Glen Abernethy

Thank you, Madam Chair. I’m going to go to Ms. Bronwyn Watters for some of that answer. To start off with, the planning that is being done for the facility in Fort Smith, the women’s facility does include a significantly larger capacity to deal with future trends that have been predicted within the department. I’ll go to Ms. Bronwyn Watters for a more comprehensive answer.

With respect to the future facility in Fort Smith, the planning study has been done, and it includes a needs analysis and operational plan, a facility program and a schematic design. We’ve already got that done. A rough cost-estimate of Class C. So we’re ready to go. When some money identifies, we’ll be standing in the line, asking for those dollars for that facility.

With respect to the Arctic Tern facility in Inuvik, a report came out in the 16th Assembly about the facility and how it’s not suitable as a corrections facility due to security concerns, doors being able to shut and whatnot. The...

This is actually one of the areas that we have been struggling with, is trying to figure out actually when we are going to start feeling the impacts of Bill C-10. I am not 100 percent sure, but we understand that parts of Bill C-10 could be implemented as early as six months from now, half a year. It is hard to say, but we are attempting to quantify it. As we get more information and we feel closer to that, I am happy to share that with committee, absolutely.

Thank you, Madam Chair. As a Regular Member in the 16th Assembly I had an opportunity to tour the female facility and also participate in a number of briefings on what the government needed to do with respect to the female facility in Fort Smith. It’s certainly something that’s a priority for the department. We need to get it done. It’s already gone through the design phase. We’re pretty much ready to go. It’s a financial issue. As the Minister of Finance has continually said, we’re strapped for cash right now. Until we have some free room, we have to keep trying to get it onto the books and...

It appears to be a bit of a contradiction. I’m not sure if I fully understand. If the Member wants us to do a cost-benefit analysis, we are going to have to know the costs that exist in the southern jurisdictions. That was where that comment came from.

When we are planning our facilities, we have to go through a number of processes to determine the costs. To do those analyses, we also have to identify what all the costs in the facility will be, including the human resources and all the other costs that are going to come down the pipes. That needs to be part of our planning process. This...

Yes, Madam Chair.

The Member keeps referring to the fact that we have a facility with one person in it. I just have to state again – we said it several times – we have no facilities with one person in it. All of our facilities have large numbers of people in them. We have a facility, a youth facility here in Yellowknife that houses both youth male and youth female. At this point we have one female offender in that facility, but it is still a facility and it still has a number of people in it.

I am interested in fiscal responsibility. I have sat, in the last four years, in front of this department during business...

We haven’t received any federal money to help us with our internal human resource management system, no. We haven’t received any money federally to help us with our human resource management system. It’s an internal system to the Government of the Northwest Territories and we fund it with GNWT dollars.

There’s nothing to prohibit, but it would cost money to do that analysis and I think our money could be better spent on programming for the residents of the Northwest Territories and the facilities that we do have.

I move, seconded by the Member for Thebacha:

WHEREAS Rule 85 requires that Members be appointed to the Standing Committee on Social Programs;

NOW THEREFORE I MOVE, seconded by the honourable Member for Thebacha, that the following Members be appointed to the Standing Committee on Social Programs:

Mr. Alfred Moses, the Member for Inuvik Boot Lake;

Ms. Wendy Bisaro, the Member for Frame Lake;

Mr. Daryl Dolynny, the Member for Range Lake;

Mrs. Jane Groenewegen, the Member for Hay River South; and

Mr. Norman Yakeleya, the Member for Sahtu;

AND FURTHER, that the following Members be appointed to the...