Kate Reid

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There's a quote I saw online recently that I can unfortunately not attribute but it doesn't diminish its truth. Quote, "The role of a politician is not to get into power. The role of a politician is to act as a steward and caretaker for our society, to manage society for the betterment of all of us."

That quote sums up why I am here today. I want to help provide the direction that leads to the betterment of all of us in the NWT. But the job of governing "better" seemingly gets harder by the day, week, year, and decade. Some of it simply is that all the problems feel like...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Very simple question. Can the Minister please tell me how many staff work in the planning, research, and evaluation part of corporate management? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. And thank you to the Minister for that. And thank you to her department for sending us some more information about EHB today. I really appreciate it. In the and it was a publicly accessible letter. Thank you for that.

So in that letter, it's noted that currently about 1,400 people are in the EHB program under the specified disease conditions list. The department estimates that that will grow when the specified disease condition list is dropped and the new policy rolls out in September, and the cost differential that health is estimating will be about $1.2 million. So it's...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That's really great to hear. I am hoping the Minister may be able to commit to bring the findings of the client navigators back to us come budget time next year possibly? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you, my colleagues, for speaking a bit about basic income today.

Mr. Speaker, can the Minister of ECE explain if her department has ever considered tailoring the income assistance system in the context of a regionallybased or a communitybased way rather than with a onesizefitsall approach. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, today I am joining in with my colleagues to speak about income assistance services in the NWT. Mr. Speaker, since becoming an MLA, my understanding of social programs and services, like income assistance, has continued to evolve. I have learned through discussions with my colleagues that what I think may be appropriate for Yellowknife residents may not be appropriate or perhaps applicable to other communities or regions. For example, what I think might be a good idea and could really work for folks living in Yellowknife might not work the same way or at all...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I'm sorry if I was not clear. I guess I'm trying to say is do we have any way of measuring the expected workload vis-a-vis the amount of drafters that we have and allocating work appropriately? I'm concerned that while the line item for the legislation division has increased since the 2022-2023 actuals, it hasn't increased since last year. And so I'm just wondering -- yeah, on that idea, like are we -- do we have enough drafters, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm good for now. Thanks.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think we're both entrenched in our positions. I'll leave it at that.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So still on the topic of corrections in Fort Smith but maybe corrections more generally, could the Minister tell me what the drop of inmates is attributable to? I'm asking this because he was the Minister of Justice in the last Assembly and should have a little bit of handle on that. Thank you, Mr. Chair.