Kevin O'Reilly

Thanks, Mr. Chair. Earlier, I guess, in the last session, I had asked the department to calculate the additional costs -- I shouldn't say "additional costs." What would be the additional costs if junior kindergarten was included in all the formulae that are used to help fund our district education facilities? That additional cost came to about $1.7 million. Just to be clear, that shortfall in funding for the district education authority, that is not covered in the supplementary appropriation. Is that the case, Mr. Chair? Thank you.

Just very briefly. The purpose of this motion is in response to the White Paper that the Chief Electoral Officer submitted, and that was sort of looking at election administration in the NWT in a broader sense comparing us with some other jurisdictions. The committee is not recommending acceptance of all of the recommendations of that report, but this motion is an effort to help clarify some of the roles and duties of the Chief Electoral Officer in terms of modernizing our approach to elections and his or her role into the future. I think this will provide the kind of authority that the office...

Mr. Chair, as you mentioned earlier, we are just going to work away through each of the recommendations as a motion.

The first recommendation I have: Mr. Chair, I move that the Assembly recommend that the Elections and Plebiscites Act be amended to establish an electoral residency requirement of six consecutive months on or before polling day. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. So yes, some of it's for unanticipated enrolment, but the $1.542 million for JK, how is that calculated and what does it actually get us? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. This is recommendation 9 from the report. I move that this Assembly recommends that Section 257.1(1) of the Elections and Plebiscites Act be amended to increase the penalty for non-compliance to $500, plus a daily fine of $50 to a maximum of $1,000. And further, that the act be amended to establish that the term of office for returning officers expires with resignation, change of permanent residency to outside the Northwest Territories, revocation, or death. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I do sincerely appreciate the efforts of my Cabinet friends to speed up that work. I just want to go on the record, because I don't often do that, thanking them for their hard work on that one. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that very clear commitment. One more question for him, if I may, Mr. Speaker: the audit shows that there is often a flurry of activity around the adoption of a greenhouse gas strategy and then efforts to monitor and report quickly wane. We know that, if we don't get our act together, we may be ineligible for federal program funding. How does the ENR Minister intend to ensure that climate change becomes a real priority for this government with the attention and leadership it clearly requires and as called for by the Auditor General...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just would like to speak to this briefly. The committee was also cognizant that we did receive correspondence from the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs and the NWT Association of Communities expressing some concerns about the recommendation that came from the Chief Electoral Officer on this subject. To us, that just flagged that this needs some more work and a discussion amongst these different organizations. I think there are probably some good opportunities for collaboration and coordination amongst them, whether having the Chief Electoral Officer run...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the efforts of my Cabinet friends to move this up and try to get the work done within one year. That is something that I raise concerns about and I am really glad to see that they were able to respond positively and try to move this work up. I understand that there might be some capacity issues in terms of getting the work contracted and out the door and following up appropriately and so on. I take it, then, from what the Minister said that they are developing a bit of a plan to try to speed up that work. Any idea when they might be able to share some of the...

Thanks to the Minister for that. I am no Chicken Little, and it is not my leadership that is being questioned by the Auditor General here on climate change. It is this government's. ENR and Infrastructure undertook joint public engagement on the development of an energy strategy in Climate Change Strategic Framework.

That work was done months ago and a draft energy strategy is now out for further public consultation. There has been no public recording on the status of the Climate Change Framework until earlier today. Why is the Climate Change Strategic Framework lagging so far behind the energy...