R.J. Simpson

Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the Honourable Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, that Bill 36, an Act to Amend to the Territorial Court Act be read for the third time, and Mr. Speaker, I request a recorded vote. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. So we have had an existing deal with the Government of Canada for a number of years. They have been providing us funding for early learning and child care in and around the tune of $2.5 million a year. We have re-signed that deal recently. And so that is this funding here. And this will be in addition to any funding we receive through the Canada-wide Early Learning Child Care Agreement. And so instead of being rolled up into one single agreement, we have a couple of agreements going at the same time. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I give notice that on Thursday, December 2nd, 2021, I will move that Bill 41, Justice Administration Statutes Amendment Act, be read for the first time. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, the money is rolling out. It is supporting a number of initiatives. Of course, we have the early learning child care diploma program at Aurora College that this money's helping fund. For the first time now that there is a distancebased early learning child care certificate, that people don't have to come to the campus to take. They can take it in their home communities. There's work on dual credit courses for interested secondary senior secondary school students. As well, we are supporting college Nordique to deliver postsecondary programming in French for early...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As the Member stated, I've already said publicly we should have this agreement finalized by the end of the year, in the coming weeks, in the coming week. It's very close. That being said, it's not finalized and so I can't say how many spaces, what costs, etcetera.

If you look at every other deal that's been made, though, there is some indications that there's a reduction in fees at the end of 2022 by a certain amount, and after five years there's a desire to get to around $10 a day average. So there are some things that have appeared in every other agreement. But I can't...

Thank you. I don't have that exact level of detail. The way this funding is often distributed is based on the attendance at a childcare centre. So childcare facilities are funded per child and different rates for different ages, and there's also funding for starting up childcare centres. There's funding for enhancing safety aspects of childcare centres. There's all sorts of different funding that can be accessed, and it's not distributed necessarily by region. It's distributed according to where it is needed. But we could probably get some sort of a breakdown for the Member. I don't have that...

Thank you, Madam Chair. And I can't give a definitive date. We are approaching this project in a very unique way, and we're working with the community and we are on the community's timeline in many ways. We understand that there needs to be a new school just as they understand there needs to be a school. No one's trying to hold things up. But it's an unpredictable process because we've never been down this path before. So everyone is committed to ensuring we get the work done and get it done in a timely manner, but I don't have a date for the Member. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As the Member mentioned, this is not new ground. Over the years, there's been a number of  much work done on the types of programs and research into the needs of young children and how we can better support them and how we can better support parents with their child care needs. And so this work has been done by the Department of Health, by E, C and E, and the officials at the department have looked at all of this work spanning many years, and as well, they have gone out to have discussions with child care providers, Indigenous governments, and so on. And all of that is...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So ECE currently has funding for startup, new child care space startup to help programs get off the ground. Of course, we have the $1 million child care infrastructure fund that we're a few years into now. As well, we have been prioritizing the communities who have no child care services for that fund. While negotiating the terms of the new agreement, the Canadawide agreement that we hope to sign here in the very near future, we've been considering how we can utilize that agreement as well as some of the existing funding that we already have to construct new spaces. I...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this government has committed to transforming our education system with the goal of improving the lives of all our residents. The Department of Education, Culture and Employment has some exciting initiatives being undertaken in collaboration with education partners, industry, Indigenous governments, and the federal government.

Mr. Speaker, it can be argued that the greatest returns on investment come from investing in early childhood education. That is one of the reasons that this Legislative Assembly has made it a priority to advance universal child care by...