R.J. Simpson

Thank you, Madam Chair. To your right is Mr. Mike Reddy, director of legislative division, Department of Justice. And to our left, making her first appearance in the chamber, Megan Wahlberg, director of policy, legislation and communications for ECE. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I am here today to present Bill 25, An Act to Amend the Education Act. This bill seeks to amend the Education Act to allow a term of office of four years for elected district education authority trustees in cases where a DEA's community government has a fouryear election cycle.

Currently, only election cycles of two and three years for DEAs are permitted by the Act. The proposed amendment arises from the 2018 change in municipal election cycles in Yellowknife from three to fouryear terms of office for mayor and council.

Bill 25 would allow the two Yellowknife DEAs...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As you can imagine, this has been a focus of the department for over a year now and the Public Health Act has been reviewed, other pieces of the relevant legislation, the everevolving case law, Charter of Rights and Freedoms. So, yes, all of these have been reviewed. And, again, this is similar to the "significant risk," the definition, this determination is made by the chief public health officer.

The department does provide advice on the risks associated with specific measures and orders, that is to say the legal risks. But in terms of the risks and what is reasonable...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Department of Justice has a division called legal division and that is essentially the GNWT's inhouse law firm, and legal division provides legal advice and services to GNWT departments and entities such as the Office of the chief public health officer. And since the beginning of the pandemic, the legal division has been working with the chief public health officer to provide advice in respect of the drafting of they will suggest wording. There's probably, I'm sure there's been some back and forths to ensure that, you know, the wording is what it should be. With...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So as part of the work to transform Aurora College into a polytechnic university, we are undertaking a facilities plan which is going to look at the existing facilities across the territory of the college as well as the needs for the three campuses as well as each community four community learning centres. That work will begin shortly. The final product will be a short meeting and longterm plan for the infrastructure and that residence has clearly been identified as one we need a new one of. You know, and I'm not breaking any news here. I've stated this before that...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As what the Member was asking about teaching life schools in school, and I don't have specific information about a life skills initiative but I can talk a bit about what is done in schools in a broad sense, understanding that what happens in the school is highly dependant on the DEA, the community, and the teachers at that time. And there could be a lot of variation and there could be heavy focus on life stills depending on those influences. So in schools of course we have the courses like career/life management that people are familiar with.

We also have courses like...

Thank you. I will let the Minister of Finance find her notes on there, because I still have to find mine as well. So perhaps if the committee can just give us a minute, we can get an answer for you. Thanks.

Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, that Bill 30, An Act to amend the Aurora College Act be read for the second time. This bill amends the Aurora College Act to create a new approach to governance based on the introduction of a competencybased board. The bill also reallocates power from the Minister to the board to allow Aurora College to operate at arm's length from the Minister and limits the role of the Minister in the operations of Aurora College while legislating the role of the Minister and approving the mandate of Aurora College. The bill...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think that's the plan. That's the reality. There are intergenerational housing arrangements right now, and as a government we need to ensure that we're serving the people in those arrangements. Again, there's working groups. I work with my Cabinet colleagues on a higher level, and this is the work we want to do. This is the work we have to do. We have to look at the realities on the ground and then design our policy and programs to meet those realities. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.