Michael Nadli

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. I’m sure Members and the public are ready for a good news story for a change.

Kakisa is getting a new community hall and I wanted to recognize the good work being done on this project. Community halls are important to the social fabric of the NWT. They are the scene of hundreds of local events but also serve the territory as a meeting place for visitors, presentations, consultations and regional special occasions.

The new facility replaces a much smaller community hall attached to the band office, and Kakisa simply outgrew the space. Using its MACA infrastructure contribution...

Maybe I will try to combine these two final points into one so I don’t take up too much time. The other point I wanted to be considered by the Housing Corporation is the accessibility of disabled persons. Of course, the social housing and public units sometimes do occupy and they have chronic conditions, whether it’s arthritis and they have to walk up the stairs or sometimes they are in a wheelchair. Sometimes they are restricted in terms of going up the stairs or restricted in terms of their mobility from their room to the bathroom to the kitchen. I just want to understand what steps the...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just a couple of comments in terms of the Housing Corporation and affecting, of course, the whole area of housing and how it is that we meet the needs of families and individuals that aspire to either own their own homes or else rent through the Public Housing Program initiatives.

One of the things that I see that seems to be fairly common is just the trend towards the public rental system. In some respects, the reality of living in the communities where you have a 40 to 50 percent rate of unemployment, opportunities are very few and far between, at least trying to work...

Thank you, Madam Chair. I just wanted to provide some general comments in terms of what we have before us. It has to be acknowledged that in the NWT we’re very dependent on our natural resources to take us through the hard times, and this far we’ve been very fortunate in terms of the mineral industry playing a very vital role in ensuring that we have operating diamond mines to create employment and business and help the NWT overall in terms of the GDP, our gross domestic product, in terms of trying to at least invigorate the economy in the NWT.

That being said, this government is constrained in...

I don’t know whether I should continue asking the Minister of Health and Social Services questions, but I’ll try. A significant portion of residential school survivors, at the federal level the Residential School Settlement Agreement has provided numerous remedies and forms of compensation.

What is this government, the GNWT, doing to build on these remedies? Is it providing direct support such as professional counselling to the thousands of NWT residents negatively affected by the residential school experience? Mahsi.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. The Indian and Residential School Supplement has been in effect for the better part of a decade. The supplement has five components, including the common experience payments, intending to recognize the harmful impact of the residential school experience. A total of $1.9 billion were allocated for common experience payments.

In the Northwest Territories, 5,000 people received these one-time lump sum payouts. The average payout is about $20,000. Although the formal common experience payment process ended two years ago, $40 million remains in the pot, so the federal government...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I’ll try to keep my comments as brief as I can. The department, of course, is the second largest in this budget and we’re seeing schools and, at the same time, languages and also training and income support initiatives. So, overall, I think the main concern that I express is the status of some initiatives. In particular the Junior Kindergarten initiative, perhaps if you could maybe term it JK versus Aboriginal Head Start program. I understand that that’s going forward, but I understand there have been some concerns in terms of how it is that that program would go ahead. I...

I believe in his role on the Social Envelope Committee of Cabinet, the current Health and Social Services Minister may be the appropriate Minister to answer this question. I would like to know if there’s an appetite, a political willingness for the territorial government to match the federal government’s $3,000 personal credit. A matching territorial credit would benefit anyone who doesn’t manage to meet their upcoming deadline. Or could it be used by people who want to collectively organize on the land healing activities. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to ask the Minister of Health and Social Services if he can commit in helping residents complete the applications regarding residential scholarships. The deadline is fast approaching. Perhaps the government services officers, or GSOs, in communities can provide assistance, or perhaps the Minister knows of other appropriate employees who can step up and assist. Mahsi.

It seems, once again, we put great effort in updating legislation and regulations, but then we really leave it to the communities. The Dog Act is basically left for communities to enforce the dog control measures, so my question again to the Minister is: Does MACA offer any training or guidance to communities on dog control matters?