Caroline Cochrane

It is really unfortunate to hear that our elders are actually feeling that their heating bills are more expensive. We do expect that it would be more expensive due to the space heaters; however, the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation has made a commitment that we will be paying for the elders' heat during this time until the units are fixed. So if there are any elders within the centre who do not know that and are paying their own bills, then we will be knocking on those doors and telling them to provide them to us and we will be reimbursing them and telling them that, in future, until...

Previous announcements to the Housing survey were provided through various methods: we did some media campaign; we did a radio campaign. We have our local Housing organizations and our government service officers trying to go work with people; the government services officers, when they're doing their home visits, to actually get the survey done.

It was requested that we extend the survey for one month at the beginning of this session. I have agreed because it is more important for me to get quality work than to just get the work done. So we are, again, refocusing our campaign. We are really...

As some of the Members may be aware, NWT Housing Corporation had originally had money in that region within this budget, this coming budget. We had to do a reallocation of that because the federal government gave the monies directly to the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation. So that was $15 million totally; $10 million coming up in the new fiscal year.

So the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation, which I will call "IRC" from here on, does have the discretion to use their funding as they see fit. However, we have met with them and we both decided that it is in the best interest to the residents of the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I also want to take a moment to recognize Arlene Hache, who is a strong social advocate not only for the community of Yellowknife but for community members throughout the Northwest Territories. Arlene Hache is also a strong mentor of mine. I've known her as a personal friend over 20 years, and if anyone blames me for tenacity it's partly her fault. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

As said earlier, we have done a study to determine what the heat issues were. We are committed to working with the contractor and making sure that these issues are alleviated. At this point we are not looking at a boiler system in that building; however, if we continue to have heating problems within the next winter then we will then seriously consider this as an alternative.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would love to be able to stand here on this side and say, yes, the issue is totally taken care of, but unfortunately that is not the reality of it. We have gone into the community; we've done some intensive reviews of the building. We have realized that there are some deficits within the building. We've realized that we need more heaters to be able to address the situation. There are some inequities within the heat that's in the building, so we are looking to address these things. In the meantime, though, every senior has a space heater.

One of the other things that we...

Sixty-two per cent of the public housing wait list actually at this point is comprised of applicants needing a single bedroom unit, so we do have a huge demand for single units, and it's really hard to balance that need for singles when we also have needs for families with children. We will be putting a huge emphasis, though, within the coming year on singles. Like I had said in my previous answer, the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation also recognizes the need for seniors and are working with us to address this issue within their region.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Within the region, within Tuktoyaktuk itself, we have 162 public housing units and nine affordable housing units; in Paulatuk, we have 57 public housing units and nine affordable housing units; in Ulukhaktok, we have 90 public housing units and 11 affordable housing units. Sachs Harbour, we have 20 public housing units and five affordable housing units. That makes a total, Mr. Speaker, of 320 public housing units and 34 affordable housing units.

So it's a really fine balance that we have to do. As the Housing Minister, we have to make some difficult decisions, so we have needs in the communities to build new housing units to replace ones that are not able to be used anymore. We have major renovations in communities that we have to address, and then we have the units that are no longer usable and it's very costly to do the remediation and the disposal of. So it's a fine balance, but we have committed because we know it's an issue. So we committed within this year and the next fiscal year that we're going to actually take out 101...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I do want to acknowledge two of the pages from Range Lake that are in the House today, Safiya Hashi and Anusha SivaKumar, and I'm really glad that they're here in the House. Thank you.