Kieron Testart

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So the -- we're talking about government and governance and service integration, and I was -- the Nunavut budget just came out, and they have been working on realignment of their departments, and they have a new Department of Community Services and the goal of that department is to establish a one-stop shop for territorial government services called Service Nunavut. Now, we have GSOs, had them for quite some time. They are amazingly helpful to small communities, to regional centres. We don't have a one-stop shop here in Yellowknife. We have some integrated service units...

Thank you. Best lake. Okay, so thank you, Minister. I'm probably going to bring some questions to you tomorrow in question period around this so we can get more of that out on the floor.

So obviously, there's been a big decrease in the funding for this activity because of the extraordinary events that happened in 2023-2024. My concern is we have an imminent afteraction review that's being done by a third party that we should expect this fiscal year. Presumably it will have recommendations. How does the department intend to act on those recommendations? Because if there's no money put...

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So I'm going to ask about the ground search and rescue. Apparently, we do not provide support to ground search and rescue through the emergency management organization, and this is something that was one of the recommendations of the audit that was held -- or the report that was held to review things. Is there any reason why we can't make changes to the emergency management organization to bring ground search and rescue under its umbrella so we can better coordinate these efforts in the Northwest Territories? Thank you.

Thank you. So these -- so we're not anticipating that we need to maintain the same level of resource for this upcoming year I guess on -- like, hopefully we're not anticipating another evacuation or something like that. I just want to make sure, like does the department have the resources in these functions that it needs to maintain its level planning and preparedness in case there is an emergency? Thank you.

Thank you. I'm on a continuing mission to find out who we core fund and who we don't. So that's helpful.

As to the 2023-2024 actuals compared to the revised estimates, financial services, policy planning and regional management are basically cut in half. Can you explain why that is the case.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So under the partner contribution funding, it's $460,000, and it's provided to them NWT Association of Communities, the Local Government Administrators of the NWT organization, and the Arctic Energy Alliance. I understand the contributions to LGANT and NWTAC. Can you explain the nature of the contribution to Arctic Energy Alliance. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I mean, that's concerning, and it's concerning to volunteers who are working in ground search and rescue, and it's more concerning to people who might get lost and need ground search and rescue.

Mr. Speaker, at the very least, can we improve -- can we ensure there's consistent recording of data? Because there's not. This data's lost year on year. We don't have a central repository. Can we at least start to implement some of these things that are low cost options like a central repository for search and rescue data. Thank you.

Thank you. No, I appreciate the honesty there. And as I said previously, that's exactly where I want the department's focus to be, so I'll just continue to encourage the Minister to reach out, and we'll continue to work on this. There's other ways to move public policy forward in our system, including working with Regular Members. I'm happy to provide whatever support to the department to make this initiative a success and, again, to tax and regulate what's already going on, keep people safe, fund the fight against addictions, and bring some much-needed revenue into government coffers....

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Mr. Speaker, I am alleging that the Honourable Premier broke Rule 3.2(3)(i) and Rule 3.2(3)(j); the first being imputing false or hidden motives to another Member and the latter being charges another Member with uttering a deliberate falsehood.

Mr. Speaker, I've had the chance to review the live feed of our proceedings earlier today, and to quote from the Premier's speaking to the point of privilege raised earlier this morning, and I quote: And from this side of the floor, this post appears to be a continuation of the spreading of...

Thank you to the Minister for that. I am appreciating the collaboration on this.

Now just so that the public's aware, this could be worth as much as 7 to $8 million of additional revenue for basically turning on a switch, a regulatory or legislative switch, with no cost to the taxpayer. And that's revenue, again, that could be used to deal with any matter of things. Of course, there are some social issues related to gambling in any jurisdiction, and these revenues could be used to address some of that in addition to providing much needed supports to other programs. In the Minister's...