Charles Dent

Mr. Chairman, every year we go through a process of evaluating the needs in the capital plan and every year there will be some movement because we will sometimes find that the piles are rotting on a school somewhere that we weren’t aware of and have to move some project forward, or we discover that the population has dropped in a community in the school, therefore it isn’t quite as urgent to deal with the project. I will certainly keep the Member’s request in mind as we are looking at the capital projects next year. It’s difficult to make any promises. It’s impossible to make promises at this...

Thank you, Madam Chair. In fact, for instance this year the school population has dropped by just under one percent. So school populations haven't increased very much at all over the last four or five years. What we're finding is a good part of the growth is in the smaller communities when it comes to secondary school graduation. So it's not something that doesn't indicate that we are seeing an improvement. Given the small numbers of people we have in schools, the numbers tend to jump up and down a fair bit, but the trend seems to be going the right way. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have had an opportunity to tour the facility. I have had an informal meeting with members of the board, so I am aware, in a general sense, of what the interest is. I do know what the programming is that they propose to offer, yes.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yes, certainly when a proposal comes forward like that, it will be given careful consideration. I would be happy, at that time, to meet with the board and discuss their proposal. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, for the most part there won’t be any considerable growth in permanent facilities for the college outside of the three campuses that we have. But the college is certainly anxious to be involved in training and has worked extensively to develop partnerships in the oil and gas industry in particular. We’re always looking for ways that the training can be provided in the regions. There’s an awful lot of mobile training that is offered and it’s offered usually in conjunction with industry and doesn’t require the same sort of investment in infrastructure to...

Certainly, Mr. Chairman. Materials and supplies is $95,000; purchased services is $191,000; contract services is $631,000; fees and payments is $106,000; other expenses is $199,000; computer hardware and software is $1.637 million.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Indirectly, yes. This government controls the funding flow to the boards, so there’s an expectation that the boards will follow the philosophy of the Department of Education, Culture and Employment when they’re providing the schooling. But boards are given a significant amount of freedom because they’re elected locally, and as long as they’re delivering the service as set out in the Education Act and subject to the directives and standards that we have in the department, then they can set their program delivery pretty much autonomously.

Mr. Chairman, there’s been nothing but some general discussion about where it might fit. Some of that will depend on some program decisions and the overall discussion we have to have with the three boards in Yellowknife.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I have committed in this House to make a presentation to the Standing Committee on Social Programs to go through the policies underlying the program, outlining what the benefits are now, and discuss with the Members what might be some options for change within the program. So it is my intention to do that with the Standing Committee on Social Programs, hopefully within the next little while.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As I mentioned to Mr. Delorey earlier, this sort of program I think is on everybody's radar right now. It is an extremely important type of program, but, unfortunately, we haven't identified any money to add into the formula for schools. So the schools are going to have to look for opportunities to partner up. I know, for instance, the Yellowknife Catholic Schools have gotten some short-term contracts with Aurora College for the use of the facility. They did make it available, as I said earlier, to the Dogrib Community Services Board for some of their students to...