Jackson Lafferty

First, I’d like to commend the Sahtu region and the communities for their academic success. Congratulations to them. The needs assessment that the Member is referring to is before our department now compiling all that information. I know the Member has addressed that issue in the House on numerous occasions. Now it’s before us within the department. Now we’re compiling all the information from other jurisdictions, as well, because we are looking at a territorial-wide training initiative and how it’s going to look in the Sahtu region. The Member alluded to earlier about the program development...

During my discussions with Jason Kenney, these were some of the discussions that we’ve raised. We’ve raised some concerns, as well, just to elaborate and also enhance our nominee programming. The Northwest Territories Nominee Program is employer driven. The program is administered by our department and supports a permanent residency. The department is investigating ways, as I stated, to enhance the immigration program, which includes raising awareness of the Nominee Program and provide supports for new Canadians. Any new enhancements to the Nominee Program will be met with the existing...

Mahsi, Madam Chair. We recall that two years ago that was addressed to our department. I was just trying to get clarification of the status on that. The appeals part will be introducing that potentially this coming fall. I will get Ms. Saturnino to just maybe elaborate more in detail. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. First and foremost is congratulating all the college grads throughout the Northwest Territories. We are very, very proud of them. Obviously, we want them to further their education success, as well, then, upon completion, return back to the Northwest Territories so we can offer them a northern attractiveness when it comes to workforce development.

Part of the Student Financial Assistance program is, again, one of the best across our nation and also international world renowned as well. We continue to provide those subsidies, those services to our students, whether it be...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. We are fully aware of the temporary foreign workers moratorium that is laid out across our country. GNWT has no Temporary Foreign Workers Program. It is a federal program but we do share concerns. I did speak with Minister Jason Kenney just the other day, Wednesday evening, May 28th, about this particular program and share our concerns, how to move forward on this and what his plans were. My department senior officials are working very closely with other counterparts as well, territorial/provincial and also the federal Minister’s office on this particular subject. Thank you...

Mahsi, Madam Chair. We’re fully aware of the collection that’s before us. It’s a challenge that we’ve been faced with, and the office of the Auditor General gave specific instructions on this particular area. The Member alluded to 60 percent fail. Those are areas that we are continuously and aggressively going after for collection. This is not pertaining to this particular change. The amendment is coming with the $5 million increase. So it is a separate topic, and I’ll get Ms. Saturnino to just elaborate a bit more on the process itself. Mahsi.

Yes, I would.

As I stated in this House, I did meet with both YK 1 and the Catholic School Board just a couple days ago, and we’re compiling all the numbers now. We want to have the true facts and the true numbers. That will be before us early next week and we will be releasing that to the public.

Again, when we are rolling out the program this fall, we talk about the implications into the daycare providers, and the contributions they get from ECE is based on enrolment, the enrolment of the child in the daycare system. We’ll continue to support those areas.

Mr. Speaker, when I talk about the action plan, yes, it’s been directed to us that we need to have more time to engage the general public because it will be their document, their solutions, their ideas and their suggestions. So I have allowed more time for that to happen. We want to deliver a draft action plan by this fall – that’s the target date – and deliver that in the House potentially I am hoping by February session or sooner. It all depends on the engagement that we’re conducting.

When the Member is talking about using existing resources or new funding, those are a mixture of information...