Thank you, Minister of Justice. Final supplementary. Member from Range Lake.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Does the Minister know when he'll be able to answer that question? Because I think the public would like to know. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I will follow up with the department and provide that information to the Member within -- before the end of the week. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister of Justice. Oral questions. Member from Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it's not often we get together here in the Northwest Territories and especially in Yellowknife with western Premiers. And I just wanted to just continue on with housing. My question would be to the Premier.

If there's a way if he could continue to work with the Premiers from -- and the three territories' Ministers -- sorry, Premiers to really push the housing issue for the Northwest Territories and operation and maintenance dollars, if you could look for support and then continue to build on that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Member from Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh. Mr. Premier.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There's been significant advocacy by all the provinces and territories regarding housing funding. That was a prominent theme in this last federal election. And the federal government has been responding to that with some significant announcements and plans on housing. And so we'll continue to push that advocacy forward. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And, Mr. Speaker, the Akaitcho region, this year we got funding to do homeownership inspections in our region, and thank you to the -- sorry, I want to say mahsi to the Minister of housing for helping out.

My question to the Premier, though, is that once -- this report is going to be done by this fall, and the chiefs from the Akaitcho would like to work together with the Premier to bring this report to the Prime Minister and ask for further funding for homeownership repairs in our region. Thank you. So my question to the Premier, can he help us out with Indigenous governments to knock on doors in Ottawa. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We can always work with Indigenous governments to knock on doors in Ottawa, but there's more than just the Prime Minister in Ottawa, and there's more than just the Premier in the Cabinet, so I'd have to defer that question to the Minister of housing. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Premier. Final supplementary. Member from -- oh sorry, Minister responsible for housing.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think this question is important because the work they're doing in the Akaitcho territory, talking about the conditions of homes in their communities, this is something that housing is doing as well through our territorial housing needs assessment. Again, we've done the quantitative assessment and now we're wrapping it up with the qualitative assessment that's hoping to be done by fall of 2025. And with that engagement, we have reached out to all Indigenous governments and Indigenous leadership in communities asking if we can have conversations about this assessment. So it's important work that we hope to see results and then we bring that to Ottawa, along with Indigenous leaders, and talk about needs in communities for housing. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister responsible for Housing NWT. Final supplementary. Member from Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. And yeah, I'm very happy to hear that because it's very important on these two items. One is to restore and reinstate the homeownership program, and also to go to Ottawa to push for funding for the homeownership repairs in our riding, and I'm happy to hear that we could probably work together with the Akaitcho chiefs, along with the GNWT leadership, to go to Ottawa, knock on doors together, so I just want to say thank you. Just a statement. Thank you.

Colleagues, I do not want to have statements; I want questions. It's question and answer period. Please, you want to say thank you to the Ministers, do it after session. Thank you.

Oral questions. Member from Yellowknife North.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister of Finance, who is also the Minister responsible for the Public Service.

So on May 5th, the Ministers of Finance and Health and Social Services issued a joint press release announcing that the government is embarking on a second phase of changes to the Public Service Act that will focus on modernizing section 41. That's the section that defines bargaining units and prescribes who will be the bargaining agent for public servants.

First, can the Minister explain what is the objective of this modernization effort that the government is embarking on; in other words, what is the problem with section 41 that you are seeking to solve? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, modernization of the Public Service Act has, in its whole, been happening now over many years. There's been much work done in this space, and we already are at a stage with most of the Act such that it is already in legislative drafting and will be coming forward to the House later this year. That is with one exception, and that was with respect to section 41. That section, of course, the Member's already detailed, does involve bargaining units and is one that is a little more complicated and so we left that aside from the rest of the Act.

What it is is it does speak to a Charter right, a Charter right with respect to freedom of association which has a couple of parts to it. You have the ability to organize as a group what kind of your group of union -- or of employees you may want to be when you decide to collect yourselves. You have that choice, and you can make that choice independently. And then also, Mr. Speaker, would be about ensuring that that group of employees can make a determination about who would represent them in a collective agreement proceeding. So, again, that choice would be independent. That choice is one that it's about choice and independence, or reflective. Right now, our section prescribes who the group of employees shall be and who their bargaining agent shall be. And so it does appear that since the time sometime ago when this Act was initially drafted, it is now out of step with what seems to be the direction of the Charter and so we are looking to bring that in line. A commitment was made to Members of this Assembly earlier this year that we bring forward an LP to make this change, and we are looking to getting that work underway. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank to the Minister for setting out a clear goal for that, the amendment to that section. For clarity, is the government committing to establish a labour relations board or similar mechanism to certifying these certified bargaining agents during the life of this Assembly? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the commitment I want to make really is one of fixing the problem that I just described in the last answer, and it may well be that it's -- that the solution is a labour relations board. It may well be that there's some other entity or organization that can conduct the bargaining or that can conduct a certification, if that's what is ultimately required. I'm hesitant, Mr. Speaker, to say here and with too much detail what -- where we may end up because we haven't necessarily gone out -- well, we haven't gone out yet. Certainly not to our unions currently that are in the Northwest Territories, the Union of Northern Workers or PSAC, to discuss with them. They have a lot of expertise, quite obviously, are more than simply stakeholders in this matter, and we want to have a time to engage with them as well as with the employees who are the public servants that this will be impacting. So, again, wanting to fix the problem that we have laid out but wanting to do that in the right way which is one that involves an opportunity to have discussions and engagements with those who are impacted. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister of Finance. Final supplementary. Member from Yellowknife North.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And so I understand the government has clearly committed to collaboration and consultation with existing bargaining agents such as the Union of Northern Workers during its work to modernize section 41 of the Public Service Act. The question is, for the Minister, does the government need consent or permission from the UNW in order to complete changes to this section of the Act? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And, Mr. Speaker, no, the government doesn't require consent or permission from other parties or -- including from the union to change the Public Service Act. That said, Mr. Speaker, as I indicated the union here certainly is more than merely a stakeholder, so certainly ensuring their involvement is quite important to making sure that we have a piece of legislation that is the best possible version of itself right now. And also, Mr. Speaker, there is certainly, I should make note, an expectation, an obligation on the government, a legal obligation on the government, in the current Public Service Act that there not be any changes to that Act which governs the relationships and governs the bargaining process when the parties go into bargaining, so once we have a notice to bargain. There is a provision in there where the parties can agree on consent to continue to work on changes such as what we might be contemplating here or as we have already done in the rest of the Public Service Act. But again -- so, again, Mr. Speaker, it's not consent or permission but certainly is one where we want to make sure that we are, you know, maintaining our relationship, maintaining fair bargaining, and maintaining our duty to engage in bargaining fairly and upholding the law as it is now in section 41. Mr. Speaker, I believe the timeline we're on and the relationships that we have will allow us to do that. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yesterday in my email I got a response from the Minister of ECC regarding some caribou herd populations. I certainly was appreciative of the response. But my question, of course, that stirred the other question which was about wastage, and so I see some numbers and information, which I appreciate. My question, of course, being more specific, which is what is the department's strategy given the most recent news stories about caribou wastage? How are they dealing with this, and public education can only go so far, so they must be able to do other types of things to address these types of problems, because it seems to be a significant sin every time we hear about more caribou wastage. Thank you.