Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So I'll direct my questions to the Minister of Executive and Indigenous Affairs, the Premier, but I know that homelessness is an issue that spans across departments so I'll leave him to redirect if necessary, and this kind of illustrates part of the conundrum we're in with the issues spanning across different mandates and departments here.
So the Salvation Army believes that we need a bigger and purposebuilt shelter facility operating 24/7 in Yellowknife in order to meet the growing needs to be more cost efficient and offer wraparound services. So will the proposed Yellowknife wellness and recovery centre be designed to meet those kinds of needs? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member from Yellowknife North. Mr. Premier.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There's no conundrum here. We all work together. And the Minister of Health and Social Services can answer all of the Member's questions, so I would like to redirect it to her. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Premier. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the wellness and recovery centre is intended to replace the temporary day shelter and the sobering centre, and the capacity is approximately about 85 people during the day with an overnight capacity of 31 designated sleeping spaces, which currently we only have 22, so that increases that. But the facility is also built to be flexible and the ability to provide approximately 35 additional sleeping spaces if necessary. Thank you.
Okay, thank you for that. Can the Minister explain whether the sleeping spaces are specifically designated for those in the sobering centre or they're for anyone who's needing an emergency shelter whether, you know, they're intoxicated or not? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, at this time the plan for the wellness and recovery centre is to provide services to those who are intoxicated because as the some of the other shelters aren't able to accommodate them, so that is what the wellness and recovery centre will accommodate. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Can the Minister explain what she might be able to do now to help nonprofits who are operating emergency shelters be able to cope and address the growing crisis that we're facing here in Yellowknife? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we are currently working to streamline the funding sources to reduce reporting burdens and increase training opportunities to strengthen the overall capacity. And through the implementation of the integrated service delivery, we aim to increase efficiencies and wraparound supports for our most vulnerable residents to ensure that they are getting the services, supports they need in a timely manner and ensuring that NGOs are part of this process. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister of Health and Social Services. Final supplementary. Member from Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So can the Minister tell us when will we be able to see more transitional housing units planned for Yellowknife to help those who are currently on the street struggling with addictions and trauma? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, currently, we have one transitional housing program for addiction recovery planned for Yellowknife. It will have the capacity of five individuals at a time. This is a new program. And so we will be monitoring it closely to better understand the need before we consider any possibly expansions. You know, we have one going in in Yellowknife, we have one going in in Inuvik, we have two in the queue that have put forward their proposals. So, you know, there are many other communities that are also requesting these types of facilities. So what we want to make sure over this next year is that once we get the two operating, that we do a fulsome review that if there's things that we need to change in the way that we're working together with the NGOs to support them or, you know, we need to make sure that before we expand it out even farther. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister of Health and Social Services. Oral questions. Member from Monfwi.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I hope the Premier had a chance to read the statement from yesterday because I'm continuing with my statement from yesterday on Chief Jimmy Bruneau residents. So this is a question for the Premier.
Can the Premier explain if there have been any discussions with the federal government regarding residential school settlements and the residential school historical record in the NWT? Thank you.
Thank you, Member from Monfwi. Mr. Premier.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Unfortunately, I've not had a chance to review the Member's statement. I just flew back into town this morning, so I won't have good answers to the Member's questions. I apologize. Thank you.
I will continue because there are some he can answer, and I will do a written question as well.
So can the Premier describe why the residents or boarding homes associated with the Chief Jimmy Bruneau School are not recognized as part of the residential school system?
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would have to go back because this was an issue that I dealt with as the Minister of ECE. So I would have to go back and look at that. But I imagine it might have something to do with the fact that it was the I believe the Dogrib Divisional Education Authority that was actually overseeing those residents. They weren't GNWT run in the same way that they were elsewhere, or church run. Thank you.
Thank you. Has the GNWT discussed residential school settlement for the NWT residential school survivors with Indigenous leadership? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'm not aware of any of those discussions happening. Thank you.
Thank you, Member from Premier. Final supplementary. Member from Monfwi.
Thank you. I want to ask the Premier what advice can the Premier provide former residential school survivors of Chief Jimmy Bruneau School; are there any options available to these people to receive recognition and compensation for their experience? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. From my understanding, the day school, the residential school settlements, other similar settlements, were all initiated through the courts, through lawsuits, class action lawsuits, and that is the path, I believe, that has been proved most successful over the years. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Premier. Oral questions. Member from Tu NedheWiilideh.
Mr. Speaker, the status quo for Indigenous education is not working. The Government of the Northwest Territories has to implement UNDRIP, and that means fixing up the territory's education system, so it works for Indigenous children and carried out in collaboration with Indigenous governments. My question to the Minister of ECE.
