Bill Braden

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I won’t press this any further on this agenda tonight, Mr. Chairman. I have learned something that I certainly intend to carry into committee’s business. The GNWT should use every advantage that we can to get good value for the taxpayers’ dollar. We have every right to use the competitive marketplace to our advantage and the government, in many ways, is a major supplier and consumer of services. One, for instance, is in the rental market, Mr. Chairman. I believe the Yellowknife Housing Authority has something like 600 units under lease and yet I wonder to what...

Thanks, Madam Chair. I will not be supporting this motion either. I can appreciate that sometimes there is a benefit to giving ourselves some room and some time from when a motion or a bill is passed in the Assembly and when it actually takes effect. In fact, I think there are some that have been out there for years that have been passed by this Assembly, but have yet to take force. In this case, I don’t really know where the benefit would be for anybody to further delay the coming into force of the provisions of this bill, which, from my understanding, would come into force on assent....

That’s good news on the small community side where there is a one-shot resupply window.

The larger communities, I would anticipate, overall would account for a much larger chunk and here, Mr. Chairman, I am looking at the needs of our big infrastructures; schools, airports, water treatment facilities and things like that. Here is where again, are we knowing what our annual volumes are fairly accurate? Are we taking advantage of our volume, if you will, and using every possible leverage to buy ahead and get a good price and lock things in? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Speaker, I would pose a question in a very objective way, I hope. That is to challenge the Minister to look within and to check our own attitudes and our own cultures and our own biases within ourselves as a Legislative Assembly, at the management levels and the senior policy-making levels of our departments. I believe that is probably where we need to start. I would leave one more question on the table as an illustration of that attitude, I guess, that we’re bringing to the table, too. That is, our consistent refusal, Mr. Speaker, to return the National Child Benefit to income support...

Okay. Thank you. That’s a very helpful explanation. Just finally on this matter, does the Minister anticipate that the money requested here, will this take us to the end of March, to the end of the fiscal year, or is the potential that we will have to find some more money to finish up this fiscal year?

Mr. Speaker, government has a primary and fundamental responsibility to help those who are least able to help themselves. Children are at the very top of that list, for me. I would like to know if in the universal review that our government is undertaking of some 17 different lifestyle and social service programs are we going to make sure that the welfare of children is at the very top of our consideration in this review? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. In this area and in a couple of other programs in pages yet to come I see a very welcome expenditure here for homelessness and people encountering potentially emergency situations and we are putting assets at the disposal of communities large and small. By my math, there is somewhere in the neighbourhood of $376,000 spread amongst a couple of different departments. Mr. Chairman, while I see this, as I said, as a very welcome response and recognition to a situation out there on our streets, I’m wondering if this is potentially the beginning of creating another realm in...

Mr. Speaker, a few minutes ago…oh, yes. I believe we still have some people in the gallery today. Mr. Speaker, I would like to recognize a constituent, a tireless volunteer and a candidate for royalty in the upcoming Caribou Carnival, Ms. Mildred Wilke. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

---Applause

Further on that page, Madam Chair, were increases for compensation after we re-evaluated nursing and health care profession jobs to the tune of about $1.6 million. I’m wondering if this process has essentially now been concluded, Mr. Chairman, and are there any other residuals we might anticipate as a result of this re-evaluation. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The Minister also agreed that we’ve entered into a new agreement now with the Capital Health Authority at a 4.8 percent rate increase. What kind of term is there on this agreement, Madam Chair?