Norman Yakeleya

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So we know the fact that we are making not bad money off our sales of buying liquor and the costs, and maybe stabilizing the costs here in the North. I guess my question is to the Minister. The main estimates are for the $25.372 million profit. I heard it before that the money goes into general revenues and they give it up. I know we passed a motion one time at least, to put a symbolic gesture to put at least a percentage to direct program services into alcohol prevention promotion programs in our communities. I am not too sure; the response wasn’t favourable from the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This can be also an educational process. If you look, for example, in the Sahtu, if you look at the fish scale artwork done in Fort Good Hope or the fish nets made out of willows in Colville Lake or the beading in Deline or the moose skin boat in Tulita, they all have meaning behind it. It would be nice to have a CD at the end of the project so kids can take it and then they can understand. Visitors can listen to it and say this is the meaning behind the art for this region; this is why they do this art.

I’d like to ask the Minister if that’s something that he can bring...

That’s a good initiative. I want to ask the Minister, in one of the projects do you sit down with an artist that tells you and documents why they do this type of work we call art? For them it’s love of their skill and they develop it. Why do women and men sit and why do they make moose skin boats that go to Deline? Why do they bead? What’s the document? Why do we sit down and make birchbark baskets, or go up to Ulukhaktok and why do they make these prints? What’s the story behind the art? What’s the real meaning?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today I wanted to talk about the people who bring the inspiration of art into our world, from the people in Yellowknife, to Ulukhaktok, to Sahtu, to Deh Cho, Lutselk’e, right down the Mackenzie Valley and in all the Northwest Territories. I want to thank them for putting in the work that they do to make buckskin vests or jackets or painting or carving or something. It takes a real talent and patience and it takes a lot of love.

This jacket here was made by my mother and my aunties, when my mother was alive. In order to get this jacket, for example, and what my mom taught...

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, colleagues. This motion is giving recommendations to the government to allocate from the resources that are already stated, additional funding to support some of our existing daycare facilities in the Northwest Territories and also assist in creating new daycare facilities in the smaller communities.

As I stated earlier, we have 10 communities without licenced child care services. In these small communities, the employment rate is not very high. Families are struggling with the high cost of living and child care. Young mothers and young fathers are trying to...

Thanks for the information. The communities in the Northwest Territories currently without licenced child care are Colville Lake, Enterprise, Jean Marie, Lutselk’e, Kakisa, Nahanni Butte, Norman Wells, Trout Lake, Tsiigehtchic and Wrigley. They are all in the same category: communities without RCMP and communities without permanent nurses in their centres. I want to list them for the Minister to reiterate that we need their support in the small communities, which brings me to something that I’m compelled to do and I’d like to do. I have a motion I want to read in the House on the daycare...

Mr. Chairman, I want to ask the Minister, in light of the exchange that I heard between the Minister and some of the colleagues in terms of the teachers’ qualifications, that is something I want to raise here with the Minister. When we implement the Junior Kindergarten Program, which is something I support fully, you have my support. We have people in the communities that could be also equivalent to a teacher but just don’t have the degree or diploma. These are four-year-old children, not Grade 10 or 12, just young ones. This is a voluntary program, not mandatory, voluntary. In our schools...

I think we’re moving somewhere. I would have to think about this. I can’t think very well on an empty stomach. I will think about this and we can come back for a discussion. I appreciate what the Minister is saying. We’re moving somewhere. I’m glad the government is thinking this way. I’m happy we can go this way for our discussion. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The whistle is getting dry there. That is a lot of booze in our communities and regions. Again, I understand the Minister, and I believe we are talking optics on the profits, I understand what he is saying. He is saying it for symbolic. For us in the Sahtu, we can put aside a percentage, even 1 percent or even a half percent, symbolically that this money from the Sahtu sales go directly to our small communities – Colville Lake, Good Hope, Tulita, Norman Wells and Deline – and we are going to do something directly to work with alcohol abuse and prevention promotion...

Mr. Chair, the optimal end result of this discussion would be the Minister look at this, and given this year’s budget and again next year, we can come forward with these miniature abattoirs to say, yes, we have worked it out through the system and the regulations. For example, next year local traditional foods can be packaged, sent into these institutions to say now you have traditional foods. It will produce skill, economy and make use in the small communities. Maybe the Northern Store or Co-ops will be interested in having these foods on their shelves. My goal here is to see if this is...