Wendy Bisaro

Thank you, Madam Chair. The debate that committee had and the work that committee did on this bill as a whole was really interesting. There were over 10 amendments made by committee to which the Minister, over time, concurred. We found middle ground on a couple of them, but, in general, there were some very good amendments that were made which made the act a better act.

This one particular amendment or change that was suggested at committee was hotly contested. We had quite a good debate around the whole issue. Committee was split; we could not agree. I think the opening remarks by the deputy...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thanks to the Minister. I’m really glad to hear that hockey will be all together. I think that only makes sense.

My last question is a statement, I suppose, a comment to the Minister. I hope that he will keep the pressure on, and with the other sports Ministers that he’s already working with that he will keep the pressure on the Arctic Winter Games International Committee, and I would ask him if he could keep us up to date as things progress in the spring.

Thanks to the Minister for the information. I guess I would like to know, and I imagine many of the people who might hear this, our conversations in the House, would also like to know, what some of the options are that have been presented by these sports to give their kids, their athletes an opportunity for a major event in 2016.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thanks to the Minister. I’m really glad to hear that training is going to be happening. I hope it’s ongoing. I would just suggest that the Minister consider mentoring as a training tool.

My last question to the Minister has to do with late fees. If an income support cheque is late and a client is paying late fees on, say, rent or a phone, are those late fees paid for by the department because it’s not the fault of the constituent? Thank you.

To the Minister, the problem in this case was not that the documentation was missing. This client is extremely particular and would have had all the documents in order. The problem in this case was a staff shortage, and that was admitted to my constituent in an e-mail, that there was a staff shortage and things were behind. So I don’t think we can lay this particular delay in payments at the feet of the constituent.

This was definitely a department problem and I didn’t hear an answer to what the Minister accepts as an acceptable delay. But since there are delays and since there are staff...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. October was a tough month for Yellowknifers on income support. It seems that the income support division at Education, Culture and Employment in late September and early October had a staff shortage, computer problems, who knows what other problems, and they got more than a little behind in the processing of income support payments. One of my constituents dutifully sent in all the necessary documents early in September, the usual time, expecting a bank deposit at the usual time. A week into October the bank deposit had not appeared. There was a polite but cryptic e-mail...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I bring this motion forward because I believe strongly that there needs to be a search and rescue base north of 60. I’ve lived in the North over 40 years, and as long as I’ve been here, Northerners have been talking about the need for a search and rescue base in the North.

All Northerners from the High Arctic to the 60th parallel are a long way from any dedicated rescue facility. Unlike southern Canada, a Northerner in distress or lost on the land is literally many hours away from the beginning of a search and rescue operation, and the further north the emergency, the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m really glad the Minister has recognized that at least one good idea comes from this side of the House.

The Minister has indicated that once these recommendations are in that there will be a rearrangement or a reorganization of department resources to implement whatever it is we’ve got coming forward. With the current resources, we haven’t had success to date. I’d like to know from the Minister why he expects that we will get success after this Minister’s forum without any new resources.

I’m still a little confused. The Minister says that they’re going provoke discussion in the right direction. Well, what is the right direction? The Minister is saying that he’s going to go and ask people to tell him what to do.

My second question to him would be if we’re going to visit communities – and I have to assume there’s an opportunity for all 33 communities to have input – what if he gets 33 different solutions? How is the forum or how is the Minister going to take these 33 different solutions and turn them into something that we can actually implement and work with?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I struggle with the fact that we’re going to go and ask people. The Minister says that we don’t really know the state of alcohol. I think we know all too well the state of alcohol in our communities. I think that we need to actually start doing something. I’d like to know from the Minister, come March 2013, when he’s got all these answers, what is he going to do in March 2013 to actually implement and start acting on our addictions problem.