I certainly support a review of the program guidelines and criteria. I think what people were really saying to me is there’s got to be some flexibility when you’re evaluating this criteria and not just be so stern and be by the book. That’s what the people are looking for. I’d like to ask the Minister: can he direct his department to start to have a heart there, Mr. Speaker? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, this is an area that is always before us every fall time and the winter season. We prepare our client service officers to deal with this matter in advance. As I stated, whenever there is a challenge or issues that are being brought to our attention, we work on the policy and if we need to change the policy. If that’s the case, I will give the Members a heads-up. Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Member for Nunakput, Mr. Jacobson.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today my Member’s statement was on volunteer firefighters in the community. Mr. Speaker, we need to get an integrated approach where all small communities can develop a standardized system service model to maximize the limited technical expertise in the Territory. This must be coordinated at the regional level to work so it can work in each different community and each fire department. Will this government implement this model before the end of this term? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Jacobson. The honourable Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs, Mr. Robert McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Member makes a very good point and it’s a concern we’ve heard from a lot of small communities in the Northwest Territories. Recognizing that, the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs -- and I think we’re going to be debating it when our budget comes forward -- have identified funding to start a training process, because we see our responsibility as being able to get out there at the regional level, have regional training workshops, get into the communities, work with the firefighters in the communities in identifying their needs and their shortcomings as far as training goes. The department has taken it upon itself to put forward this initiative and -- we’re looking at after the budget’s past on April 1st -- being able to get out in the communities and start working with them identifying their firefighting needs. Thank you.
Considering small and remote communities are more susceptible to house fires -- we have the highest number of deaths per capita in Canada -- this government will work with the local fire marshals in finding funding sources to develop real capacity in each community with the funding Thank you.
[Microphone turned off] …to use this funding to identify capacity in the community and work with the communities to improve it where we’re able to. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, considering the volunteer firefighters are risking their lives to protect the communities that they live in, can we implement a comprehensive checklist and systems whether everything is proper, valves functioning, breathing apparatuses, heated fire truck facilities, and proper safety gear and training? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, that would be the goal of the department, too, is to ensure that all local firefighters are well trained and the fire marshal and assistant fire marshal would be able to go through the equipment with them and do a checks and balance of all the equipment they have, to make sure things are working properly. It is our goal to ensure that we work with the communities as best we can to ensure that their fire departments are properly trained. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Your final supplementary, Mr. Jacobson.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to thank the Minister for that. The firefighters in each community... Can we look forward to getting some help in regard to getting new bunker gear and new breathing apparatuses and heated garages in some communities, please and thank you?
Mr. Speaker, I’d like to make sure that the Minister commits to me today that he comes in to the small and remote communities all across the Territory and makes sure our firefighters are protected and properly equipped. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, we would go into the community and work with the community to identify the shortcomings as far as their firefighting ability goes. As far as equipment goes, we’ll help them to identify the equipment that they need and then they would have to work with the municipal government to ensure and they would have the ability to purchase the equipment. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to ask the Minister of the Housing Corporation in terms of working with the home ownership of the housing in my region. We seem to be running into a lot of issues with land tenure on the Commissioner’s lots and sometimes that prevents applications from being looked at or being seriously considered for approval. I want to ask the Minister if, in his strategy, would there be some movement in terms of how do we deal with the land tenure issue, especially for the elders in my communities.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The honourable Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation, Mr. Robert McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Land tenure does sometimes get to be a hindrance as to people’s ability to access some of our programs. However, we’ve been very fortunate lately that we’ve been working with a lot of the band communities and they’re making band land available to their constituents so that they’re able to access the home ownership programs, which helps the Housing Corporation quite a bit, but more importantly, it helps the residents of the community quite a bit because they will be assured they have land tenure and they’re able to put their house on it.
As far as Commissioner’s land goes, I mean, there’s a process where they can apply for the purchase of Commissioner’s land within the community and it’s one that would go through the proper process and then they’d be able to purchase the land if it’s available for sale. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, sometimes these seniors and these elders that do have land in the community and sometimes when they make an application they find out that they owe money on this land here and sometimes that prevents them from being eligible for an application to fix up their houses there. I want to ask the Minister: is his department looking at how do we look at issues around arrears or outstanding bills that elders have without them knowing and, of course, they need their houses fixed and it stops them from being repaired?
Mr. Speaker, we are coming forward with a slight change in policy to address some of the Member’s and other Members’ concerns. It is one that we would have to bring before committee and have the discussion with committee, but we do recognize that it has been a problem across the Northwest Territories and we’re taking the necessary steps to do what we can to help homeowners access some of the programs we offer. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, certainly I look forward to the new policy. I’m so happy I just about choked on it here, Mr. Speaker. I’m very pleased to hear what the Minister has said. I wanted to ask the Minister, there are 600 families in the Sahtu and 330 families make less than $75,000. I want to ask the Minister in regards to the public housing units in the Sahtu. Will the Minister also be coming forward in terms of rent scale adjustments so that families do have an equal chance to make it in society in terms of adjusting their rents that is liveable in the public housing units?
Mr. Speaker, we are, as Members know, reviewing the rent scale right now. The work is still ongoing. We are hoping that we are able to come forward soon with some recommendations and a discussion again with committee. But as to the number that the Member mentioned, the amount of money that is made in communities, these are the type of people that we want to graduate out of public housing and into the home ownership side and we are doing what we can as a corporation to try and accommodate them and try to get them into home ownership.
