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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I will have to go back to the department. If this is a contract, I am not sure what I am able to share. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I won't educate the House what double jeopardy is, but it's also used as a lay term being tried twice. Mr. Speaker, the current dental review officer has processed -- we'll call it concerns on an individual constituent. The issue is so much so is that who -- brings to the question is if -- who reviews the work and mandate of the dental review officer to ensure they administer a fair and reasonable process? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I said, I will have to get more detailed information on this line of questioning. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

Mr. Speaker, the current dental review officer is out of Edmonton. They have no contact with the NWT dental association except when they fly into the community to administer dental justice.

So, Mr. Speaker, would the Minister review the individual's contract to ensure someone from Northwest Territories who is more familiar with the community's and the territory's issues, including the dental association people that they're practicing this justice on, will be considered a Northerner, at the very least, and possibly even go back to the college of dentistry to have someone competent enough to fairly administer this program? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I -- you know, I am -- I don't know if anyone here on the floor is able to decide competency on dentists. I believe that that's left for the college of dentistry. What I do know is that because the NWT has a very small pool of dentists, if any complaint comes in of a dentist, an out of territory is used to avoid any conflict of interest. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister of Health and Social Services. Oral questions. Member from Range Lake.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Going back to the inclusive schooling review, what is the total funding need that's been identified by that review? The Minister referenced that it may, in fact, be greater than $30 million. As we're broaching that subject now, if she could inform the House of what that total gap looks like. Thank you.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, that's information that I do not currently have at my fingertips on the floor of the House. It's also information that has not yet been shared with education partners or with Members of the committee on accountability and oversight. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, will the -- Jordan's Principle funding shortfalls -- like, if the federal government's programs don't work for the North, because we're not sure that they will yet, will this new $30 million that's been committed -- will some of that be able to support the gap left behind by the Jordan's Principle shortfall? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the inclusive schooling review did cover things, for example, like access to therapeutic services, which some Jordan's Principle funding did cover. It also did speak to needs of students, which some of the needs of students are access to supports within classrooms, and also spoke to the simple nature of the -- and I say simple, but very complex nature of the change of the needs of students across this territory. So certainly there would be an overlap of some of it, but because of the fact that the Jordan's Principle funding applications went directly from education bodies to the federal government, it would not be -- it wasn't something that we participated in, that we vetted, and so it's not something that I would be able to say it is an exact one-to-one and certainly there were things that were involved in that that would not be covered off under an inclusive schooling policy because, for example, some things had to do more with school food funding, some things had to do with the purchase of cultural infrastructure, so certainly there will be some differences. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, and granted that these will be different programs. So just to clarify, this -- will there be -- what are the strings attached to this new funding so education bodies can understand? Is it the same policies that covered inclusive education -- or inclusive schooling funding before, or are we expanding the criteria to ensure the dollars reach farther and address some of those things that Jordan's Principle was filling? Because that's partially why we're so dependent on Jordan's Principle, the money wasn't going far enough, and it wasn't being -- it couldn't be used everywhere that it could be, and Jordan's Principle could be used at the time these applications were made, anywhere, for anything.

So can the Minister just clarify that these dollars are going to go to solve those problems and help keep our kids educated and -- yeah, let's leave it there. Thanks.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my particular area of interest right now is an area I've talked about before, and I am trying to find out about population growth. As we all know, our grant from Canada is tied to that, amongst many other things, but, of course, key is population growth. And given the fact that we suffer a significant deficit in human resource, opportunities, and specialized skills, trades, etcetera, including doctors and nurses, and yada, yada, yada -- Mr. Speaker, we would be putting a full frontage on that. So my question for the Premier is, what type of mandate has he given his departmental colleagues -- ministerial colleagues, sorry -- to help stimulate the growth of the Northwest Territories through some function of population growth? Thank you.

Thank you, Member from Yellowknife Centre. Mr. Premier.

Thank you. So the question is how are we going to stimulate population growth? Well, Mr. Speaker, there's a number of reasons that, you know, someone -- many people want to move to the Northwest Territories. It's a great place to live. And if you like outdoors, if you like this kind of lifestyle, then this is a great place to be. You know, I am from Hay River, so I might not be able to go home after saying this, but Yellowknife is actually a great city. There's a lot to do here. And that being said, there are challenges. We need to make more land available for housing so that we can build more houses and bring down the cost of housing, and so we have committed to that. And I didn't need to give direction on that one. The Minister of ECC has made that a priority of his to ensure that that happens. So we're doing that. We are looking at massive investments from the Department of National Defence. I am expecting additional investments from the federal government in our major infrastructure projects. These are the types of things that will create an economy, generate jobs, open up lands for exploration and development.

And so there's a lot going on. The future over the next five to ten years in the Northwest Territories is going to look much different than the past, and there's going to be a lot of economic opportunities that I expect will draw people to the North. We need to make land available so that they have somewhere to live. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I almost had a tear in my eye, Mr. Speaker, when the Premier talked about how great Yellowknife is. It was very emotional, and I want to thank the Premier for bringing me to a side I didn't realize. Mr. Speaker, the Premier spoke to massive investments through DND. Please enlighten the House as to what massive investments and development are we intending to see through that description he provided. Can he be specific? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think people in this House are aware that the Department of National Defence had a pre-procurement announcement to allow businesses to get ready, that there could be up to $10 billion invested in forward operating locations in the Northwest Territories. I don't have further details on that right now, but we are trying to reach out and work with the Department of National Defence to get an understanding of what those might be. But the possibilities are endless. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Premier. Final supplementary. Member from Yellowknife Centre.

Mr. Speaker, you know, a lot of that is all theoretical, of course. We know nothing's actually been committed to. So back to the population growth origins of the question, which is ultimately, is there any mandate to try to grow population in the Northwest Territories directed to the Ministers as part of their initiative or mandate letters? Because growth is key in population, and that will help sustain or lower costs here in the Northwest Territories, which at the end of the day, Mr. Speaker, is one of the fundamental issues I am trying to raise by finding better ways to cost of living. Thank you.