Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d also like to welcome Mr. Grant Hood, the SAO for the Town of Inuvik; and the current mayor of Inuvik, Floyd Roland, also former Premier. Welcome to the House and enjoy the proceedings.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s my great pleasure to recognize the president of the NWT Teachers’ Association, Ms. Gayla Meredith, and thank Gayla for the reception meet and greet that was held this morning. It was very enjoyable. Thank you
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Mrs. Groenewegen.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d also like to take the opportunity to recognize a former colleague in the House today, as he mentioned last night at a gathering, he and I and Minister Miltenberger were all from the class of 1995 and there were four of us elected in 1995. So many memories of his presence and presentations in this House. Thank you.
Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Mr. Lafferty.
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker, I, too, would like to recognize Gayla Meredith, president of the NWTTA for her ongoing support and partnership. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. I’d like to welcome all our visitors here in the public gallery. Thank you for taking an interest in our proceedings today.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I listened with interest to the Minister of Human Resources, Glen Abernethy, when he talked about the soon-to-be launched Aboriginal Cultural Awareness Training Program aimed at enhancing and promoting the Aboriginal culture of understanding. I want to ask the Minister, in light of what I said in my Member’s statement about Deline hosting a huge hand games tournament, with something like that, is the Minister looking at some type of cultural training program where we can fully immerse in the training and culture and understanding of Aboriginal people at their best. Is the Minister looking at something like that in terms of a training program for our employees?
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The honourable Minister of Human Resources, Mr. Glen Abernethy.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The program that we’re designing is actually designed with the intent of helping new employees, as well as some existing employees, understand the cultures and reality of working in the Northwest Territories. It was designed in participation with a number of different Aboriginal groups in the Northwest Territories. As far as having it presented at something like the hand games, it’s not really designed for that. It’s designed for employees to help them understand the different cultures and the realities in the Northwest Territories.
I wanted to ask the Minister to be open and flexible, because what better way to learn about the Aboriginal people than to get into them, play the hand games with them, understand the culture. Even learn a few hand signals, which I really can’t say in the House here. I think that’s the most opportune time to have employees come and sit and eat, and dance and learn the hand games of the Aboriginal people. Would the Minister look at something like that to fully understand the Aboriginal people at their best?
I’ve had an opportunity to travel to a lot of the communities in the Northwest Territories with the Member, as well, and had an opportunity to participate in the hand games, which I thoroughly lost. I do understand the value of these types of activities and initiatives but, once again, this program is really designed to help the individual employees who happen to be in Yellowknife or other communities where maybe the hand games aren’t taking place.
As a government, we do encourage our employees who live in smaller communities to engage and become part of the communities and I would hope to see members of the GNWT public service participating in the activities in Deline. The program is more designed for all communities, not one particular location.
If young kids in Sachs Harbour can learn the Dene hand games, certainly we can look at some of our regions and the departments that we’re responsible for in the Tlicho, the Deh Cho, the Sahtu, even the Gwich’in coming to Tulita and taking that prize. I want to ask again the Minister, it would be good if we had a GNWT representative look at and understand the Dene culture, and one aspect is to see these magnificent hand games and really understand, okay, this is how the people celebrate life. I know it’s designed for some things, but I’m asking to leave some room for flexibility in the training program.
I’d say that we’re absolutely going to be flexible and open. We have some of the most generous leave policies here in the Government of the Northwest Territories and we encourage our employees to maybe take some time to go participate in these types of events.
As Cabinet members, I know we’ve all had an opportunity to travel to the Sahtu and many of us did participate in the hand games when we were there previously. We do see the value of these types of activities and we encourage involvement. We will continue to encourage our employees to take advantage of these opportunities as they present themselves.
Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. Final supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. On page 3 of 3 of the Minister’s statement he said, “so far have been in the right direction and that we are a national leader and role model in advancing diversity in our workplace.” I’m with the Minister on that. I want to ask the Minister how I can support him. Can he write some kind of directive or initiative that would support cultural awareness, such as participating in regional hand games, when the opportunity is available to our workers.
We, obviously, want a public service that represents the population that we serve, and as such, we have put in a number of these programs to help us attain that. I’m interested in what the Member has to say and I’d be happy to sit down and have a conversation with the Member to see what we can do, and discuss it further with committee as well.
Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In follow-up to my Member’s statement today, I have questions for the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs. Back in November my colleague Mr. Dolynny made a very good statement on this very same topic. I believe that since then, the report of the unfortunate and tragic incident that took place in the Yukon has progressed further, and their government, the Yukon Government, is looking at putting in place measures to avoid this very preventable loss in the future.
I’d like to ask the Minister what our government has done to date to address the issue of carbon monoxide detectors in buildings in the Northwest Territories.
Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The honourable Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs, Mr. Robert McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The National Building Code requires that all structures built from 2008 now have to have CO2 detectors. Any structures built prior to then, it wasn’t a requirement at the time. However, with the incidents that took place in the Yukon I think there are a lot of people who are starting to install CO2 detectors.
The department, working with the NWT Fire Chiefs Association, had a very good awareness campaign and I believe they were even handing out free detectors to those who wanted them. We are trying to raise public awareness. There are some requirements for it in the National Building Code to have these installed after 2008.
That is very good news, both the mandatory installation in public buildings, the public awareness campaign, and the handing out of carbon monoxide detectors. The potential problem is all too prevalent in our residences.
