Alfred Moses

Thank you, Mr. Chair. If my memory does serve me correctly, I do believe we sent a letter to standing committee on this one. We can follow up and see when there is time to have that meeting, but I can check with the chair of standing committee. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, we can definitely have those discussions. We're definitely big supporters, as well, in terms of making sure that we have apprentices in the Northwest Territories to meet our labour market demands, as well as our employer demands. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Just to reiterate what the assistant deputy minister said earlier with our Education Renewal Initiatives, putting funding into certain programs as we go through the process, as I mentioned earlier, we have a lot of initiatives on the go, and providing the financial resources to that shows the fluctuation from year to year. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. There are a lot of programs here that the Minister is referring to: Student Financial Assistance, Income Assistance, Senior Home Heating Subsidy. With the income, I'm not sure if it's something more specific, in terms of somebody that he's speaking to; but we're also doing investments, such as our career and education advisors who can work with students on things like budgeting programs, services. If they can't find a job in the community, depending on the age of the child, there's also an opportunity for that youth or young adult to look at accessing income assistance as...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Of course, we care about all of our employees throughout the whole government. As I mentioned, those discussions I am sure are happening between the senior management over at the Aurora College and their current staff.

In terms of students in the Social Work Program, or social workers in general or educators, we continue to support students who are taking education as well in Social Work Programs in other jurisdictions, and we continue to support them and bring them back to the Northwest Territories here to work. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I know there are some programs out there, Moms and Tots, mothers and babies, that invite all families to participate in those programs. We have made increases and improvements to the Canada Child Benefit, the NWT Child Benefit. That puts more dollars into low- to modest-income families. We also provide daycares and funding for day homes through subsidies, where, if parents want to have a day home, we can work on helping them provide that, possibly having their kids participate in the program, as well. Obviously, there are still other options. The Member did mention one in his statement. We are...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, we have reviewed the Senior Home Heating Subsidy. We also had this discussion with NWT Seniors Society and the Yellowknife Seniors Society in terms of enhancements that we will be making to the program. If everything goes well, we will be making those enhancements in the new fiscal year. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. There would be a number of variables, and I think the Member has alluded to a few of them, in terms of journeypersons with certificates. We have seen a decrease over the years. We continue to also look at having 389 apprentices who are current registered in the Northwest Territories. The good news is that we have developed an Apprenticeship Trades and Occupational Certification Strategy for the next five years, and that's being implemented by the working group and the steering committee. That's mainly made up of people in the industry. So hopefully we will start seeing...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We've heard, on numerous occasions, that our current high school graduation requirements are not meeting many of the NWT students; and, therefore, the department has taken it on and is looking at reviewing and working towards revising the current requirements and looking at how we can assist students to create a pathway to graduation, whether it's the trades, whether it's for future post-secondary education, whether it's to get into the career field right away, or even just to get a completion of their high school, but those are discussions that we're going to have as we...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. There are certain criteria for families and seniors to access the Senior Home Heating Subsidy. They can also be accessing income assistance. Other factors, such as kids going off to school, no, we don't factor those in. We factor what is in the criteria for accessing Income Assistance and the Senior Home Heating Subsidy. Thank you, Mr. Chair.