Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Further to my Member's statement, there's a number of houses that are beyond repair within the Northwest Territories specifically referring to the Mackenzie Delta ridings. Does the department know how much of these houses that are not liveable anymore that belong to Housing NWT that are situated in the three communities of the Mackenzie Delta riding? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Member from Mackenzie Delta. Minister responsible for Housing NWT.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Member for the question. His concern is my concern because living in small community, you drive around, you walk around, you see many units within the community that are boarded up or that have no windows or busted up windows. So this is something that we are working towards as Housing NWT is working within our community, working with Indigenous governments, to either remediate or demolish or modernize these homes.

So in terms of the question from the Member, we have 293 units in the Mackenzie Delta riding. 265 are occupied. We have one that is surplused, approved for demo. We have four that are approved for sale. We have three that are ready for occupancy. Four, repairs in progress. And we have 16 that require repairs. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'd like to thank the Minister for the detailed answer. You know, we have companies within the region of Mackenzie Delta that can conduct these demolitions. Will the Minister look at acting on the concern and have these hazards removed before an accident happens? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I completely agree that we need to remove many of these boarded up or derelict buildings. The situation is it's hard to get money for housing. It's even more difficult to remediate or demolish older housing units. Our budget for Housing NWT is $500,000 a year. We have 2900 units across the North. It costs up to $50,000 to remediate or demolish a unit considering the contaminants or the age of the unit, the space within the solid waste site, and sometimes we have to ship that material south. So it could be difficult but we are willing to look at partnerships. We are willing to look at arrangements. So thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister responsible for Housing NWT. Final supplementary. Member from Mackenzie Delta.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, it is quite hard to look at removing some of these units because of the contaminants that are in there but, you know, they work with the Indigenous governments, with these local contractors, maybe something -- we can find something out.

Can the Minister commit to a timeframe as to when these projects can commence within the Mackenzie Delta region; hopefully this calendar year. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I'm willing to commit to meet with the Member to discuss this further. We do have funding available. It's called the community housing initiative funding. We could work with Indigenous governments or local government or bands to look at some of these opportunities and perhaps advance them in his riding. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister responsible for Housing NWT. Oral questions. Member from the Deh Cho.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Further to my Member's statement, the questions, how many Indigenous employees have been hired through the career gateway program in the last fiscal year, specifically in the Deh Cho riding? Thank you.

Thank you, Member from Deh Cho. Minister of Finance.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'd be very happy to get that breakdown of information. The career development program -- or gateway program has been quite successful. It's now went from being undersubscribed to oversubscribed which is a problem we like to have. But I don't have the numbers in front of me. I will certainly get them to the Member quite quickly. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Does the Department of Finance track how many Indigenous employees enter the public service through the career gateway program tracking their progressions into senior positions in the public service? In other words, are we seeing development and succession for these employees? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We do track, again, folks who are coming in through the Indigenous Career Gateway Program. The degree to which we might be tracking their succession thereafter that, I'll have to double check, Mr. Speaker. I can say that only as recently as June of 2023, until then we did not have a formal succession plan within the human resources, not even a formal strategic plan for human resources. So I appreciate the question. That's exactly getting to one of the things we are trying to now do, and we do now have, as I say, a succession planning document focused on ensuring that we are, in fact, bringing Indigenous employees through succession planning so that they are moving through exactly that. So I suspect we are, based on that, doing that tracking, and I'll get those numbers, assuming they're available, to the Member. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister of Finance. Final supplementary. Member from Deh Cho.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. What other approaches is the GNWT taking to reduce barriers to Indigenous recruitment and retention into the public service? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we had launched a few years ago the Indigenous Recruitment and Retention Framework of it and that had two key goals associated with it. The one is to increase Indigenous representation, full stop, in the public service. A number of goals and a number of actions therein, everything from creating and ensuring that there's employment opportunities, that there are no barriers, speaking with the Indigenous Employees Advisory Committee about what barriers they may observe, putting in Indigenous employment plans for every department. Different departments have different types of needs, different types of employees. ECC employees out on the ground might have very different circumstances from ITI, and wanted to get at what barriers this are for each department in not having more representation.

The second goal, Mr. Speaker, is to increase Indigenous leadership. So, Mr. Speaker, what I'd like to suggest is I'll commit to getting an update on where we are with all of those action items and have that to the Member or to the House. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister of Finance. Oral questions. Member from Yellowknife North.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister of Health and Social Services following up on my statement.

So child and family services has a category called neglect which is one basis for reporting mistreatment to CFS and sometimes results in apprehension of children from their homes. Is there a clear definition of neglect either in legislation or policy? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Member from Yellowknife North. Minister of Health and Social Services.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'll have to follow up with the Member. Thank you.

Fair enough. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I do look forward to the answer on that, actually.

And with regard to plan of care agreements, they're listed as a preventative measure and yet they're increasingly used to remove children temporarily from their homes, but that can be for up to two years. So what is the Minister doing to ensure that there is proper oversight and proper legal protections for children and their families who are subject to plan of care agreements? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, plan of care agreements are not necessarily agreements that remove children from their home. Plan of care agreements within the child and family services are where the family agrees that child and family services will support the family. Depending on their situation, you know, I can't speak to when it's deemed necessary to remove that child from the home. If they're -- you know, but the reason that a lot of the plan of cares have gone up is because more people are accessing support which, in my eyes, is what I've been trying to say, even as a Regular Member, is that this program should be more supportive and the way to access services within this is to meet with a child and family services worker, to be assessed, to get the support, and work with a family preservation worker. Sometimes there are, you know, situations where, you know, family members may want to better themselves and they go away, and those children stay with family members. So thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister of Health and Social Services. Final supplementary. Member from Yellowknife North.