R.J. Simpson

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...

Thank you. Perhaps I can pass that on to the deputy minister. First, I just want to comment that I'm aware that we have lower numbers right now and I've looked into what we can  what sort of savings we can expect, if any, understanding that there's often a lot of fixed costs and you don't save a lot if the numbers fluctuate a little bit. But I this is an area where perhaps we will have some savings in the future. But as it stands, these vans presently do need to be replaced. But I can ask the deputy minister for some more information. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Department of Education, Culture and Employment provides some broad strategic direction to education bodies. It provides funding to education bodies. But really it's the education bodies themselves, the DEAs and DECs, who really deliver the education to students. And so I can talk about the supports that ECE provides, but really the -- obviously the majority of the supports are at that level. So ECE has the ministerial directive on inclusive schooling and that provides explicit funding for and direction to education bodies on supports for students in the territory...

Thank you. That work has been done, and I believe the final inspection is on December 3rd. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So article 19 also mentions several steps in determining the RCMPdirected reviews where contract partners, such as ourselves, have input into the work. So it would be a hundred percent funded review as sort of a last step if we don't get satisfaction through those other methods. So every fiscal year the contract management committee, made up of ADMs and policing from across the country, Public Safety Canada and some municipal representatives, may provide certain matters to be audited in the RCMP's operations, and there's a strategic advantage to this process as the...

Thank you, Madam Chair. And I have the updated numbers somewhere here. I can look them up.

So at NSCC, we have a capacity of 148, and we have 55 inmates;

SMCC, capacity of 36, and we have six inmates;

Fort Smith Correctional Centre, female, our capacity is 23 and we have four inmates; and,

The male facility in Fort Smith, with a capacity of 21, we have eight.

For a total of 73. And at the youth facility, we have a capacity for 25, and we have one. So we have 74 inmates, a total capacity of 253. So very, very low capacity, which I would argue is a good thing. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The RCMP as the service provider in our agreement with Public Safety Canada provides so the financial accountability is to the federal government essentially. The responsibility for RCMP financial statements rests with the RCMP and the Government of Canada and is submitted as part of the public accounts of Canada. The RCMP expenditures are reported to the Legislative Assembly through the public accounts of the GNWT. Costs related to the RCMP fall under the policing services activity of the Department of Justice. Accountability for the Territorial Police Service...

Ms. Karin Taylor on your left, and on your right Ms. Christina Duffy.

Thank you, Madam Chair. So we need a facility to hold youth. Whether that is the current facility or we build a new facility, we do need somewhere. It's not really feasible to send youth away to Whitehorse or Edmonton. And I think we all know that the cost of constructing something new is a big upfront cost, and so our option would be to construct something new and then try and do something with this current facility that already exists and is pretty difficult to repurpose or to keep the facility as is.

So that's a long way to say that I wish there was an easy solution where we could say, yes...

Yes, I would.