Jane Groenewegen

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today I’d like to talk about support for grandparents who are caring for their grandchildren. I’m a grandmother and I know that if I had to go to sleep at night or for one minute had to wonder whether my grandchildren were being properly cared for, I would necessarily have to rearrange my life and make sure that I stepped in and became involved in that. Thankfully, I’ve been blessed with daughters-in-law and sons that are probably better parents than their parents were, but I understand the heart of grandparents who do step in and raise their grandchildren.

This issue...

Thank you, Minister Lafferty. Rather than getting into great detail on the program itself, if we could limit our comments today to the issue of the increase on the cap for the Student Financial Assistance. That might serve us well. Thank you. Mr. Yakeleya.

Agreed, thank you. I’ll ask the Sergeant-at-Arms to please escort the witnesses to the table.

Minister Lafferty, could you please introduce your witnesses for the record?

Thank you, Minister Lafferty. General comments. Next I have Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Minister Lafferty. I’d like to ask the Minister if he’d like to bring witnesses into the Chamber.

Thank you, Mr. Bouchard. Minister Abernethy.

It’s no secret that we live in one of the harshest climates on the planet. It would reason well that our government, when investing millions of dollars in new infrastructure, we want to be on the leading edge, cutting edge. We would want to be the showcase of energy efficiency.

Again, I’m just curious, has the Department of Public Works and Services done anything above and beyond the standard national building codes for the various types of buildings that they build that would see our costs reduced to operate on an ongoing basis in the actual construction? I appreciate the biomass piece, but on...

Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Next I have Mr. Bouchard.

Thank you, Mr. Aumond. Mr. Dolynny.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As Members know and Cabinet knows, we have had some recent retrofits of some government infrastructure in Hay River. We appreciate these very much. Of course, I made reference today in my statement to the work that’s going on to construct a new regional health centre for Hay River. I have a question for the Minister of Public Works and Services.

Over the years we have talked a lot in this House about how to make new infrastructure owned and operated by the GNWT more energy efficient. I’d like to ask the Minister of Public Works and Services, are there any particular...