Jane Groenewegen

Agreed. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Dent. Thank you, Mr. Cooper. Thank you, Ms. Schofield.

What is the wish of the committee? Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I would like to table an excerpt entitled Public Service Growth, 1999 to 2004, public service growth by community. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’m not really sure what that meant. I think the Minister knows what I want to hear here, but anyway, we’ll keep going at it then if that’s what we need to do.

Mr. Chairman, you want to talk about the way the government spends money. In the case of unanticipated costs for anything, like a bad fire season, we find the money. Wherever there’s a will it seems there’s a way to find the money. That’s why we’re in government. That’s why we make the rules. That’s why we make the laws. That’s why we decide how to spend the money. There’s nobody else in charge. We’re in charge...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman I had an opportunity to just do a little bit of research. I had talked before the break a bit about the treatment of the casual and term positions and with respect to particularly the casual employees who worked at the justice and corrections facilities in Hay River. I was able to determine that when the Department of Justice went to Hay River to notify the employees verbally for the first time, at Dene K'onia, and they asked the casuals to leave the meeting. However, the casuals refused to leave the meeting and the indeterminates wanted them to stay...

Agreed. Thank you. Back to the start. Department summary, infrastructure investment summary, total net book value and work in progress, $59.368 million.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m sure they’re aware when they take casual positions of that, but I’m sure they’re also compelled to take it because they probably need work and they probably have families to feed. But, Mr. Speaker, with respect to term employees then, as well, is it possible that this government would let term employees go when their term comes up, in order to backfill their positions with other affected employees who have been on a priority hire list because of job losses? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My point is that if there were infractions of the Criminal Code and there was a serious rise in the statistics related to crimes committed, this government would be obligated to respond to that. If that required more financial resources, they would also be obligated to find those resources to deal with that. You wouldn’t just turn a blind eye to the crime and say, oh, well, we don’t have the money to deal with that.

The point I’m trying to get to, Mr. Chairman, is that when the government wants to do something or wants to find money for something or needs to find money...

Mr. Chair, I hope people can see this for what it is. Did the Minister envision, when this government spent $50 million on a new North Slave Correctional Centre, that you would be sucking the services out of the communities and bringing the inmates from all corners of the Northwest Territories in order to justify this $50 million expenditure? We talk about an expenditure of $400,000. Isn’t it ironic that we had to spend $50 million to save $400,000 here and $1 million there? I hope people can see the irony in this picture. Did the Minister or his department envision having to relocate and...

Agreed. Activity summary, services to the public, infrastructure investment summary, total net book value and work in progress, $814,000.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we’ve been talking a lot on this side of the House today about discrimination. I’d like to talk about the way this government treats casual and term employees. In an earlier set of questions, the Deputy Premier indicated that we’re not even including the casual employees who are going to be losing their jobs as a result of the actions taken in Hay River. I’d like to ask Mr. Roland, the Minister, what’s the purpose of hiring people on a casual and term basis in this government? Thank you.