David Ramsay

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask the Premier, I guess for Regular Members, what is our best course of action in trying to communicate to the Workers' Compensation Board that, as a Yellowknife MLA, I feel the 100 jobs should be downtown? I think we should pay attention to the revitalization project that’s taking place downtown, and try to maintain these jobs downtown. I’m wondering if the government should write letters to the Workers' Compensation Board chairman. Should we talk to the mayor? Who is going to take up that fight on the government’s side of things? Is it going to be the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I guess it’s kind of the same as when Regular Members have to deal with injured workers and we feel completely left out of the process. If the Minister responsible for the Workers’ Compensation Board was advised of this type of investment taking place, I’m wondering why he didn’t advise us, and we had to ask him and request from him a meeting to go over the business case for such a move. Does the government or Premier feel that it makes sense to allow the Workers' Compensation Board to build this office complex outside of the downtown business core of the city of...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, I am wondering why the WCB is so intent on having this waterfront address. The last time I looked, employer premiums were increasing, and injured workers were still feeling that the process and the bureaucracy were treating them badly and poorly. How can the WCB justify the building of this waterfront castle? They even stated that they will maintain public walking trails within the vicinity of this new building, and all of this on the back of the injured worker and the employers paying ever-increasing premiums. Mr. Speaker, I will have questions for the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are to the Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation.

Would the Minister advise what the capital costs were for the seniors’ facilities in each of the following communities: Deline, Fort Resolution, Tuktoyaktuk?

What is the current occupancy in each of these three facilities?

What has been the historic occupancy rate in each of these three facilities?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I’d like to ask the Minister what type of meaningful consultation takes place with a community that would allow a facility built in a community like Tuktoyaktuk to stand vacant for three years, and now we’re actually going to try to go back and do something about it? But whose responsibility is it that that facility built with our scarce resources sat empty for three years? I’d like to ask the Minister how much did it cost to build these three facilities, and what has been the ongoing operations and maintenance costs for those three facilities for the...

That’s okay.

Yes. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I’ll rephrase my question for the Premier. Does the Premier and the government feel that they should support the downtown capital area of this, Yellowknife, capital city of the Northwest Territories, by maintaining the Workers' Compensation Board and the 100 jobs they represent be in the downtown core? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions today are for the honourable Premier, and it goes back to my Member’s statement from earlier today. I’m just wondering if the Premier knows, or can tell us, what type of consultation took place between the Minister responsible for the Workers’ Compensation Board and the Minister responsible, in terms of this new office building. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The subject I would like to speak about today is the proposed new Workers' Compensation Board office complex that is currently being entertained by the WCB. The Minister responsible has not presented any type of rationale or business case for this happening. The Standing Committee on Governance and Economic Development is finally going to be briefed next Wednesday, a day before this session concludes. It is only because, Mr. Speaker, we asked him for the briefing; he didn’t offer it.

Mr. Speaker, I do not take issue with the WCB wanting to have its own building if it...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it is a sad thing that pieces of public infrastructure get built in communities, and, again, the Minister didn’t answer the question. What type of meaningful consultation takes place in a community that would allow a seniors’ facility to be built and nobody living in it for three years? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.