Thank you. For students and young people looking to retrain, payments, including grants and loans that are received for training and education are currently considered unearned income. Can the Minister say if there is any plan to change this so that money received for education purposes does not reduce the income assistance they receive? Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the changes to the program did allow for more unearned and earned income to be maintained by residents. Should residents be, you know, full-students or be pursuing post-secondary education, we do have a very robust student financial assistance program that we can move them into that does also come with living allowance supplements as well. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. Final supplementary. Member from Monfwi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Can the Minister explain what employment programs are available to young people on income assistance. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. So, Mr. Speaker, we have career development officers that work for the department of education and their role is to connect, through our client navigators, income assistance clients with job opportunities for people who are able and are willing to take that route. So these career development officers have access to a suite of different workforce development programs that can be paired with an employer. So there is funding, and substantial funding out there, for example for training, for helping to pay a wage for somebody as they learn how to do a job, to really ease some of that stress off an employer who really is wanting to support somebody to improve their skills. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. Oral questions. Member from Yellowknife North.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.

So this morning, Aurora College informed committee that they would be reallocating about $2 million of the funds that previously went to the community learning centres and CLC staff towards online learning, including hiring three online program coordinators, hiring three new tech support staff, and 1-800 support lines and online platforms, possibly buy everyone a computer as it seems they were promising to ensure that everyone would have access to modern technology.

Does the Minister support this dramatic shift in approach from face-to-face learning to spending those same funds on essentially tech support and online platforms? Does that approach fit within the current mandate agreement laid out given the Minister's expectations of the college? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Member from Yellowknife North. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, what I do support here is the college looking at different ways to access our learners across the territory in a more efficient way. What they've identified is that -- concerns over access to the programming that students want. With those additional positions that the Member referenced, there's also six adult learners that will also support that program in addition to tech support and online mentorship and wraparound services. These are the types of services that they could not afford to -- students across the territory before looking at a shift in the programming. And what has been passed along to me is that along with a program that has a borrowing system for hardware, for computer hardware, for students across the Northwest Territories who need it, there will also be people that support with -- you know, how to learn online, student life, being able to really support the whole student wholistically.

I think it's also worth noting that there was community learning centres in 19 communities before, and now an additional 10 communities will have access through online learning to these post-secondary programs which afford them not only access to the adult learning and basic education but also the programs that they might want to transition into after that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So if we fully embrace this vision that the future is digital and if the college changed all of its programs to online programs, does the Minister consider that in that case the college would still be fulfilling its mandate? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It's very difficult for me to base all of my answers on hypothetical. I think what the college is looking at doing is exploring how this works for Northerners, and I would expect that they would be consistently evaluating this shift and this change.

The other thing that was referenced today was different opportunities that communities are taking advantage of with additional partnerships both through Indigenous governments and through community governments. And I think that those will continue to flourish in the territory as well. We do have relationships through Dechinta, through College Nordique, through Wilfrid Laurier University, and, of course, Indigenous governments are also forming their own relationships and their own workforce development plans, which I intend to continue to support through our workforce development funding as well. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Can the Minister justify why we would spend public money on Aurora College developing online programs when many students already access online learning programs from other places and, in fact, that's the entire sort of attraction of online learning, is that you can get it from anywhere. What would Aurora College's niche be in this space? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we're certainly at an interesting juncture in the life-span and chapters of Aurora College. So Aurora College has a mandated responsibility for accessing -- or for community members to be able to access educational opportunities. So that still exists within their mandate agreement which is why they continue to find different ways to deliver that programming but because they have autonomy over operations and how they choose to deliver that, that is entirely up to them as a decision. And because of the noninterference clause, I don't have the ability to reach in and tell them to do it how I would like to see it. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. Oral questions. Member from Range Lake.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Earlier today the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment has signed a deal to extend the Canada-wide child early learning -- learning program, the $10-a-day program. While families are appreciative of these efforts, daycare providers are still -- or childcare providers are still very concerned about a system that looks to be unsustainable. The funding's been extended until 2031, 2032, without any changes, which means no additional funding to address the concerns that have been raised by the sector or increasing wages for workers in the sector for another five years. I know the Minister's live to these concerns. Can the Minister speak to why no increases in the contributions to the Northwest Territories were secured in this recent extension of the deal? Thank you.

Thank you, Member from Range Lake. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I can promise this House it was not for lack of trying. As the Member also would have seen in the same news article, we weren't alone in resigning that agreement with Canada. That agreement is to the tune of $80 million over the lifespan of that agreement, and it is very difficult to say no to $80 million that supports families with young children to access childcare.

I absolutely acknowledge what the Member is saying about the fact that there are challenges with that program and the implementation of it in the Northwest Territories, issues that I very vocally shared with my federal counterparts over the course of the negotiating period. I was incredibly active in speaking with the federal government about ways that that program does not fully satisfy the needs of the Northwest Territories and can also advise the Member because of those conversations, we did not sign the agreement until the 11th hour. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I mean, it's becoming increasingly apparent that this program's not working. I don't think it's working anywhere in Canada. But leaving money on the table is not an option but finding money from within is. So one way we can do that is the funding formulas may be the same across all provinces and territories, as the Minister pointed out, but there's different legislative environments. And in some cases, they allow for extra fees, voluntary fees to be charged in jurisdictions, including Alberta. Will the Minister bring changes to policy and legislation to allow voluntary fees to be charged by childcare providers in the Northwest Territories? Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Certainly as previously committed to in this House, that is an aspect of the agreement that I'm currently looking into with the department. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. Final supplementary. Member from Range Lake.

Thank you. I've looked into it as well, and you know who else has, Mr. Speaker? Mr. Speaker, the childcare providers and their advocates, the associations, have looked to it -- looked into it as well. They want these changes made. So can the Minister commit to doing more than looking into them and actually change these things, make a commitment to change these things before this problem gets worse. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my concern is implementing or agreeing to something on the floor of the House without doing my due diligence because in the end, we could end up having our agreement cancelled which costs this territory and families in this territory a tremendous amount of money. We would risk losing our agreement with Canada if we are found to be in contravention of it. So I want to ensure that I'm doing my due diligence before making an $80 million mistake. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. Oral questions. Member from Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I just want to make follow-up comments to questions from earlier.

When I talked about the winter road, it was mentioned between 7 to $8 million. I see that as being an investment for putting the road in like that. But overall, Mr. Speaker, my question would be to the Minister of Infrastructure. I think at this point in time, if we don't start looking for solutions then I'll be back year after year asking the same questions. I think it's important now that we look at maybe building -- when I talk about a pre-feasibility study, it would be nice if we could do that and look at a plan for 5 to 20 years. And when we -- if we do that pre-feasibility study, we could look also at the all-season road, winter road, perhaps even runway expansion, and also, you know, looking at a chip seal program for our community. But before we could even do that, my question to the Minister of Infrastructure: Can we look at -- get a commitment from her to start a process so that we are able to look at doing a pre-feasibility study on these four items I just talked about? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.