Robert C. McLeod

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, the RMO1s were wellreceived, and we have them all filled. They're all filled with local people. I think three of the five or four of the five are female. We've had very good interest in that, actually. If there are, as part of the HR plan, you know, if there's further opportunities to offer training positions in the regions, then that's something that we'll take into consideration. We want to be able to build up the capacity in the region because who knows the region better than the folks that live there, right. We would like to try to build the capacity there...

We are always looking at ways that we can increase our funding, especially for the youth. I mean, I can tell this House that we've had five events, I think, in the last year or so and we spent close to $650,000 at these events, and some of this is O and M funding for staff time and such. So it is a program that, you know, we will look at ways to enhance once the evaluation has been completed, and we will work with committee members to see how we can incorporate into our business plans and main estimates going forward. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, we actually have some from the GNWT that were affected. Also some of the federal employees were affected as well. Thank you.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair. I think during business plans we had said that the three positions we were hoping to turn them into training positions in Yellowknife and give those out in the region an opportunity to move here for a couple years, take the training and then go back to their home community. I'm not sure what the uptake is on that right now, but if we have to put it out for competition, our goal is to put it out to competition as part of the requirement, the hiring requirement. It would be understood that they move out to the region after they've completed a couple years here in the...

The department really has some good training programs when they are preparing youth to go off to some of the events that they attend. A training event will be held in March of 2017 to prepare the Youth Ambassador Project at the Canada Summer Games, and discussions are still under way with the Host Society in Winnipeg to gauge our interests related to our Youth Ambassadors, but no decisions have been made on the traditional games component of the -- at the March event. The Aboriginal Sports Circle continues to do some community clinics and hosting the traditional game championships. So my...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, the fuel shows up under utilities, just below travel. There was a restricted base funding for inspection response to be filled was a $250,000 that the Member would have noted under travel. We still have a fairly healthy budget. I think there is not much happening out there on the water side of it. So inspection requirements may not be as high as they are, but we still have folks out on inspection. I think we have 28 total across the Department of Lands and all the regions. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think the activity description in page 301 is pretty well self-explanatory. It points out a lot of things that we're hoping to do and some initiatives that we want to undertake. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to use this opportunity to recognize two constituents from Inuvik Twin Lakes: Sarah Jerome, who we've spoken about numerous times already today; I appreciate the work you've done. With her is her husband, Freddy Jerome. So welcome to the gallery. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I think we still will have the capacity to carry out our inspections as we have done in the past. If you recall from MACA lands days, before it was converted over, one of the questions we kept getting was the amount of inspectors we had. I think since Lands has been formed, we have -- I am not sure of the exact number. I can get them, as far as our inspector division goes. We have a fairly robust inspection division that is adequately staffed. I will confirm that information, and I will share it with committee.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. The Member is correct that we are going to be looking at the acts because we have two acts that we're operating under right now. As far as having a line item for it, it's within the day-to-day operations of the division so there's no specific line item for it. If the Member's looking -- I'm not sure exactly what our budget is for that, but if the Member would like that information, I'm sure we could find it somewhere. Thank you, Mr. Chair.