Wendy Bisaro

Thank you. I don’t believe I have yet today indicated that I think anything was circumvented. I’m trying to get from the Premier what the rationale was to not advise us. Yes, I understand that the notice period was waived, but was there not some consideration that maybe we might want to know about that? The Premier advised last week that the Standing Committee on Economic Development and Infrastructure was advised of these changes, and I believe I asked last week if I could see copies of the presentations that have been made to committee. I didn’t hear an answer. I’d like to ask him again if...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are addressed to the Premier and I’d like to follow up with him on some questions that I asked last week in regard to the Auditor General’s report on the Deh Cho Bridge.

We’ve received a lot of information since last week and I am not asking questions to point fingers and assign blame at this point; I’m trying to clarify a couple of things, which I don’t believe I got answers to last week.

In February of 2008, the government changed regulations to provide what is a standard indemnity for the bridge project lenders and a by-product of that was the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise today to say yes I “con,” I “con” support the City of Yellowknife district energy system.

---Laughter

I “con” vote yes on referendum day, next Monday, and I will vote yes. I support the City’s Geothermal District Energy System Project and I’m excited by the concept of a district energy system, and I’m excited by the long-term benefits that will accrue to both the city and its residents.

Like many city homeowners, when I first heard the details of the project, I heard that it would supply heat to 39 downtown buildings. I wondered what was in it for me. Would there...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just have a couple of comments I’d like to make. I’d like to start off, as well, by thanking the members of the commission for their work. I think they did an admirable job. I know it certainly was a lot of time that was put in. I think the result was a thorough and comprehensive report. It obviously was well researched and I think some thanks have to go to our staff for that, who provided an awful lot of support to the commission.

I think that some of the amendments that are coming forward provide clarification to a number of provisions around Members’ travel...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thanks to the Premier for that commitment. I will look forward to receiving that document. I’d like to ask the Premier, he’s referenced that the Financial Administration Act has been under review. I know that I think there’s consideration for changes to the act coming up. I’d like to know from the Premier, considering that this is an issue for Members at least on this side of the House in terms of notification, is this an issue that the Premier would consider might be something that should be discussed between Regular Members and Cabinet in terms of a Caucus protocol to...

Thanks to the Premier. I am not suggesting that this was not a standard indemnity. I think I mentioned that in my preamble. My concern is that there was obviously in the regulations an indication that notice was required and by changing the regulations and waiving the advanced notice that’s fine, but communication has been a problem in the four years or three and a half years since I’ve been here and I would have thought the Premier would have considered that communication of such a change to Members was a good thing.

I’d like to know, again, from the Premier, when the Financial Administration...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It gives me great pleasure today to recognize one of the Pages who’s been working with us I think over the last six weeks off and on. Aimee Yurris is a constituent of Frame Lake and I’d like to thank Aimee for her work off and on over the last six weeks. I’d like to congratulate all the Pages for the work that they’ve done. They’ve done a great job.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It gives me great pleasure to recognize a fellow female legislator from the Province of Manitoba. Ms. Myrna Driedger is here. She’s the MLA for Charleswood in Manitoba. She’s also vice-chair of the Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians – Canadian Region.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would hope that the Minister would take advantage of any funding that we have available that would increase the employment of persons with disabilities within our workforce. I would hope that he would look into this program.

The Yukon has a program called the Yukon Disability Employment Strategy. What are we doing that is similar to that kind of a strategy? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, thanks to the Minister. I would appreciate anything he can discover as to why we did not take advantage of this. I believe that there were other jurisdictions that were not provinces that did. I could be corrected on that.

Another program which is not yet expired is a labour market agreement. The Yukon last year negotiated some $218,000 worth of funding. Some of it, not all of it, because labour market agreement in this case was for sort of all employment, but some of it was specifically earmarked for the Yukon Council on Disability. I know that the Minister of HR has been talking...