Norman Yakeleya

I want to let the Minister know that I would like to continue tracking the types of support services that are going to be looked at for continued support for our Aurora College students and in our institutions. I also want to say to the Minister, I would like, one day, to see our learning centres in our small communities take part in the celebration like we have done in Fort Smith, Yellowknife and the Inuvik campuses. We have had a good celebration in our own communities in our learning centres.

Is the Minister looking at ways that we can improve our community learning centres so that one day...

I want to acknowledge the families, their communities and the students themselves for a job well done. Graduates are role models. We need to look at how we can continue to support them.

Lastly, I want to thank the campuses of the communities of Fort Smith, Yellowknife and Inuvik and all the Aurora College centres in the Northwest Territories that support these students. Mahsi cho from the MLA for Sahtu.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I will certainly take your advice on this one here and I will make comments on his opening comments. I will follow that procedure.

Since these are opening comments, I do want to say that it is good to have students who are going out from the North or in the Northwest Territories, especially from outside the Territories. It encourages them to come back and bring these skills back with educational knowledge and be positive role models in our communities. I know that Aboriginal students are taking advantage of it through the grants. I know a grant is only limited and they...

Mr. Speaker, I give notice that on Monday, June 2, 2014, I will move the following motion: Now therefore I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, that the Legislative Assembly strongly recommends that the Department of Health and Social Services devise a system of compensating medical and non-medical travel escorts for their time, with the goal of implementing the system in the fiscal year 2015-16; and further, that the government provide a comprehensive response to this motion within 120 days. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, also I would ask the Minister, given in the time of the ‘70s, what type of authority, what type of working relationship and if it’s possible that when that fracking operation happened at Beaver River. I’m not too sure where exactly it is and what type of impacts we are seeing today in 2014 from that operation even though it is a vertical frack. A frack is a frack is a frack. I want to ask the Minister if that is possible.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to continue on with my question on the issue of hydraulic fracking. I want to ask the Minister of ITI in his capacity with this information.

I spoke to one of the leaders from Fort Liard. The leader had said that they did have some fracking in his region. Have there been any other types of fracking in the Northwest Territories in the last 15 or 20 years?

The technique that I understood from Husky and Conoco’s personnel, and of course our own research in our communities, is that the hydraulic fracking would go down about two kilometres underground. Some of the other fears that people have is that there are only shallow wells that will be hydraulically fracked. That’s not the case in the case in the Sahtu.

Is there any type of method that can reassure the people that when we do hydraulic fracking underground two kilometres, that if there are any type of tracers that you can put in the fluid that shows that the actual chemicals are coming up out...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. One of the concerns that we have also has to do with the geoscience work that’s happened up in the Sahtu.

Is the Minister also going to be involved in some of the leadership, some of the work that could happen that our people also can take advantage of the geoscience work that is going to be happening in the Sahtu?

The people in the Sahtu are looking at other opportunities due to the delay in the exploration work. I want to ask the Minister about the other opportunities that we really should talk about and what specifically.

Will the Minister come to the Sahtu to work and meet with the people in the Sahtu to continue this type of dialogue we’ve had in the last couple of days?

Mr. Speaker, the Auditor General’s report was tabled in the Legislative Assembly on March 4, 2014. This year’s performance audit focused on child and family services. The department is responsible for the overall management of the child and family services system, and the director of child and family services has key obligations under the act to protect children from harm, abuse and neglect. The regional authorities are responsible for assisting the director in fulfilling these obligations.

Many lives are touched by the child and family services system. Across our jurisdiction over 1,000...