Bill Braden

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to ask the Premier this afternoon some questions in his capacity as the leader of the Executive. It’s about the general area of consultation and communication across the NWT. Mr. Speaker, in the last few days, I have asked various Ministers questions on topics including the national child benefit supplement and workers’ compensation. We are hearing this afternoon about consultation on Housing Corporation business. What I have heard is Ministers are reluctant to take issues out and get a sense of what kind of program policy should be developed. They said...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I thank the Minister for that information. I am going to see that I get a couple more details on this. How many people are involved in this? Is there a budget figure given? The point I am getting at, Mr. Speaker, is that existing organizations, and especially the territorial sporting organizations, are concerned that meagre levels of resources are going to be further eroded by this new organization. I don’t want to take away from the purposes the Minister has outlined. But I am looking for some securities and some stability so that our existing organizations are...

Mr. Speaker, my question this afternoon is for Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs. It relates to the imminent creation of the NWT council of sport and recreation partners. Could the Minister advise what are the issues and problems that are going to be resolved with the creation of this new sport governing body in the NWT? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I can’t speak in favour of this motion. I guess where I am coming from on this is if we, as a government, and then through our various departments and agencies, have a reasonably good policy on travel, and if we go about passing our business plans and giving these people instruction and direction to go do a job on our behalf, then I think along with that comes sort of a degree of trust and integrity in their ability to make prudent decisions about where we are going to travel, and follow the policies that have been set under which they will do that. I think this...

Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just wanted to get on public record how we go about setting that up. At least with that information, perhaps it will clarify things. I think we do take reasonable steps to set that allowance. The other area I wanted to go into was the cultural enhancement strategy. I was at the public Board of Management meeting a couple of weeks ago when this strategy was put before the board. My perception of the meeting, Mr. Chairman, was a strategy which was commissioned by the last Assembly and just now completed, was accepted by the Board of Management. The Speaker has...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’d like to comment and ask a question about the policy of the Board of Management, which of course the Speaker is reporting on behalf of, and it concerns something that I’ve had some feedback on from constituents. It’s about the housing allowance policy that is in place to provide those MLAs who don’t live in Yellowknife adequate resources to set up in effect what amounts to a second household for them. Understandably there are costs incurred for them and the Assembly quite rightly has a responsibility to provide that. The cost of rental housing in this city has been...

Thank you, Madam Chair. I move we report progress.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So a case-by-case basis. You know, overall, there’s a lot of case-by-case, one-at-a-time, we’ll think about it kind of approach. I would like to know in the area of consultation and communication, which is such a big part of the environment we work in, is the government looking at adopting a formal consultation policy so that everyone knows what the parameters and the thresholds and the ground rules could be? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, could the Minister advise what performance measures or what indicators of performance? Is it going to be meeting its objectives? How is this new council going to be measured for its success? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Under the area here of culture, heritage and languages, the notes in the main estimates refer to the development of a northern arts strategy. This is something that is a carryover from the previous assembly, something that I've been looking forward to and so have dozens of organizations and hundreds of performers and volunteers in the arts area.

This is a joint approach, Mr. Chairman, between this department and the Department of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development. I wanted to ask the Minister when we might see the actual completion of this strategy and the...