Caroline Cochrane

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, I want to stress that the agreement for the $15 million is not in consultation with the Government of the Northwest Territories. It was done directly with the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation. They could determine what they wanted to do with the whole funding. We have developed a partnership. Within that partnership, the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation has agreed to make sure that the buildings are done to code. We have agreement that we will be confirming that, as well. The Inuvialuit Regional Corporation does have the capacity. This corporation does have...

As the Members are aware, the housing survey actually just closed the other day, and so we will actually have the statistics coming in which we will share with all Members, which will identify the prioritized needs of each community and what they say. So, once that information is all compiled, I will share that with all of the Members.

The current practice is that we try to do an assessment every year, and we try to look at all of the housing needs throughout the whole Northwest Territories. In my opinion, that was not always the best practice. That is why we are doing the survey and actually developing community plans, because, at that time, each community would have its own identified priorities, which, in my opinion, is a better way of providing services.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs was recently the subject of a performance audit conducted by the Office of the Auditor General of Canada. The audit assessed the department's performance as it relates to supporting community governments with the provision of essential services to residents.

The Department of Municipal and Community Affairs is always looking for ways to improve our programs and services. Given this commitment, we welcome the report and recommendations of the Auditor General.

The report of the Auditor General was tabled in this...

There is a variety of supports that seniors can actually access for renovating their own homes that they currently live in. Recently, we also put an extra $500,000 into our budget specifically for seniors' homes, that they can actually use to help renovate so that they can stay in their homes as long as possible.

We are working hand in hand with Health and Social Services. We recognize that, seniors, there is a huge need, that the population is growing, and we are doing the best we can to try to help seniors to be able to age in place, whether that means staying in their own homes or having...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Currently at this moment I do not know if we have tracked the seniors' needs in Tsiigehtchic at this point. I can make a promise that we will do an assessment on the community and see how many seniors there are. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I am very proud of the work that the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs has done as part of the Government of the Northwest Territories’ commitment to education, training, and youth development. Today, I would like to provide an update on the progress the department is making in the area of governance, capacity building, and support for community governments in the Northwest Territories.

Mr. Speaker, the cost of attending or delivering training in the Northwest Territories has always been high and can be challenging for community governments to work into their budgets...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Currently, the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs has nine unfunded positions. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. At this point, no, we are not inviting other communities to the table. We are looking at the communities that have some kind of ground ambulance or rescue services in place to be able to provide those provisions, so only those that have the services that can provide ground ambulance currently are going to be at the table. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Currently, we are not looking at turning it over to LGANT. Currently, LGANT only provides support services to their membership, whereas we provide supports to all municipal and Aboriginal governments. Thank you, Mr. Chair.