R.J. Simpson

Thank you. I don't I'm not sure who the owner of that building is, thank you. But we can find out and get that information to the Member. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. You know, I don't have that I have it in my hands but I can't flip through this document and find that information at the moment. I'm sorry, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Government of the Northwest Territories saved zero dollars due to the Canada Emergency Response Benefit, CERB. We exempted that. So if you were collecting income assistance and you received CERB, we did not count that against your income. When the Canada Recovery Benefits, CRB, came out, that was counted as income. Notices were sent to income assistance clients. There was an advertising campaign. We let MLAs know that that was the case. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The productive choice productive choices are something that are in the legislation, the income assistance regulations. Individuals who are collecting income assistance are required to participate in a productive choice unless they are seniors or persons with disabilities I believe.

The productive choices, there's a variety of them. But currently everyone is enrolled in the wellness productive choice which we instituted at the beginning of the pandemic where people were required to take care of themselves and their families. And so that is what people are currently...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And I just wanted to take this opportunity to clarify. I've never claimed to be a lawyer. I've never said that all students go to university. What I said is in Hansard yesterday and I apologize if I appeared as though I was showboating. I will say I was getting a little frustrated but I never intend to showboat. I think about an elder I spoke with in your constituency, Mr. Speaker, when I was there, and they were talking about how they watch the Legislative Assembly and they appreciate the level of decorum in here, and I always try to maintain that. So I apologize to...

Thank you, Madam Chair. To the amendment, I do think the amendment does improve on the previous recommendation. Once again, the previous recommendation or the main motion is very prescriptive. It's the Assembly encroaching on how Members run their offices. It's saying you will share an office in a central location. We've already seen a bit of that encroachment occur today, and so I'm happy that actually the Member reversed course and went a different direction on this one because I think it is an improvement.

I do have an office downtown in Hay River, a constituency office. I made sure that I...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And I don't have that. When a client goes to apply for income assistance, we don't ask what their level of education is. And, you know, I think as a government we need to always be mindful of how much information we are requesting. However, I get the Member's point; it would be useful information. I think that we're at a point, though, where we have a good sense of what the education system is like across the territory in communities. We have a lot of data out there, and we just need to start implementing or continue to implement some of these new initiatives to help...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So the first reading by the Senate was on October 6th. So I don't think that those benefits have been finalized yet. I understand that the federal government should have them finalized and money should be flowing perhaps by the end of this month.

When that happens, I can say that we will be exempting the additional GST that clients may be receiving. So currently GST rebates are counted as income against someone's income assistance. But understanding that the reason this is being doubled is because of the record inflation that we're facing, we are not going to count that...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So there's a number of ways. First I'll speak about ways outside of the income assistance program. We have the small Community employment funds. $4 million go into communities every year to help create jobs which helps people, you know, get jobs and earn income. We have labour we have funds for employers to hire people who might need additional training, people who the employers might not otherwise hire. And we have a number of different programs like that. I recommend that everyone read the recent report from the Ombud on income assistance. They talk quite a bit about...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So we have a number of income support programs. I believe the Member is referencing our income assistance program, which is a specific income support program. The purpose of that program is to provide residents with enough funds to be able to procure the necessities of life. It's not the type of program where people can save money or earn you know, earn a living doing that. It is to help people who are at the point where they can no longer, you know, keep a roof over their head, have food in their fridge, things like that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.