Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate Member Moses for bringing this motion forward. If this isn’t apparently clear right now, you’ve heard from numerous committee members on their passion on this area of early childhood development. Now, we may not always agree on the actual steps or the age group per se, and we know that the department is working quite well in getting their junior kindergarten up and running, and I do support that initiative. You’ve also heard from many committee members that zero to three or the month five to month nine. I’m sure anyone who does enough research can probably dig up any study that will corroborate anything in that area of childhood development, and I think there are some good ideas out there.
That said, I can just imagine what’s going through Cabinet’s mind right now going, you know, we’re on a fiscally tight budget, we’ve got a lot of initiatives on the agenda. How can we afford another $2 million? What’s going through this committee’s mind that would allow us to even conceive that, given the fiscal restraints that we continuously hear when motions are brought to the floor of the House? That’s a good question. This committee as well as Cabinet as well as the entire Northwest Territories have waited over two years for this early childhood development to come into play. We’ve heard a lot of good things, and I think over the years, this committee and individual Members have supported the initiatives, waiting feverishly to see these actions and these steps to be put in motion.
I think we just heard from Mr. Moses, this is a fairly daunting action plan where this committee feels that we’re not actually putting enough money to achieve meaningfully, the results that, I think, everyone is hoping to resolve this. This motion basically gives that direction to say, listen, we support this initiative, which I think is a good thing. No one should read negatively into this motion. What we’re saying is we’re supporting what is being done. We’re just saying let’s put a little bit more grease on that axle so that we can achieve what is meaningful to the people of the Northwest Territories.
I can tell you that in this committee structure in this very House, we will spend less time debating on $20 million, $30 million, $40 million, $300 million for new highway construction, and that goes with very little debate, and yet sometimes we’ll sit here and we’ll talk about a $2 million project, a $1 million project when really that’s less than one kilometre of new highway. I always find that mindboggling in this room. What will benefit the future of our territory and we put so much debate into it, and yet other pieces of equipment or infrastructure barely see the light of day and barely get debated. It’s usually just approved, because, yes, infrastructure is the right way to go. I’m not saying that it isn’t. I’m just saying that this is something that will greatly shift.
This motion is setting the course of a paradigm shift in our thinking. It’s saying, listen, let’s put more money where we’re going to get a bigger bang for our dollar. Let’s put more money in something that we’re going to have a tangible benefit for the future of the Northwest Territories, and nothing more.
This is not about a power struggle. This is not about a bunch of Regular Members who don’t understand dollars and cents. Members on this side of the House clearly understand the budget and clearly understand the fiscal restraints that we’re facing. We’re saying let’s put more money where it really counts, and it counts in our people. If it’s not apparently clear what I’m indicating today or what my rationale is for this motion, I will be in support of this motion, and I will actually be calling for a recorded vote.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to say that reading the motion very carefully, it does say a reallocation of an additional $2 million, so there might be the appearance of, when the word is additional, it’s really meant addition to the programming, not necessarily to the overall bottom line of the budget. That’s the way I read it and I think that’s the way it was intended. I do hear Mr. Menicoche’s point, but that’s why I want to reaffirm I read it and I think a lot of other folks do as well.
That said, I think it’s given enough of a parameter and design with the flexibility to allow the department and certainly the government, through the – goodness, I hate to say this word – through the government’s wisdom, to find a way to do that. This is committee members trying to help support the initiative that’s being led by the government and certainly by the Minister. I have yet to have a single person tell me that junior kindergarten isn’t important. This is re-profiling money, and sometimes we think we can offer the best advice, we know that sometimes if we just say look, this is clearly what we want, help us help you, and this is exactly what this is, is a motion that Members want to help government further the ideals and benefits of junior kindergarten. So again, this is just about re-profiling the money, reallocation within the government and we feel like $2 million is necessary to achieve the goals as prescribed.
We could talk at length, and as much as I would like to talk at length, we all know the benefits of junior kindergarten. Everyone is completely sold and I am an absolute believer in its benefits and I want to thank the department for building this into a giant pillar for long-term educational plans. That work is important. I admire the expertise they bring forward in the briefings. I mean, we have some top quality people providing this guidance and that should not go understated. We have got some really good insight on this. The only concern is we want to make sure that it gets off on the right start. This being, of course, good advice from Members of government, I would hope government would heed our advice and jump on it and say, my goodness, what a great idea. It’s not too familiar for government to think that way. They have every opportunity to agree with us, so I would like this to be the occasion. I believe a recorded vote has already been asked for, so there’s no sense in repeating that. Thank you.
Question has been called. Call for a recorded vote. All those in favour, please stand.
Mr. Moses, Mr. Bromley, Mr. Yakeleya, Mr. Dolynny, Mr. Hawkins, Ms. Bisaro.
All those opposed, please stand.
