Caroline Wawzonek

What I want to commit to doing is ensuring that every department, in the chain of hiring that goes through that department in cooperation and in conjunction with staff from human resources, is indeed taking responsibility to ensure a representative public service and indeed is taking responsibility to follow the Affirmative Action Policy but also to be conscious of their own biases and act in such a way that we are not relying on them. The point of human resources is to try to create a system and a process that is fair, that is open, and that acknowledges that human beings will naturally at...

The work is already under way, and it is my expectation that both the framework and implementation plans for departments will be completed within the 2021-2022 fiscal year. Thank you.

I certainly would agree that every department, through its deputy minister, will need to take responsibility to help ensure that the GNWT continues to do better in terms of what we're doing to follow the Affirmative Action Policy. The goal here is to have a representative workforce. The Affirmative Action Policy is one of the tools that we use to achieve that. However, Madam Speaker, the way that we will do that through deputy ministers is by ensuring that there are some clear targets and a clear plan for each of them within their department that they can implement and that that can then be...

Yes. The Indigenous framework that we are developing for the recruitment and retention framework is meant to have targets, department by department. That's really the answer to the question, Madam Speaker. It will have hiring targets. I have not been given any sense that men over women is going to be part of the targeting, but Indigenous affirmative action candidates will be part of those targets.

I will certainly commit to reviewing the succession planning that is under way within the GNWT. As I have indicated at the beginning of the Member's questions, the direction right now is to develop the Indigenous framework, have that go department by department, and create some targets that will then be applicable to each department. Within that, of course, it includes the need for succession planning, the need for those targets to include management, so I will make the commitment that we are going to look at those targets. I want to provide some flexibility that we aren't necessarily doing...

I'm inclined to say "yes," but I want to be cautious. That also requires ensuring that the Indigenous governments are prepared and interested and willing to be receiving, hopefully, all these many, many employees who want to go and participate in this program. What I will say is that I, certainly, want to see that the 10 placements that are available get filled. In and of itself, there's a target there, and I'll certainly commit to keeping that 10 placements as a target.

One of the other commitments of the 19th Legislative Assembly, of course, is to increase employment in regional centres. That is a commitment of the 19th Assembly and of this government and is certainly one that the Department of Finance also plays a role in. There are ongoing efforts to ensure that, when new positions are being created, efforts are made to consider whether they have to, in fact, be centralized in the capital, which sometimes is the case, depending on the nature of the work, depending on the nature of the role to be played. If it is not the case, then it need not be centred...

I'm sorry. Eight, Madam Speaker.

Madam Speaker, the Government of the Northwest Territories is committed to maintaining a professional and representative public service. Increasing Indigenous representation within our public service has long been a goal of the Legislative Assembly. The first and most visible tool used by the GNWT to support this goal is the Affirmative Action Policy. This policy and its implementation are often criticized as being ineffective because the percentage of Indigenous Aboriginal employees in the GNWT has remained at around 30 percent for the last several decades. Madam Speaker, the Affirmative...

I think I probably just answered that in my last description, but I may have misheard, I didn't have my earpiece in there. That's exactly the idea is to try to create opportunities for anyone that's applying and anyone that's within the application process and the interview process to be able to speak and communicate in a way other than just the traditional asking of a question and having to provide a correct or specific answer but instead be able to tell stories. Part of the reason there has been a change in the Indigenous cultural awareness training and sensitivity program is so that all...