Daryl Dolynny

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. To put the Minister’s answer in context, this was a response done in camera, so I can’t believe we are talking about that in the House here. But I can tell you that, quite frankly, Ordinary Members have not seen this report yet, so we are talking about a report that is still not before the House or before Members, and what we know is that I can’t comment on something we haven’t seen.

NTPC is the only organization set to gain anything from the expropriation of Northland Utilities, and yet the Minister of Finance claims to open up competition. Yet it is he who writes the...

I was trying to find an answer in that to my question. The issue will be eventually if NTPC is successful, we are going to be talking about taxpayers’ money, and I think we need to come back to the point of the question.

To change things up a bit, I would like to take a moment to ask the Minister about a report, a report that the Minister has been referencing publicly in this House at a recent energy charrette and in media, whereas the Minister has more or less summarized that having one electricity distributor in the North will be more cost effective and can lower rates.

Can the Minister...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The past 48 hours has been host to a power struggle, a fight, not based on improving electricity rates or lowering our cost of living but a war of ego and ministerial legacy building.

I want to take this opportunity to speak about not what I believe is a legitimate RFP process in Hay River, but an ad that appeared in this week’s newspaper suggesting this government’s intention is to expropriate Northland Utilities, a successful, northern, private company, 60 years’ history, 50 percent owned by 27 Dene First Nations, and sure enough, today this Cabinet responded...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I move that this committee recommends that the Department of Education, Culture and Employment work closely with the Standing Committee on Government Operations to revise and bring forward its legislative proposal for amendments to the Official Languages Act in the life of this Assembly;

And further, if the department has received any legal opinions related to the issue of federal concurrence with changes to the NWT’s Official Languages Act, this information should be shared in confidence with the Standing Committee on Government Operations, so that the department and the...

I’d like to call Committee of the Whole to order. What is the wish of committee?  Ms. Bisaro.

  Thank you. We will commence after a short break.

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I believe I heard $24 an hour but I’m assuming it means per diem per day. I’m assuming that’s the number we’re referring to here.

Again, I’m not quite understanding whether or not there was a change in 2007 to the per diem rate for foster care families. It is alleged that $24 was the rate that may not have changed since 1996, as indicated in yesterday’s Hansard, but I’ll leave it at that. The question still is that that there is a CPI index that needs to be looked at since 2007. So, if by minimum compounded standards of 1.83 percent per annum, there would still have to have some considerable...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. After a review of yesterday’s Hansard, I’d like to continue where my colleague from Yellowknife Centre left off yesterday during questions on foster families. My questions are addressed to the Minister of Health and Social Services.

Referencing the 2014 Report of the Auditor General on Child and Family Services, it was stated by the Auditor, and subsequently noted by committee, that there was no standardized approach for foster care. Beyond the standard rates of pay for foster parents, there were no territory-wide standards of delivering foster care.

Can the Minister...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I would like to thank the Minister for bringing some clarity to the House and bringing some clarity to the committee with the report. I know the Minister has made offerings a number of times in his dissertation earlier about coming back in 120 days with a more fulsome report to us. That said, there was and there is a bit of a strained relationship currently, and I think our report factored that in with the standing committee. There were a lot of moving parts in the last couple of years since 2009, and our attempt was to try to find at least some commonality where language...

  Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Does committee agree?