I’d like to ask the Minister if there’s anything that our government could do further to step up the efforts to ensure that people have access to these detectors in their homes. I understand that they are not that expensive, and in our communities they are probably not readily available in some of the small communities in stores. Is this government prepared to go further with this?
I can assure the Member, and all Members of the House, that we will do whatever it takes to try and ensure that all our residents across the Northwest Territories are covered. The National Building Code that I pointed out before does apply to residents also. That protection is there. We are monitoring the legislation that the Yukon is planning to enact and see if there’s opportunity for us to enact the same type of legislation. We’re monitoring that quite closely. Once that’s all done, we will have discussions with committee and Members of the Assembly.
That is very good to know. Is there anything that we as a government could do legislation-wise? New construction I understand. What about existing homes? Is there anything we can do, from a regulation and monitoring perspective, to ensure that people have carbon monoxide detectors in their homes?
Other than trying to wear public awareness and that, I suppose we would have to look at trying to work out some regulations. I do note that if they are renovating a home that was built prior to 2008, then the new requirements would take place where they need to install a CO2 detector. If renovations are being done, then it would be mandatory to install CO2 detectors.
Again, I can assure all Members that we will do whatever we can to ensure all members of the public are aware of the dangers of carbon monoxide and work with the public in any way that we can. If it means handing out CO2 detectors, then we would have to explore that also.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final supplementary, Mrs. Groenewegen.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I for one would strongly support handing out these. We take a lot of measures, as a government, to address public safety, everything from making sure we wear our seatbelts and our kids wear seatbelts. We do a lot of things by regulation and by law to ensure public safety. I would like to see us address this and would certainly support an allocation of funding to purchase carbon monoxide detectors and give them out to anybody who would be interested.
We appreciate the Member’s support and look forward to working with all Members to try and raise awareness out there. I think the event that took place in Whitehorse, unfortunately, was a sad way to make the public aware of the danger to carbon monoxide detectors. I do know our NWT Fire Chiefs Association is working very hard on this issue because they recognize the importance of it too. I think, in partnership with all the stakeholders, we’re doing all we can to make sure our public is well protected.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are addressed to the Minister of Finance. I would like to follow up on my statement and ask him questions about whether or not we have policies in regard to our use of social media. I know we have some policies that apply to individual employees. For instance, Facebook is blocked on employees’ computers. Cell phone use, I know, is listed. There is a policy on cell phone use. I’d like to know from the Minister, in terms of the development of Facebook sites and websites, and in terms of the maintenance of Facebook sites and websites, do we have any policies or any guidelines that people follow?
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The honourable Minister of Finance, Mr. Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Apparently none that I’m aware of.
I didn’t hear the answer. Thank you very much, colleagues. To the Minister, I would like to know whether or not this is something that, as a government, I feel that we need to remain impartial and I would like to know from the Minister whether or not he thinks there’s a policy gap here and, if so, is he willing to do something about developing some guidelines and some policies to handle Facebook sites and websites.
I’ll commit to review the matter with the appropriate officials in the departments and if there is deemed to be a policy gap, then we’ll, of course, take the steps to close that gap.
Thanks to the Minister for that commitment. I appreciate that. In the absence of anything right now, if we have Facebook sites which have likes on them, a particular business that has been liked which indicates that the GNWT likes this business and not another one, for instance, what is the Minister going to do to try and monitor Facebook sites and website that we have that may have particular preferences for a business or organization?
I’ll commit to put this matter on the table for Cabinet strategy tomorrow, and where all the senior officials are, as well, and we’ll discuss the best way to make sure that we are impartial in all the appropriate areas as it pertains to government policy.
I appreciate the commitment from the Minister. I guess I would just like to say I appreciate this is coming before senior management and Cabinet. I’d like to suggest to the Minister that we don’t have to reinvent the wheel. There are lots of governments out there that, no doubt, have policies and guidelines, so I would suggest to the Minister that we copy them more than develop our own.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. No question there. Mr. Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the Member’s sage advice and I will keep that in mind as we move forward.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. The honourable Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Moses.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. I guess basically it’s in terms of planning and getting ready for a region when we go through an economic downturn. I just want to ask the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment if he has seen an increased cost in our Income Assistance Program and, if so, does he know the figure of how many dollars we’re putting in to the income assistance in the community of Inuvik. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Lafferty.
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. With the Income Assistance Program, we made some changes in 2007 to reflect the cost of living in the North and also the remoteness of the communities and, of course, the high costs. So we made those changes in 2007 and we have continued to monitor that since then until today. I have instructed my department to re-evaluate the program itself and continue monitoring it. If there are changes in the cost factor in, let’s say, the Beaufort-Delta, we need to take those into consideration. If we’re going to make changes, we have to come back to this House to make those changes. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Just along those lines, I’d like to ask the Minister if there has been an increase in the amount of applications and an increase in the amount of residents that are now collecting income assistance in the community of Inuvik, has there been an increase in the amount of dollars that are allocated to this particular program. I’m trying to get to a point here, because with the lack of jobs and the downturn in Inuvik right now, we’re going to see more families, we’re going to see more people, more residents who are becoming dependent on government and income assistance. I’ve seen it through my office. I’d like to ask the Minister if he has seen an increase in the applications and the number of people who are on income assistance and an increase in dollars. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
