I know I have an ally on the other side if I need more funding for comms. Thank you.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Range Lake.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. And if I could just squeeze in one quick question, I would like to hear from the deputy minister just to get the perspective of the actual department. I appreciate what the Minister's background comes from, but I would appreciate hearing from the deputy minister on this. Thank you.

Okay, thank you. I'll go to the deputy minister.

Thank you. Okay, I'm going to continue on here. Trying to get Members to speak that haven't spoken to to this issue yet. But if I don't see any more hands, I'm going to continue on. If we could, I'd like to continue on.

No further questions, I'm going to go to -- I'm going to continue on here. No further questions. Please turn to page 37.

Education, Culture and Employment, corporate management, operations expenditure summary, 2024-2025 Main Estimates, $12,456,000. Does the committee agree?

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Yellowknife Centre.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Sometimes part of the job requires a person to be nimble as we listen to the budget, certainly some of the answers, hence I am going to move a motion with respect to this line item. I move that the Department of Education, Culture and Employment, corporate management, operations expenditure summary, 2024-2025 Main Estimates, be reduced to $12,201,000. And I'll speak to the motion. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you. There is a motion on the floor. Thank you. There is a motion on the floor. To the motion. Okay, against? Sorry? Thank you.

We're going to -- I'm going to pass the -- to the mover, if you could speak to the motion.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This isn't personal or anything. I just think the value of the cost of this particular position at the value given, we could do so much more. We could, for example, turn this into two positions. One in the North, and one in the south. We have fantastic programs growing up. I mean, I would see language programming in the schools in Fort Simpson where I grew up. I'm very well knowledgeable around the issues of -- for example, what's happening around Diga School. You know, I supported the old language nest programs that have changed. And if we want to inspire young people to learn their language, learn their culture, this is exactly how we could do it. So instead of finding ways to create more systems and bureaucracy -- I'm actually saying hire two people with that money. I'm not saying don't do anything. I'm just saying I believe it's -- get it into the schools and in the communities where it belongs. I mean, we don't have a, you know, community like Behchoko everywhere or Wekweeti. I mean, we need to inspire the communities to find their voices and their languages and to -- I would say that this is one of these situations where we should be saying rather than bigger administration, let's get on the ground people -- or sorry, people on the ground and find ways to cultivate this sort of inspiration and opportunities.

So, Mr. Chairman, I'm not going to go through the comments I made earlier. I suspect there will be some objections, which I respect. And this is sort of an on the spur of the moment so I mean, I didn't coordinate it -- this with my colleagues. But I'll let them decide whether they feel that this type of direction in the communities, in the regions, is more effective than someone sitting in an office tower in Yellowknife, you know, behind their computer saying, we want to coordinate better. And frankly, if we want to do something, you know, this is how you do it.

I mean, I should mention, you know, Gwich'in is one of the lowest speaking languages, if memory serves -- I'm not going to pull the statistics up, but if I remember correctly, at one time there was around 250 speakers of Gwich'in. Hiring someone in Yellowknife is not going to inspire that language. Getting somebody, an elder paid or some coordinator for those types of programming in that community, will help inspire those young people to connect with their language and culture. And that's the point is that more bureaucracy doesn't get it us better results. Let's get people in the program and in the community to create this and foster this excitement. And to me, that's the nature of the motion. It's not a -- it's not a mean motion. The problem is people -- and I don't want Cabinet to be sensitive. It's proposed as a deletion but, really, it's a find a different way to do this and it can be done fantastically.

So, Mr. Chairman, I'll leave it at that. If I said much more at this point, I'll just repeat, so I don't want to do that. And I'll let the -- my Members, if they feel the urge to rise to speak to it, either way, it's fine. It's part of the process and the business we do. Thank you.

Thank you. I'll go to the -- to the motion, I got Yellowknife North. Member from Yellowknife North.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just want to be clear that this motion deletes just over $200,000, so it will not allow more on the ground people in communities, in schools, language, educators. This motion just deletes money from the budget, and even though the Member's vision might be to add in programs and services, this motion cannot and does not accomplish that. So I just want us to all be clear that that's what we're talking about here.

I do think there's a place for us working with the department in terms of their business plans and the way they do things to try to encourage more on the ground programs, and that's a different discussion. But I feel at the moment we're micromanaging their operational matters, and I just don't think that we have enough information or basis for making the decision to just cut this budget by 200 and some thousand dollars. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. To the motion. I got Premier Simpson.