Will the Minister commit to allowing Indigenous students to apply through student financial assistance for both supplementary grants and the remissible loan? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member from Tu NedheWiilideh. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, ECE completed a review of the SFA program just in the last Assembly and with the goals to ensure that it was meeting the needs of NWT students to pursue their postsecondary education goals. The changes were in alignment as much of the work that we do, and the new work that we do with the Truth and Reconciliation of Canada Calls to Action, as well as the Report on the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, as well as United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, with the aim of better supporting Indigenous students with financial assistance to access postsecondary. And so that led to specific changes being made for northern Indigenous students in the program, which increased the supplementary grant to help with their monthly living expenses and to remove the limit of semesters that can be accessed by students as well, Mr. Speaker.
The SFA program offers monthly living allowance to students through either the supplementary grant or the remissible loan. And just so that everybody is aware, the grants are not repayable to the Government of the Northwest Territories. Remissible loans may be forgiven if a student returns to the NWT after they've completed their schooling but otherwise will be considered repayable. And students who receive the remissible loans must remain within that $60,000 loan limit. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Will the Minister commit to establishing educational bodies that align with regional boundaries of existing treaties and those treaties still under negotiation and work with Indigenous governments to determine the governance of those bodies? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, one of my tasks, and very exciting and important tasks over the life of this term, is to begin work on the modernization of the Education Act, and that work will be done in collaboration with Indigenous governments and so I could very well see this being part of the conversation.
One of the cautions I would put out there is that the treaties currently under negotiation, that do not yet have boundaries established there's some of them so we wouldn't know what those would be, and then under, for example Treaty 8 and Treaty 11, the geographies are quite large, so you might end up with very large education bodies that may be deemed kind of unfeasible. And so I look forward to having these conversations when we do review the Education Act. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Will the Minister commit to working with Indigenous governments, including the Dene Nation, to help them reclaim education to preserve their traditional culture and knowledge so that they pass on from one generation to the next generation for education to be available in their traditional language? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in conversations in communities and with Indigenous governments that happened in the previous Assembly, immersion education was one of the top things that our committee at that time consistently heard about, and so I absolutely expect that this will be a key component of the conversation when we do review the Education Act. But that being said, Mr. Speaker, there is an Indigenous languages and education policy in place today in support of education bodies and welcoming all students within learning environments that centre respect and promote Indigenous world views, culture, and languages in our classrooms.
In addition to that, there's the Indigenous languages and education handbook, which is now being implemented in all schools across the NWT. And this was developed with the guidance of Dene, Metis, Inuvialuit, and NWT Cree, to help inform and guide efforts to Indigenize education. And then there is also the Our Languages curriculum which was released and implemented in our classrooms and is really truly a groundbreaking curriculum in the Northwest Territories and something that the NWT should be very proud of. But I very much look forward to continuing conversations about immersion education across the Northwest Territories. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. Final supplementary. Member from Tu NedheWiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Will the Minister commit to revising the NWT Education Funding Framework away from an inequalitybased oriented to a equitybased approach so that small communities can access more educational and wellness programming? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the current school funding framework does distribute funding based on a base level of funding; enrolmentbased funding as well; a northern context index, which depends on the location of the school; consumer price increases, as well as targeted funding, for example for inclusive schooling. But I fully expect that the funding formula will also be a huge topic of conversation as we review the Education Act. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. Oral questions. Member from Dehcho.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are to the Minister of health. Can the Minister commit to improving mental health training and crisis response to mental health coordinators and health centre staff in small communities? Thank you.
Thank you, Member from the Dehcho. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, Mr. Speaker, I can commit to the Member to following up with the department to see what training the mental health workers in the Dehcho riding and communities are receiving and reach out to see if there's future things that they need training with. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, and thank you to the Minister for that. Mr. Speaker, can the Minister commit to ensuring that any mental health training provided to health centre staff is also offered to NGOs in the communities that work directly with the public? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, what I can do is I can check with the department to see what type of outreach training that we do provide to NGOs, or if there's funding dollars available for NGOs to access. Within the communities, like I was saying before, mental health and addictions, there is pots of money for each community to access for the suicide prevention fund. They could be used to you know, for training within the community if that's what the community wishes. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Minister for that. Mr. Speaker, we know that many people struggle with addictions, for addictions treatment. Can the Minister describe how often the GNWT makes referrals for treatment based solely on mental health? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I don't have that level of detail. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Health and Social Services. Final supplementary. Member from the Dehcho.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Can the Minister provide that information to me, and can the Minister commit to multiyear funding agreements for organizations that offer on the land programming? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I know that we have the stats on the territorial wide. When we start going down into smaller communities, it's harder and harder to be able to give numbers because they could they're so small that they may identify people. So what I can do is I can provide the information that we do have on what people are going out and if there is addictions or mental wellness is a territory wide. Thank you.
And to the multiyear funding question, you know, in my Minister's statement today, the community wellness and addiction recovery fund, that fund there can be applied through multiyear funding. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister of Health and Social Services. Oral questions. Member from the Sahtu.
