Tom Beaulieu

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, assuming that the communities are still looking to have some environment officers in their communities, would the Minister agree to place these important positions in the next business plan process? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today I’d like to recognize two Pages from Fort Resolution: Mr. Paul Boucher and Gerald Norn Dumas.

Okay, I guess in simple terms, my question is the Housing Corporation has programs in play that are doing their job, right? It’s taking the core need in the Northwest Territories and taking the core need down in all the appropriate communities where core need is highest, which in effect is bringing the overall core need down. So if we just divide the amount of units in the Territories in half, half is in Yellowknife, half is outside of Yellowknife. If the overall core need goes up, right? It’s simple math. If the overall core need goes up but the core need in Yellowknife goes down, that means...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The committee would like to continue the review of Tabled Document 62-16(4), Main Estimates, and continue with the Housing Corporation and hopefully get MACA read in today.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. A question on housing for staff, $1.5 million has been reduced to zero. I’m wondering if the government -- I know this is not a solely Housing Corporation initiative -- has abandoned the housing for staff initiative.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I had an opportunity today to brief the review, the 2009 Housing Needs Survey. As indicated in the Member’s statement or indicated in my discussion making some remarks on the budget, one of those two places yesterday, I talked about the increase in the core need across the Territory. Now it is kind of an interesting situation, because we can’t just look at the increase overall because the actual true reflection of what has happened in the small communities is actually greater than what the actual increase of the core needs in the needs survey is because of the decrease...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am pleased to see that there is more money being put into repairs and renovations by NWT Housing Corporation. I think that is a substantial increase from when this government first started. I do believe that the original repair and renovation budget was $792,000. It went up to $2.1 million and then now to $8 million, so this is very good news.

I hope that the money is able to get out to communities that have the higher needs and up to the groups that have the higher needs as well. When I speak of the groups with higher needs, I am referring to the different groups...

Just on the public housing rental subsidy Income Support Program. I’m pleased that the government has returned the subsidies back to NWT Housing Corporation. However, in this business plan the 34 million-odd dollars plus the $12 million recoveries from CMHC are still in this business plan. I understand why, because we’re going to do the transfer back during the next fiscal year. I’m wondering if the department and the Housing Corporation could maybe work together to speed the process up. I feel it should be a fairly simple process to transfer it back. We have a month and a half to be able to...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, will the Minister commit to looking at other options to increase funding and directing his staff to begin dialogue with the communities of Lutselk'e and Fort Resolution on the examination of the education plans through his department?

Mr. Speaker, although I’m not aware of a written education plan by the DEA in Fort Resolution, would the Minister commit to communicating with the Fort Resolution District Education Authority to discuss a full spectrum of their educational needs including daycares? Thank you.