David Krutko

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, one of the core components of our initiatives is to look at the affordability, adequacy and suitability of housing for people in the North. I think the biggest element of that is affordability. We hear about people trying to get mortgages, people trying to get into homeownership, but the problem that we’re running into is the costs of stick-built homes in the Northwest Territories are excessive. We do have a manufacturing directive that looks at manufacturing products in the North, and in the last 10 years we’ve spent $18 million in that area. All that goes...

Mr. Speaker, we do have programs through the Housing Corporation, such as the EDAP program or the IHP program. They are programs to assist from social housing into homeownership. What we have done is amortized this over 25 years. So by extending it by an extra five years, it brings down your mortgage costs and will make it more affordable for clients. We are working with clients in communities to ensure that they make that transition. I think because of lifting the moratorium, we are working with clients in all the different communities and counselling them to see if they are interested in...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I am working in conjunction with Bill Erasmus through the AFN allocation. As everybody knows, in the budget there was $5 billion allocated for aboriginal housing. We are working closely with Bill and the people he has, developing the proposal to take forth to the AFN meetings this summer; to look at a plan for the North for this funding so we can access funding for aboriginal communities on top of the funding we have through our core funding allocations.

Again, in the budget, that’s one area that we’re looking at. Also, there is work that is ongoing with...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, with regard to that, talking to manufacturers and other groups, like I stated, there is no one right now at the present time who has certification to deliver or build these units in the Northwest Territories. We have been talking to people in the private sector who are looking at developing proposals and coming forward. Again, Mr. Speaker, the whole idea of mobile units versus stick built, there’s almost a 40 percent difference between the price of a stick built and these mobile homes. Those mobile homes do meet national building standards and are also...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we have completed two phases of a needs survey. Based on those needs surveys which identify where the majority of the core need is, we are now focusing our dollars and resources to where that highest need is. That’s how we basically make our decisions on how we allocate; based on the needs surveys that have been completed.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I’d just like to point out to the Member that almost 50 percent of the cost of phase one was done through the BIP process. Fifty percent of that investment was put back into the North for the business communities, the manufacturing business that build the septic tanks, the fuel tanks and whatnot put into these units. So I would just like to clarify that for the Member, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I think we can’t lose sight of the objective that we’re trying to meet here. The whole intention was to ensure that we have housing available for our core...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to inform the Members and the general public of a change to the planned implementation of the new rent scale.

Mr. Speaker, in 1995, the public housing rent scale moved from a flat rate of 25 percent of income to a sliding scale of between 6.4 percent and 30 percent. This was done to bring our public housing sector more in line with other jurisdictions across the country and to ensure that public housing remained available to clients in need. This change was originally scheduled to take place over a four-year period from 1995 to 1998 but was...

We have to look at housing in the context of how do we get houses on the ground and get more accommodation in communities. This is one of the ways we’re looking at. I think that to access 22 units at the cost that we have been able to, we talk about affordability and trying to get program services to make sure that the client that we’re dealing with is looking at how these units could be occupied and also the rents that we’re charging. That was the big concern under phase one.

For phase two we believe we are able to come forward with changes that will bring down that cost to almost $1,000 a...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, with regard to establishing a policy of dealing with seniors and people with disabilities, I don’t see it being a problem. I think that’s something we can look at. We have an opportunity now. We’re reviewing our mandate going forward with a new Northern Strategy and also looking at how we are going to be dealing with these people. So with regard to the Member’s questions, yes, we can develop such a policy and I will bring that forward for the Member once we have it in place.

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Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, if you look at the programs and services that this government delivers, especially in the area of seniors and working with people with disabilities, we do have a lot of good programs. I’m not going to say they are all bad. We do have good programs out there. They do improve the living conditions of a lot of our seniors with regard to our repair programs and our maintenance programs. Also we are looking at the whole arrangement with regard to barrier-free access. The Member touches on that but, again, it’s a national standard. We build houses in the...