Jane Groenewegen

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Hay River has a wonderful high school, which is not utilized to its maximum capacity, with very experienced teachers and a very wide variety of course options, so I would like to ask the Minister if he could report back to us what a survey of parents might indicate who, in the South Slave, in small communities, might be interested in accessing an education in Hay River.

In my Member’s statement I was very clear to suggest that this would not be feasible, doable or even desirable if there were not home boarding or residential options available to these students that were sober, supervised, supported and in every way healthy for the children.

The Minister says that parents don’t want their high school students to go to regional centres for the reasons that the Minister stated, and he said that he will speak to the superintendents of education. Could we not perhaps find a way to ask the parents how they feel about that? Because I have run across many parents who...

By the time young people reach the age of high school, maybe it is an opportunity and it is time for them to spread their wings and experience some new things and perhaps living in a new community as long as – and I have to really stress this – there is safe, supervised and supported living accommodations for them in those regional centres.

So I for one would be in favour of having this dialogue on revisiting the idea of regional high schools. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I will take the opportunity to stand up as somebody who has been in this House for a long time and has heard a lot of exchanges, and has been known to spar and argue and fight with the best of them on the other side of the House, but, Mr. Speaker, I did find Mr. Hawkins’ comments, questions to Mr. Beaulieu yesterday to be offensive and it did, in my opinion, reduce the demeanor of our House.

Mr. Hawkins was asking Minister Beaulieu questions you really couldn’t answer, like can you do your job. Some of it is even what I would put in the context of asking him for an...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I guess I would just like assurance that before this facility would leave the hands and the submission of the GNWT under the Department of Public Works and Services that there would be ample time to entertain proposals for other sorts of things. I have suggested in the past perhaps even like NGOs that deal with certain types of social issues and things like that. I just don’t want to see us run out of time and go, oh no, here comes the wrecking ball, let’s tear the building down. I still think it has value. I’m a little biased.

Will the Minister assure me and assure the...

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Minister if he would concur that there are different standards of types of buildings within the inventory of the GNWT and that probably hospitals are one of the more costly and more technical types of buildings. They’re more costly to build. If we were looking at a repurposing or re-profiling of this building and it were not for a hospital, for something else, does the Minister concur that the standards that might be applied to that evaluation would be considerably decreased? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to recognize and thank two students from the Diamond Jenness Secondary School in Hay River who have been Pages for this week, Sean Smith and I don’t see Michaela Crook here, but she also served us. Thank you guys for a great job.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In June of this year I talked about the importance of showing our support for families across the Northwest Territories who have experienced the tragedy of losing a child through miscarriage, stillbirth, or Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Last week, October 15th was recognized in many countries, provinces and states around the world as a special day of remembrance for pregnancy loss and infant death. This day of remembrance has been honoured annually by all 50 U.S. states since 1988. In Canada, six provinces have observed October 15th a special Pregnancy and Infant Loss...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I give notice that on Monday, October 28, 2013, I will move the following motion: Now therefore I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, that the Legislative Assembly resolves to formally observe October 15th as a special day of awareness and remembrance for pregnancy and infant loss in the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, with the new health care facility in Hay River, I believe there are at least eight activities currently being carried on in the H.H. Williams Memorial Hospital which there has been no provision made for in the new health care facility. I could try to list them off, but maintenance, for example, has a large area within the hospital as it currently exists. I do not believe that maintenance has the kind of infrastructure at the new location that they had at the old location.

Has the Minister or would the Minister consider looking at those activities that have not been built into the...