Bob Bromley

In reflection, I have to be quite disappointed that the Premier is not willing to welcome any input from our citizens on the issues that our people face. That’s shocking to me. It depends on what the question is on whether he is interested or not, so that’s a bit shocking, but let’s go with it.

With so many informed and caring citizens in our employment, and I assure the Premier, and although he sounds doubtful that we do have a significant number, there is some concern that GNWT may be tempted to silence public debate by preventing GNWT employees from expressing their opinions, even when the...

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thanks for the Minister’s clarification there. Again, I don’t know, but it just seems like it would be a good thing to have that built in somewhere in here, and maybe it is at some point, but I think that sort of clarity would be good. Although we hear about it in other forums, it might be good even in a narrative sense at the beginning of the department in the budget document here just to have that clarity. Just a suggestion there.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. My questions are for the Premier today. I’d like to start by noting that a democracy works best when all citizens are able to speak their minds.

Would the Premier not agree that we should welcome respectful input from everyone if we want to get the best result?

Thank you, Madam Speaker, and thanks to the Minister. If I had wanted the private emissions reductions cost efficiency, which I suspect would be a lot higher than GNWT, then I would have asked of that, but in fact, I asked for the government data.

I want to be sure that I do not surprise any other Ministers when I ask about the cost-effectiveness of their greenhouse gas reducing initiatives. We need to be sure that we are getting the best bang for the rare dollar that is allocated to this programming.

Will the Minister commit to working with his colleagues in ITI, Public Works and Services...

Thanks for the Minister’s response. I appreciate that and I also appreciate being close to the edge. That means I’m doing my job.

Madam Speaker, the Minister may or may not have been surprised, but I’m fairly sure I have not seen an analysis like this before. While the response left out an analysis of the rebate program that was requested, some programs are clearly more cost-effective than others.

Why, after running greenhouse gas reduction programs for over a decade, has the Minister never presented us with an evaluation of the cost-effectiveness of these various greenhouse gas reduction...

Thank you, Madam Speaker, I’d like to congratulate Aurora College and Mary Rose Sundberg for offering Wiilideh language lessons this year.

The course started on January 20th and continues until February 24th. Hugh Moloney, an instructor of the college, recently spent a year with his family, living and teaching in New Zealand. They were inspired about how the Maori language and culture have come to have an important role in New Zealand’s national identity. When Hugh came back to Yellowknife, he wanted to learn more about the Wiilideh language and culture.

Fortunately, he found that Aurora College...

Thanks to Ms. Bassi-Kellett for that. I guess I’m going to leave it at that. Like I said, many of the topics were covered. I was particularly interested in succession planning and where we are at that and whether there are any trends in that trying to build ourselves a bigger buffer there, because it was pretty serious a few years ago. I think I’ll just leave it at that at this point.

In terms of recruitment, one of the concerns I have – and the Minister addressed this the other day – is that the exit interviews aren’t telling us what the external factors are that are causing them to leave...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the department being here today. We had a pretty good start to general comments and I appreciated the discussion yesterday and many of the points that I had were ticked off there. That is, addressed one by one.

There was a lot of discussion on vacancy rates and recruitment. One thing I didn’t hear about was turnover rates. We’re winning these awards as the best darn employer around, which I appreciate and I want to reiterate my earlier congratulations to the Minister and his staff, but if it’s just, you know, we pay really well and we help with expenses and...

Thanks again for the Minister’s response. I know he’d like me to answer the questions that I’m asking here, but I think that’s his job and obviously he has the resources. I’m happy to come up with my own suggestion, but he’s got a lot of professionals working for him, so I think those are the people we want to engage.

Does the Minister agree that regulatory legislative sorts of actions can be quite cost-effective – they don’t cost millions of dollars – and are a toolbox that we should be looking at to get the objectives achieved that we know we need to achieve? Mahsi.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I just want to follow up from my earlier questions with the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources. I understand there is a report coming out on the cost-effectiveness of our respective program for greenhouse gas reductions. The Minister has obviously got the results as a result of the analysis he did in response to my questions.

What sort of contemplations are in place, are happening towards now responding to that information we have so that we can increase our cost-effectiveness on the basis of these analyses? Thank you.