I believe we have made a lot of progress in the last little while. We have been able to see more and more people getting into home ownership and with some of the gap analysis that we are using, we are able to get some of those that are just slightly over the threshold into home ownership. I think there have been some innovative solutions put forward here. I think we are seeing more and more people get into home ownership. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In his strategy, is the Minister considering looking at a communication strategy also? Mr. Speaker, there is an elder in Fort Good Hope that somehow we missed this elder here in terms of communicating between the elder and the Housing Corporation. This elder had his house frozen up for over a month here and nothing happened in terms of Housing looking after him. He was in the bush. The technical advisor was on holidays. Just nothing happened to help this elder here. Now it is finally being looked at and still not a done deal. Is the Minister looking at the communication strategy to work with elders such as this kind of incident?
Mr. Speaker, if it was a home ownership issue, then it would be the homeowner’s responsibility to ensure somebody is watching over his house. Having said that, though, we still continue to try and work with folks that find themselves in situations like this, to see if there are ways that we can assist them. At the end of the day, the ultimate responsibility I would think would have to be on the homeowner to ensure their place or units don’t freeze up. In the cases where it does happen, we do what we can to work with these folks to try and repair some of the problems. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement today I was very proud to speak to the issue of V-Day North here and the campaign to work to stop violence against women. My questions will be to the Minister who would be responsible for the Status of Women. Mr. Speaker, one of the statistics I highlighted which was the rates of spousal abuse in the Northwest Territories are 5 percent higher than the national average. What strategies does the government have in place that will combat this problem and what has shown results on dealing with this terrible statistic? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. The honourable Minister responsible for the Status of Women, Ms. Lee.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As the Member knows, this government has been involved with the Family Violence Action Strategy and we work with the coalition to address this issue. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, would the Minister be able to highlight some of the resources they have committed directly to the V-Day North campaign or any other campaign that has gotten out there to stop the violence against women? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, specific to that event, the organizers had asked me if I could attend and say a few words. I was happy to accept that invitation and participate in the event. Mr. Speaker, under the NWT Family Violence Action Plan, which is now in phase II, we fund shelter stabilization enhancement funds. We fund funding for non-shelter regions. We also work with Justice and we have contracted YWCA to deliver a program on children who witness violence. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, what programs does the ministry support for men, specifically to help curb this terrible trend where we have a 5 percent increase above the national average which is directed at violence against women? What programs does the department have specifically targeted at men to bring down this terrible, horrible statistic? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, as the Member knows, the Department of Health and Social Services and the Status of Women are part of the coalition that works on family violence issues. One of our initiatives that Strategic Investments committee Building Our Future has approved is a program for men who use violence. That program is being delivered by the Department of Justice. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Lee. Your final supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Is the Minister able to point towards any specific statistic that shows and demonstrates that our terrible average of being on the national worst list of abuse against women is coming down? Is she able to point specifically at any numbers or statistics that definitely define us as working towards that goal of ending violence against women? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I believe through the work that the government has been involved in, we are better able to keep track of stats, and the stats do not show a downward movement. We still stay at the high end of the increasing numbers of family violence and domestic violence and other violence in the Territories per capita. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Member for Kam Lake, Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have some more questions following up on my Member’s statement today. The other mission in the contracts report over $5,000 is the contract between the Government of the Northwest Territories and Ruskin to build the Deh Cho Bridge, Mr. Speaker. It is not every day that the government signs a sole-source contract for over $92 million. I would like to ask the Minister of Transportation where that contract is and how come it is not in the registry. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. The honourable Minister of Transportation, Mr. Michael McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The contract for Ruskin was signed with the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation in March of 2010 with the approval of the GNWT, of course, so it would not appear in the GNWT contracts report for the 2009-2010 year. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, didn’t the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation hand over control of the project prior to March of 2010? If so, why is the contract with Ruskin between the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation and Ruskin and not the Government of the Northwest Territories and Ruskin? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, the GNWT assumed the contract through and as part of the letter of agreement that was signed between the GNWT and Deh Cho Bridge Corporation in 2010-11 fiscal year, so it will now start to show up in our books once we do the appropriate changes. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I am going to have to certainly take a longer look at the timeline and how this all happened, but that is pretty alarming if the contract is between Ruskin and the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation and not the government. We supposedly took over that. Mr. Speaker, have the assets of the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation been transferred over to the Government of the Northwest Territories and when did that happen? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, the assets, the contracts, all the dealings with the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation were transferred to the Government of the Northwest Territories and they will now start to be part of our public accounts, that is including the long-term debt. It will also be included in our non-consolidated financial statements. There is going to be some requirements for some legislative changes to the act that will require us to now not put the revenues into a special fund, but will now go into general revenues of the government. So there are minor changes to that. That will be forthcoming as we move along here, but now, for the comfort of the Member, all assets, all components of the bridge project are now under the Government of the Northwest Territories.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Your final supplementary, Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I guess the timing is pretty good. The Minister and his staff are going to be providing a briefing to Regular Members next week on the Deh Cho Bridge Project. I was wondering if the Minister could commit to have his department staff, when they come to the briefing next week, provide the committee with an overview of the contract itself, especially with an eye to eligible costs and where responsibility lies for eligible cost overruns on that project. Thank you.
Thank you. We’re always pleased to provide the Members of this House with information and updates on what is happening with the project. There’s a lot of interest, of course, as the project moves forward. We have committed to provide a briefing to the Members and we certainly will bring all the information we can. Of course, I indicated earlier that we will not be giving the Members a copy of the contract. That would be something that would require some approvals from other people that are involved in this project. But we will certainly give the dates. When this was transferred over I think we signed a letter of agreement and agreed to transfer this portion of it over in April and all of the dealings are no different than any other government project and the reporting will be done accordingly. Thank you.
