Julie Green

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'd like to table the "Social Assistance Act Income Assistance Regulations" and "Exemplars, Income Assistance Changes, July 2016." Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, my question for the Minister  and please take this as I'm concerned, and it took a lot of work to get to this point. So I'm not too surprised you haven't heard from people who are on income assistance. My question is: why did your department change its income assistance regulations and stop funding food and clothing allowances for children? So we're talking specifically about NWT income assistance regulations.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are about income assistance, and in order to avoid the kind of misunderstanding that I had with the Minister yesterday, I just want to start by asking a preliminary question: is the Minister up-to-date with the changes that have taken place in the income assistance regulations? Mahsi.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. So what? Well, first almost a quarter of NWT children live in poverty, 22 per cent. The Canada Child Tax Benefit is supposed to alleviate poverty for these children and low income families, but NWT families on income assistance are being shortchanged. The federal government has given with one hand, and the GNWT has taken away with the other. Poor families are the ones out of pocket. I will have questions. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and thank you to the Minister for that answer. I think one of the major issues here is that I needed the help of the research department to understand exactly what was going on in the administration of these benefits. I stand by the remarks that I made, that every example shows a decrease in both food and clothing allowances.

I understand the Minister doesn't believe that this is the case, but that's what my research shows. So maybe -- and this is going to turn into a comment rather than a question. I'll follow up with written questions. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I appreciate that the Minister has now enabled income assistance recipients to keep a wider range of income than was previously the case. However, the amount of money paid for both food and clothing has been reduced for income assistance recipients. How can the Minister justify reducing these assistance amounts when they are meant to alleviate poverty for the people who are most in need?

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to acknowledge the passing of my great friend and mentor Ruth Spence. Mrs. Spence was a force to be reckoned with from the time she arrived in Yellowknife. She was the first executive director of the YWCA in Yellowknife. She built the Y from a 12-bed home for single women to the 84 apartments at Northern United Place.

Mrs. Spence served several terms on the Yellowknife City Council, was chair of the Stanton Territorial Hospital, and the Yellowknife Health and Social Services Authority. She was honoured with one of the first Orders of the NWT last year. She lived the...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, today is an important day. It is the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty, as declared by the United Nations and marked each year on this date since 1987.

I believe all of us understand that poverty is a problem here in the Northwest Territories, as it is in much of the world. According to 2014's CRA tax filer data, 17 per cent of families and 22 per cent of children live in poverty in communities across the NWT.

In March, the federal government announced it would help families with income under $80,000 a year with the cost of raising their children...

Right around the time we were elected, so in other words when the Minister was not yet the Minister, the treatment centre sold for almost double the price of the appraisal, which I take to be $880,000. Does the Minister have any idea how the building suddenly gained all that value?

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Today I have some questions for the Minister responsible for the Housing Corporation about the sale of the treatment centre on the Detah Road. My first question is: does the sale include both the land and the building? Mahsi.