Wendy Bisaro

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We would like to consider Bill 6, An Act to Amend the Medical Care Act; and Tabled Document 22-17(5), Northwest Territories Main Estimates, with conclusion of general comments. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, it just does not compute for me. We are comparing apples and oranges and I cannot understand how it’s okay for us to record the revenues… It’s an accounting entry, I think the Minister said. So we are recording an accounting entry and it’s okay for revenues but we won’t do an accounting entry for expenses. So on the one hand we’re taking advantage and on the other hand the government is also taking advantage and saying we’re not going to do it in ‘14-15, we’ll do it in ‘15-16.

I’d like to ask the Minister if he can tell me, since 5 percent is presumably what the budget was...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to ask some questions to the Minister of Finance. I want to follow up on my statement and also follow up from my colleagues’ questions earlier.

I would like to say that I appreciate the government’s willingness to do the right thing and put 25 percent of our new resource revenues into the Heritage Fund, but I am unable to reconcile the Minister’s words with the numbers that are in our budget. As I stated in my statement, the request was to put that money in -14-15, not in ‘15-16.

Mr. Bromley has asked this already, but I don’t believe I heard an answer, so I...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Unlike my colleagues, I will not be putting aside my statement today, and I want to talk about the Heritage Fund. I want to speak to the report that I tabled yesterday from the Action Canada Fellows, titled “A Question of Future Prosperity, Developing a Heritage Fund in the Northwest Territories.” That report had six recommendations and I’d like to comment briefly on each one of them.

The first one is to establish clear fund objectives and allocate more than 5 percent of annual resource royalties to the Heritage Fund. We’ve heard from the Finance Minister earlier today...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Minister’s desire to be on top of things, but if he really thinks that I’m going to be asking him questions about public information about a meeting that’s upcoming, I have a hard time understanding that.

I would like to know if there is any hope that the Minister might change this policy. I’m talking about public information, something that’s already in the public domain. It’s been released through a press release or a media advisory.

Is there any hope that he will change his policy and allow his staff to talk to my staff to confirm public information...

Mr. Speaker, thanks to the Minister, I think. I really am struggling to understand why public information must be routed through the Minister’s office. Were I a general citizen and not an elected official, I could phone the name on the press release and ask for the confirmation of the information directly.

So, I need to ask the Minister why he feels that information that is publically available must be requested through his office and why my office cannot go directly to his department and ask for it. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today I want to speak about what is perhaps the most important part of our job: serving our constituents. We all do it differently and that’s no surprise. Our ridings are each unique and different from each other. One tool that I use to do the job is social media. I use it to share information, news items, media releases, upcoming events, funding opportunities, youth exchanges and so on.

Recently, I wanted to share information about an upcoming public meeting, information previously published by the Cabinet press secretary in a news release several months ago. I wanted...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have a number of questions that don’t need to be answered today. Many of them are rhetorical, but in looking at the budget address, I found it raised a number of questions in my mind. I don’t need answers that are detailed, but I do want to raise a number of concerns that I have.

Right off the top, the budget address stated that Members had helped with the budget. Yes, we certainly had input into the budget. We certainly had any number of meetings where we provided our comments, but like other Members, I don’t really feel that this budget reflects the handprint of...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to table the report of the Action Canada Fellows, entitled “A Question of Future Prosperity: Developing a Heritage Fund in the Northwest Territories.

I guess I need to say to the Minister that if I had asked for this information through his office, it probably wouldn’t have arrived in time for me to communicate that information to my constituents in advance of that meeting, so I have a real difficulty with everything having to go through his office.

I would like to ask the Minister, if he needs to track every request that comes from a Minister’s office, why cannot requests for public information asked of one of his staff of the department, why can that staff person, or a communications person, why can they not track that information or that...