Thank you, Mr. Speaker. A significant amount of work has been done around child and family services. The 16th Legislative Assembly did a comprehensive review where this exact question came up on a number of occasions. Also, the Auditor General recently brought forward a fairly scathing report of child and family services here in the Northwest Territories, and committee has been very, very, very active in articulating their concerns and their desire for significant change. As a result, we are moving forward with Building Stronger Families, an action plan to transform the child and family...

We actually have filled a large number of the physician positions on a permanent basis. But given that we do have a contract here in the Northwest Territories, those physicians who are resident here are entitled to education time and sick time as well as annual time. We want to make sure that we are continuing to provide services, so there is still a use of locums. But for the most part, in Yellowknife, in Hay River, in the Beaufort-Delta we’ve been able to get physicians in on a permanent basis. But until all positions are filled that way, we will continue to use some locums.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The recruitment and retention of physicians continues to be a challenge, but I think at this point in time we are actually doing fairly well. We have moved to a system where all the physicians are actually employees of one body rather than multiple bodies. This has actually given us some opportunities, because individuals can now have rights and access to Stanton even if they don’t happen to live in Yellowknife.

When we originally went to this one model, the expectation was that we’d be having physicians in Yellowknife who can actually provide services in other...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, I do.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise today to congratulate the NWT Montessori Society on their 40th anniversary. The society has been part of the Great Slave riding for many years, delivering a high quality Montessori Casa preschool program from the society’s location on 52nd Street.

Yesterday the society celebrated their 40th anniversary with festivities at their downtown and N.J. MacPherson locations. Students were treated to a surprise visit from a mock Maria Montessori, founder of the Montessori method, collected material from a time capsule and enjoyed a reception with cake and fruit.

The...

Thank you. I appreciate the comment, and we’re working with our partners, including the different French associations here in the Northwest Territories as we move forward.

Should this legislation be passed, it will take a bit of time, six to 12 months to roll it out. But to ensure that we are still able to provide French juries here in the Northwest Territories, we have agreements with three different provinces that will allow us to hold French jury trials in their jurisdictions until such time as we get our stuff in place in six to 12 months.

Now, as I’ve indicated, it is rare that this...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. With me today are Emily Ingarfield, the manager of policy and planning on my left; and Kelly McLaughlin, director of legislation on my right.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am pleased to be here today to speak about Bill 38, An Act to Amend the Jury Act.

The main focus of the amendments to the Jury Act is to permit the Department of Justice to develop regulations that will allow French-speaking residents of Yellowknife to be effectively identified for inclusion on a specialized French jury list. There are also a number of minor amendments, including one that will add Public Prosecution Service of Canada employees to the list of persons exempted from jury service. Another amendment will repeal the provision of the act that references fees...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Pages are an integral part of the operation of this Chamber and we’ve been blessed to have Pages from all over the Northwest Territories come and work with us. I really do appreciate all the work that all the Pages have done and I’d like to thank all the Pages that we’ve had over the years and the Pages that we’ll have in the future. In particular, I’d like to recognize a number of Pages who happen to live in the Great Slave riding who have been with us here since last Monday and are going to be with us here until March 12th, and those individuals are Shiri MacPherson...

Resolving this particular challenge here in the Northwest Territories is going to take partnership and awareness, and one of the main organizations that do incredible work in this area is the NWT Seniors’ Society. We do currently provide funding to the NWT Seniors’ Society to offer a toll-free line to seniors with a significant amount of information, including who they might be able to call if they are witnessing things like senior or elder abuse. We can certainly have a conversation with them to see if and how that can be expanded. But at the same time, if you see or happen to witness abuse...