Charles Dent

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Cabinet was certainly aware of the recommendation that the committee made, and there was some discussion about it. As I have said, I think we would all agree that investments in early childhood programming are significantly important investments, but we haven’t yet found a way to say that we have the money to put this back into the budget yet. As I have already said though, this is something that we are continuing to discuss. I am convinced that this is the area where we should try and look for an opportunity to reinvest, and we will continue to do that.

In terms of...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is made up a couple of things. There is a bit over $800,000, as I mentioned in my opening comments, that relates to the expansion of the nursing program. Sorry; it's $269,000 due to the bachelor program and nursing program because of the increased enrolment. The $825,000 is a catch-up in student financial assistance. That's really just growth that has happened because of an increased uptake over the years. The money wasn't in our budget previously, but it got to the point that we couldn't cover it from other places and have now asked and received permission to...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I believe I indicated to standing committee that we expect to have it completed by May.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, it's certainly an area that I recognize the importance of investing in. I think all of my Cabinet colleagues do, as well. It is something that we have had some discussion about, and we are certainly interested in seeing what we can do. We will look at whatever options we can. Without having rolled it out, just off the top of my head I know that non-government organizations don't like to see short-term funding, and I don't know how excited they would be about quarterly funding because it's tough to get staff to commit for programs that you don't know...

No, there is no change to the program. We are still going to have $1,750 maximum per semester for the tuition, for example. This is really related to a volume increase. We’ve had a significant increase in the number of students who are accessing student financial assistance and so that’s really the biggest driver, the numbers of people taking it. The loan side would be driven by cost to cost increase.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I guess I have to be cautious about agreeing with the Member that we just spent $200,000 on buildings that were beyond economic repair, so I am not going to agree to that. We are not saying that.

In the longer term, there does need to be something to address the housing issue in Inuvik and I have met with the Chair of the college board and we’ve talked about the solutions to the housing issue in all three communities, Smith, Yellowknife and Inuvik. The all have housing issues. I have told him I am prepared to consider innovative solutions, and I have encouraged the...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am advised that our people are already working with industry to try and develop that kind of programming, an operator training program to make sure that we have it delivered before people are needed to perform the jobs. So we are trying to stay on top of that.

The other area that I know the Member will be interested in is the area that Mr. Menicoche was talking about, the aboriginal skills employment program. That proposal -- which is shortly going in to the federal government -- will be seeking about $10 million, for a total of $14.5 million worth of training for...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would certainly like to hear if there are problems in communities in terms of there being a willing partner to work with us in training. I would like to know about it if there's a problem having us take advantage of it. We are always anxious to work with partners to make sure training can take place. I think in the past we've been pretty good through the regional offices. The staff have been very aggressive at finding partners and making sure that there are opportunities. But if something seems to be slipping through our fingers and if the Member hears about...

Mr. Chairman, I’m not aware. I think there were three boards in the Northwest Territories that were charging fees. I know that at the meeting with the board Chairs that at least one of the Chairs did mention a number, but I can’t remember what that amount was; I’m sorry.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I think this is an issue that there's an interest for this in high schools right across the Territories. There is a lot of demand for improvement in this kind of programming.

When we had the meeting here on February 24th and 25th with the Chairs of all the DECs, we took an opportunity to talk about partnerships and we talked specifically about this kind of training. The Yellowknife Catholic Schools here have an example of how, through a partnership arrangement, they have managed to put together a fairly good operation. The people from Yellowknife...