Bill Braden

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the explanation, it is a multi-layered issue. The Minister explained that one of the core principles that the federal government had behind this is it wanted to help stimulate development and inclusion in the workforce, but our program, our own income support program, recognizes that staying at home to raise a family is recognized as a productive choice, just as productive to our society as being out there working. So does it not stand to reason, Mr. Speaker, that income support clients who make this productive choice should be entitled to the full...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. I would like to take up the issue again -- one that has frequently occupied the time of this Assembly -- of this government's decision to claw back from many, many families in the Northwest Territories the national child benefit. Mr. Speaker, the Minister responsible for this area, Mr. Dent, to his credit met with the organization Alternatives North a short while ago to receive an extremely well-developed proposal and argument they are putting forward, Mr. Speaker, that this clawback should stop. The Northwest Territories is one of only five jurisdictions, I understand...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I won’t belabour the results, but at least we have something we can move forward on now. So that we can avoid this in the future, Mr. Chairman, have we talked to the folks at either the census office or Revenue Canada to see if we can sort out the criteria for this, so that we don’t have these arguments about whether or not a community was counted accurately? This was a real frustration for us in the last government, Mr. Chairman. I think it caused us at least a year if not two of uncertainty in our financing situation with Ottawa. It was several millions of dollars...

Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate that within the bounds of the Liquor Act, as we know it, it is set up as a piece of business, administration law and, to some degree, covers control and enforcement. But in the course of reviewing a number of the departments in the social envelope leading up to this budget, Madam Chair, it just gets reinforced that liquor plays such a large part in the damage and the violence, abuse, and the unnecessary hurt and death that occurs in the NWT. We hear indications from our medical professionals, from our justice professionals, from our mental health and...

Mr. Speaker, yes, the Minister’s commitment to have a look at the broad application of the program is a welcome one. As a Member of that standing committee, I look forward to engaging in that. But in the meantime, the Minister’s answers have made it very clear that, for now, there’s not going to be any budging on this issue. So I’d like to ask that at least this aspect of it, if we’re not going to be making any moves to get off this clawback kick of ours -- Alternatives North reports that over the past two years the NCBS has increased something like 17 percent the size of its allotment -- to...

Mr. Speaker, my questions this afternoon are for the honourable Minister of Education, Culture and Employment in relation to the issue of the clawback on the national child benefit supplement. Mr. Speaker, to illustrate this briefly, a single parent in Yellowknife with two kids, receiving social housing and on income support loses the equivalent of about $2,700 a year because of our government’s clawback. My information is that leaves just under $10,000 for this family of three to look after their necessities. What justification can the Minister provide to this single parent for keeping the...

Mr. Speaker, those are all measures that I would certainly welcome. I think the public would also. I guess I’m wondering though, in the system that we already have, to some extent that information is available. It might not be readily available, but I think we could supply it. I guess I’m curious, Mr. Speaker, when the Minister says he’s considering legislation, do we need legislation to govern those things in this Assembly? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I can’t help building on the pictures that a couple of my colleagues have painted for us. I guess I see perhaps not a Cadillac or a convertible, but perhaps more like a pick-up truck heading toward this debt wall. We’re all in the back of the truck screaming, no. But you know, one thing that has changed is that we do have a new driver and I’m glad it’s Mr. Roland because he’s a journeyman mechanic.

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And he’s going to be able to find the brakes in time. Mr. Speaker, I too would like to reflect a bit on the message, at least one of the messages that Mr...

Mr. Speaker, I would wholeheartedly endorse the idea that we would be able to demonstrate results against objectives for the money that we spend. The final question that I’d like to ask, Mr. Speaker, is where the Minister says he’s considering creating legislation, what kind of a mechanism does he envision for determining if that’s needed and then what kind of time frame for bringing it forward? Thank you.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Also to the matter of the budget, I would address a question to the Minister of Finance. On page 8 of the budget, Mr. Roland had a discussion there about expenditures and accountabilities and transparency. The sentence, if I may quote, says, “I am considering creating legislation that will establish accountability measures and debt and deficit limits to make our financial management transparent and open to public scrutiny.” I would like to ask the Minister to expand a little bit on this, Mr. Speaker, perhaps beginning with the idea of accountability measures. What would...