Mr. Menicoche, Mr. Blake, Mr. Beaulieu, Mr. Abernethy, Mr. Miltenberger, Mr. McLeod – Yellowknife South, Mr. Lafferty, Mr. Ramsay, Mr. McLeod – Inuvik Twin Lakes.
Votes are six for, nine against.
---Defeated
Committee, page 10-17, activity summary, Education, Culture and Employment, operations expenditure summary, $241.213 million. Mr. Moses.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I know the first round that I got through I focused a lot on early childhood development. I know when we give out our funding to our education authorities, being the Member that represents Inuvik Boot Lake and the Beaufort-Delta Education Authority and discussions and talking with both educators and staff, the amount of funding that they do get in that region alone, I’m not sure how the formula is given to the students, but in that area alone when we fund the Beaufort-Delta Education Authority it does have a very high cost associated to travel. So when we want educators or people from the authority to go into the communities, especially the coastal communities, there’s an added cost that really affects their budget and the amount of time they can go and support their teachers or go see how a school is doing. It does affect the budget. So it also affects the amount of programs that they might be able to do that year and might possibly be taking away positions within the authority that might otherwise be beneficial.
I think the department, when they do give out funding, has to have something in there that addresses the high cost of travel within the Beaufort-Delta region, and I’m sure it’s the same with the small communities in the other regions as well. I just want to ask the Minister how is that being addressed or looked at when we’re allocating dollars to these authorities. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. Minister Lafferty.
Mahsi, Mr. Chair. As it stands now, I can only speak to how we’re contributing to the school boards. I do have a list of just over $146 million to the school boards and the Beaufort-Delta Divisional Education Council is top on the line. We give more money based on the enrollment and also the cost factor as well, as the Member alluded to, the high cost of living in the communities.
My deputy alluded earlier that we’ll be re-evaluating the funding formula to the schools. So this is an area that could change as we develop the discussion paper on whether we’re going to be changing the formula funding. That’s an area that we’re going to be discussing. So what I’m sharing with you is current to date and then that will obviously see some changes. Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Mr. Moses.
Thank you. I’m glad to hear that formula funding is something that’s going to be looked at and addressed. I think it’s long overdue because each authority only gets so many dollars to spend and when a lot of it goes into travel, that’s a lot taken out of the education components, the support components there.
Moving forward, one way that we can affect this is through a program that the Minister is very familiar with and that’s the e-learning program. I just wanted to make a little comment on the e-learning program. Committee has seen firsthand that program in action, seen the results that were given in a presentation, as well, to some Members on the increase of school marks as well as the options of doing academic classes that otherwise couldn’t have been done before. So just really amazing, innovative ways of educating our youth in the small communities. In the Beaufort-Delta there are seven of them that can be affected in a positive way. In the Sahtu there are four communities that can get this type of program delivered. In the North Slave about four or five. Then in the Deh Cho there would be four communities that could get on the e-learning system and we’d get high quality education to our youth in those small communities but also provide an academic course to these classes.
I know the Minister is aware of the e-learning program. It’s a great program. In fact we passed a bill in this House getting information using the e-learning system from students in Tuktoyaktuk, from the students and educators. So that e-learning system helped us pass legislation in this House. So, history, amazing.
I don’t know what to say any further, except that I do have a motion that I’d like to read into the House, Mr. Chair. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. Go ahead, read your motion.
Just a quick note there, Mr. Chair. The motion, again, recommends that the government increase its allocations to fund the e-learning. I heard some pretty successful stories and especially for our small communities to move people into the required educational careers that they want to go into with full confidence that they’re getting the required courses. Of course, the funding is being looked at through the Beaufort-Delta District Education Council, and they’re looking beyond its regions, and I certainly agree with Mr. Menicoche on other regions taking full advantage of this type of initiative and that we start looking at avenues where our smaller communities can be under the same sort of level and on par with the larger regions who have some courses that we don’t have in our small communities. I do support the reallocation of this type of funding. It’s a very good initiative, and I certainly know that the Sahtu people, if this ever happens, it would be beneficial if Members spoke on it. So I’d like to add on my last comment to ask for a recorded vote.
Question has been called. Members have asked for a recorded vote. Will all those in favour, please stand.
Mr. Moses, Mr. Bromley, Mr. Yakeleya, Mr. Hawkins, Ms. Bisaro.
All those opposed, please stand.
Mr. Menicoche, Mr. Blake, Mr. Beaulieu, Mr. Abernethy, Mr. Miltenberger, Mr. McLeod – Yellowknife South, Mr. Lafferty, Mr. Ramsay, Mr. McLeod – Inuvik Twin Lakes.
All those abstaining, please stand.
Results of the motion: five in favour, nine opposed, no abstentions. The motion is defeated.
---Defeated
Committee, we are on page 10-17. Moving on with questions, I have Mr. Blake.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just a couple comments on this page.