Thank you. And the Member for Yellowknife North stole my thunder a bit. I was going to say that deleting over $200,000 from the budget does not give us the ability to hire people in the regions. So just so everyone's clear who might be reading Hansard or watching this, this is actually reducing the ability to do what the Member is saying. So it's a bit backwards. I just want to make sure that the Member himself is actually aware that this is a deletion and that taking money away does not somehow allow us to hire more people. So just for everyone's information, I just wanted to add to that. Thank you.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister of ECE, then to -- Member of ECE.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I appreciate the concern of Members. And what I think I would really love for people to be able to take home is the importance of what it is that we are talking about, which I think that everybody is on the same page of that is that we need to make sure that we are putting as much of a spotlight on culture and languages across the territory. When I have had the opportunity to speak with people from one end of this territory to the other, every time we start talking about healing, it always leads back -- the conversation always leads back to one of languages. And the amount of times that somebody has started a conversation about their journey to sobriety or their journey to healing, that starts with them reclaiming and revitalizing their language, I don't have enough fingers on my hands in order to express that. And it's not not just about sobriety. It's absolutely about healing, and it's about enriching our communities and our territory and making sure that we are doing our best. This is a vital piece of reconciliation in this territory. And I understand what the Member for Yellowknife Centre is saying as far as people on the ground is most important. I couldn't agree more. But what puts people on the ground is the millions of dollars that ECE receives from the federal government. Every year, we have federal funding of $5.9 million that flows directly through ECE and to Indigenous governments, and we need vital people in the department to be negotiating those dollars. And quite frankly, I would like somebody negotiating more of those dollars. And without those positions in the department, I cannot do that work, and I cannot make sure that we are in the territory getting a fair shake at the dollars that exist within the federal government to be able to do this work. If these dollars are cut, I don't just lose that position. Because this was internally funded, I'm losing another position within the department that can help do this work. And so I would urge Members to please leave the -- leave the funding where it's at, and let us go down this path of putting a spotlight on culture and languages because I think it's critically important, and I've long been an advocate for that. Thank you.

Thank you. To the motion. Next I have on my list is the Member from Range Lake.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I just wanted to speak to some of the comments that have been made by the Honourable Premier and the honourable Member for Yellowknife North around, you know, deleting this won't put jobs into communities. So I just want to point out that of this key activity, there are 38 jobs in headquarters. In languages and culture, there are 51 jobs in headquarters. One in the South Slave, and two in the Beaufort Delta. So we are not seeing -- this function of the department is a headquarters-based function. And I think this -- the Member's motion underscores the need to improve the presence of language and culture staff outside of headquarters and outside of, like, senior management level functions. And those are the points I was trying to make as well. And this does come from, I think, a place of those intentions. I appreciate what the Minister is saying, but the Minister also presented a budget where there are three jobs outside of Yellowknife to support language and culture, which is primarily Indigenous language and culture which is not residing in Yellowknife. So I just want to make that clear in kind of support of the Member's intentions for this motion, that this is a broader issue about where we're spending those dollars and how we're getting those dollars to a community. And I think anyone from the regional centres and the communities that I have spoken with in this Assembly and who represents those regions will say they need staff in their regions to effectively deliver programs and services. The honourable Member for Boot Lake has made Members' statements about the need for this -- for a regional superintendent to be the -- you know, the Premier's eyes and ears in the region to make sure things are moving effectively and smoothly in this the region. And I think that's true across the board. So when you see those numbers and then you see the addition of another senior manager and the intention is to, like, raise the profile of language and culture, I think it just leaves some people thinking, well, is this really going to work, and is this really the right way to expend those resources. So I think this comes from a well-intentioned place. And, again, 51 positions in Yellowknife, three outside of Yellowknife. That's what we're looking at on languages and culture. Thank you.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Inuvik Boot Lake.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yeah, Mr. Chair, my colleague from Range Lake is not wrong. Certainly I am a huge proponent of positions, particularly senior positions being not centralized in Yellowknife, but being in the regions, such as the regional director position, which I would love to see as an ADM position. I would love to see many ADM positions or any new ADM positions moved to the regions and/or new positions go to the regions. Having said that, I don't want to delete money from this budget. I know the department has done their diligence on why they want it. I do question and I would fight tooth and nail about having it in Yellowknife. If you have an Indigenous languages ADM, that Indigenous languages ADM should reside in one of the regions where the majority of the Indigenous languages are being spoken. So and I think, you know, that position would sit very nicely in Inuvik or in Behchoko or in the South Slave, or in Deh Cho. There's places that that position can be supported.

So yeah, and all due respect to my colleague from Yellowknife Centre, I understand where he's coming from, I don't want to delete the money from the budget but I, again, will fight tooth and nail to have this position put in the region where I think it will be properly housed. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Okay, as an Indigenous person, due to colonization we know that it almost -- the Indigenous language and culture were almost extinct. And based on that, you know, like, I don't really want to support or reduce or delete a budget from this -- from the corporate management. I don't want to do that because -- especially concerning Indigenous language and culture. What I would like to see -- and I did ask the Minister in our briefing, and she said, well, I hope so. I hope I will take this position to the regions. And that's what she said. So I was quite pleased about that. I would like to see this position move to one of the communities outside of Yellowknife where the Indigenous language and culture is very strong and it's thriving and it's alive, you know. And I know that a lot of people, a lot of report have said that Indigenous language is dead or -- but it's not. And it is -- so outside of Yellowknife is what I would like to see where this position goes.

The last time that we had somebody as a director who had no Indigenous language background, nothing, and she was -- you know, I mean, the person was in charge of Indigenous language for so many years, and it's still continuing to this day. So I do support having this position move outside of Yellowknife. So I would like to see that, but I don't support reducing or deleting of the budget. But I just want to see that position somewhere. Because there is a pilot project happening with the South Slave with the ECE for ADM. So I would like to see that kind of a -- I would like to see more of support in that area. Thank you.

Thank you. Speaking to the motion only, next on my list I have is the Member from Nunakput.