Wendy Bisaro

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In the last week we’ve heard a number of Members express their disappointment in the refusal of this government to provide financial assistance to NWT senior athletes for the 2010 55-plus Games to be held next August. I want to add my voice to those of my colleagues to protest the action, or lack of action, on the part of our government.

That this government can’t afford $50,000 to support NWT seniors in their attendance at these games is inexcusable.

To the Minister, then, if the Minister won’t change that mandate and it is going to stay focused on youth for funding through the Sport and Recreation Council and lottery proceeds and so on, I would like to know from the Minister whether or not there is any possibility that he will take the lead, canvass four or five different departments and find $5,000 to $10,000 from each of these departments that will assist our seniors. Thank you.

That is, unfortunately, the answer I expected from the Minister. I appreciate that there is a focus on youth, but I have to remind all of us, the Minister particularly, youth become adults, and adults become seniors and elders. We need to keep them active. It has been stated earlier by another Member that active seniors reduce our hospital and medical care costs.

I think the Minister said that he might look into providing funding for seniors if this is something which is going to be ongoing. It has been ongoing for about four or five games now. What will the Minister do to find the $50,000 to...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, I appreciate that the department is doing things. What the department is doing is long term and it’s not going to assist us right now in increasing the percentage of persons with disabilities in our workforce.

I talked yesterday about priority lists. I’d like to ask the Minister what priority does he put on the increasing of persons with disabilities in our workforce. Thank you.

I understand that change takes a while for it to be processed. It’s good to hear that we have at least two more people hired who are persons with disabilities, but that still doesn’t bring our percentage to any kind of a limit that is representative of our workforce.

In June of 2009 the Minister made a statement and he talked about the development of a recruitment strategy as a long-term goal, and this is a recruitment strategy for persons with disabilities. The percentage of persons with disabilities in the GNWT workforce has been at about .4 percent for quite a number of years. I’d like to...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It is no secret that NWT communities are diverse. They are small, medium and large. They are on the road system and not on the road system. They follow the traditional economy, the modern economy, and sometimes both. Providing services to our communities is a serious challenge for the GNWT given this diversity. It is particularly difficult to ensure that the same services are available in each of our 33 communities.

My colleagues on this side of the House have often spoken to our failure in that regard. But do we, as a government, really know what level of programs and...

I thank the Minister for the answer and I understand that, again, as I say, I know that change takes time and I guess to the Minister’s comment that I’d have a problem with self-identification, I do, but I think perhaps we’re on opposite sides of the fence on what the problem may be. If we look at .4 percent of our workforce as being persons with disabilities and if we consider that it is the policy of this government that our workforce should represent our general population, we should, therefore, have about 15 percent of our workforce be persons with disabilities. So the Minister says we’ve...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to address my questions to the Minister of Human Resources. I’d like to follow up on his statement from yesterday and some of the questions that I asked the Minister yesterday. In our exchange, I referenced the Employability Working Group and asked the Minister what the group had accomplished. In the results that he mentioned to me, he mentioned a number of things. One of them was that the department has consulted with a number of other different jurisdictions; another one was that they have implemented some sensitivity training. I’d like to know from the...

Six months? I guess that’s great. I’m still not sure whether or not that encompasses looking at the priority lists in the resource manual, but I’ll leave it at that.

In the Minister’s statement, he referenced persons with disabilities at one point. I know that a working group was established in June of 2008 to deal with persons with disabilities to try to make things a little easier for them and to further their employment. I’d like to ask the Minister what work that working group did some 16, 18 months ago and how is that relevant to the review that he was referencing that will be done in six...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are addressed to the Minister of Human Resources. I would like to thank the Minister for his statement about the NWT Public Service Strategic Plan and I would like to follow up with a couple of questions.

I note that the Minister talked about goal two under this plan: Engage: Magnetic Attraction. I’d like to know what’s in this particular plan relative to an evaluation of the GNWT’s Affirmative Action Policy, specifically in light of the priority lists as outlined not in the Affirmative Action Policy but in our Human Resource Manual. We have two lists...