Jackson Lafferty

Yes. It’s a great possibility. In fact, I’ll be addressing that with the Board of Governors when we’re meeting in June. We’ve already addressed with the Board of Governors a while ago, and they are developing their corporate plan for a long-term strategy. This will obviously be part of their strategy, community learning centres in all communities. They should be producing highly skilled, qualified people. That’s my view, that’s my push, and I fully support that. The Members support that, as well, so we’ll continue to push that forward.

Mr. Speaker, the Temporary Worker Program, again, is a federal funding, but also federal programming. The Nominee Program, we also administer that with the federal government. Part of the process is to monitor and evaluate the program itself. With the actual numbers which I don’t have with me, the detail, but I can share with the Member all the transactions that have taken place since we took over the program with the federal government until today and how we are planning to integrate that with the federal Temporary Foreign Worker Program as well. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Madam Chair, that is correct; they are two separate issues. We have been talking about the collection, how we can collect or be aggressive in that area. I’ve been dealing with my department on how to address those matters at hand because we have to take the Auditor General’s recommendations seriously into consideration, so that’s what we are doing. Those are two separate issues with requests of the $5 million to increase. Mahsi.

Mr. Speaker, I just want to make it clear. If I was forcing the school boards to use their surplus, I would take all the surplus back, which I am not doing. It is at the discretion of the school boards to use the funding towards educational programming, and we highly encourage them to do that. Some of the boards have, as I stated in this House, substantial surpluses. When it comes to enrolment, if the enrolment goes up, then obviously the financial aspect of the school boards, their contribution increases as well. Those are areas that we continue to closely monitor and provide additional funds...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. [English translation not provided.]

I would just like to recognize and I appreciate all the Pages working with us. I appreciate their work ethics and just for being here with us. One of them will be Sahara Sadeh Lafferty. Sadeh stands for my sunshine. She’s also my girl, Sahara Sadeh Lafferty. Mahsi.

Mahsi, Madam Chair. To my left is Jolene Saturnino. She’s the director of income security within the ECE department. Also, to my right is Ken Chutskoff, legislative counsel within Justice. Mahsi.

Mahsi, Madam Speaker. I am pleased to introduce Bill 24, An Act to Amend the Student Financial Assistance Act. The purpose of this legislation is to raise the maximum aggregate of the principal amounts of all student loans that may be made by the Government of the Northwest Territories.

The maximum aggregate principal amount of student loans that the government may lend under the Student Financial Assistance Act is currently set at $40 million. The amendment proposes to increase this amount to $45 million for the fiscal year 2014-2015 and thereafter. This change is required to allow the...

With any organization there is a budgeting process. We have to work with that. As the Department of Education, Culture and Employment, we provide public money to these organizations. There is the accountability issue and transparency issues, so we’ll continue to support that.

Mr. Speaker, I am not forcing the school boards to use their surplus on various projects. It is at their discretion to use. We’re hoping and encouraging them to use it towards their educational programming within their district. We will continue as a department working closely with them. My department, as I stated yesterday, is meeting with them now and yesterday and continues to discuss part of the opportunities that we have before us. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

I just did commit to that. Sometimes when it comes to a review, it does take time, but we will provide that information to the Members. Mahsi.