Bill Braden

Okay. So what other agencies, Mr. Chairman, would be included in this category one, which I understand these are organizations which would automatically get a comparable increment to our public service. Are there any other agencies or organizations of this nature, Mr. Chairman?

Mr. Chairman, okay, so we have some explanation of the numbers here is the cause. What’s going on in communities, in families, in societies, or is it in the way we are enforcing or intervening? Do we have new laws or something that’s causing this surge? That’s what I’d like to get a little bit of understanding of, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to table correspondence from the executive director of the YWCA to the Honourable Michael Miltenberger dated December 27th of last year, and previous correspondence concerning the issue of pay and benefits for non-government organizations delivering government programs, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Chairman, under community health programs just shy of a half million dollars is identified for contributions to additional costs associated with the increased number of children receiving services under the Child and Family Services Act and to providing services for children in southern facilities due to an increase in the number of placements. This is quite a…It’s a lot of money on its own and I’m wondering if the Minister could give us some idea in terms of percentage or ratio this, as I say, almost half a million dollars, how much of an increment is this in what was forecasted for this...

Mr. Speaker, I believe we do have a way of building something like this into our ongoing budget. It is called forced growth. We do it all the time. We are going to be dealing with it later on today, I believe, when we consider the supplementary appropriation bill. This is something that I would be very much in support of considering if the Minister’s department or, in fact, others that deal with NGOs, feel that it could be warranted, to offer our partner NGOs an increment for salary and wages. Would the Minister consider using forced growth as a way of providing these NGOs with some wage...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Okay, I think I have a handle. So it was the sort of the price of volatility. I like what I just heard, Mr. Chairman, in that departments have been extended, if you will, half of the forecasted increment, but some obligation has been put on them to find ways to avoid or replace the other half. I like that. That’s putting some responsibility on managers toward our energy agenda.

Mr. Chairman, when it comes to dealing with the fuel and the volatility of it, we just went through a bill earlier in this session directed toward the petroleum products division, which...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. In the last two days, Mr. Speaker, the issue of parity or at least some degree of fairness in wages and benefits for NGOs that deliver programs on behalf of our government has been a bit of a topic here. It’s interesting to note some evolution in that issue, Mr. Chairman. I would quote from Hansard of February 23rd from a comment that the Honourable Michael Miltenberger, Minister of Health and Social Services, said in regard to a question about wage parity. The Hansard record says of the Minister, “I don’t recollect when the time was that there was automatic increases...

Mr. Chair, I think this is the first time in this bill that the information comes up about the rise in fuel prices and the impact it is having on our current year’s budget. People will remember, with some horror and trepidation, Mr. Chair, the way fuel prices skyrocketed last summer and fall. We are now seeing the impact of it on our operations. I believe this whole supp here, the cumulative impact on various departments is $4.3 million in unforeseen fuel costs. In this particular page, $281,000 attributed to or connected with Public Works and Services’ issues.

Mr. Chair, I have several...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. As to the cause or the responsibility for the contamination in the first place, I know that in many community sites around the Northwest Territories, due to activities from years ago and decades ago under different owners or different parties, there are previous liabilities. Are we looking into whether or not there is a potential liability that could be assessed to previous owners or occupancy of this site, Mr. Chair?

Thank you. Again, we are going into some policy area here, and maybe it is something that I will take up at another time in more detail, but I am interested in how consistent this policy is across various losses or disasters or people who lose cabins and things due to forest fires, floods and various things of this nature. Unless the Minister cares to offer some comment, does disaster loss of any kind enable the victims to be able to get 100 percent of costs covered by the government? Mr. Chair.