Page 9-24, information item, justice, court services, active positions. Any questions? Hearing none, committee, we move to page 9-27, community justice and corrections, operations expenditure summary, $40.616 million. Are we agreed? Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Just quickly for committee here, I know there’s a broad net cast here in terms of support, and we provide support to youth programs and so on. Given what we’re learning, the very exciting research and the massive amount of information that’s coming on board now about early childhood and the implications for investment in those early years for the full and proper development of the human being, and the consequences to a healthy life that avoids the sorts of issues that the Minister has to deal with here, is that an area that the department funds community groups or would contemplate funding? I’m thinking of things like parenthood during the early years and community events that support the young families and so on. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister Abernethy.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Not specifically. This isn’t one of the areas that this particular division is working on. This division has a lot more involvement with things like the community justice committees, who happen to be doing sort of on-the-land initiatives from time to time, which clearly, young families can participate in and benefit that way. But there’s nothing specifically being done necessarily for early childhood and development. This is about reintegration and trying to get people back on the right path.
That’s to be expected. Recognizing that this really is about crime prevention first of all, and then early correction second of all, I suppose, I’d say this is a real opportunity, based on what we are learning, and it might be something the department could look into and consider. That’s all I had. Thank you.
We will absolutely work with other departments to see what opportunities exist for our partnership and our involvement in this area.
Thank you, Minister Abernethy. Mr. Moses.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Just one quick question in terms of community justice. I still see it’s relatively the same, but there is, I think, about a $170,000 decrease into the community justice from last year, under community justice, the line items. Anyhow, seeing the importance of community justice programs in our communities and the diversion programs, on-the-land programs that they do and the intervention work that they do, is the Minister willing to take a look and add those dollars again, possibly next business plan? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. Minister Abernethy.
Thank you, Madam Chair. One of the areas that unfortunately sunsetted for us is the Aboriginal Justice Strategy, which is probably where you see the significant amount of this decrease, but we understand that that money is coming back. If it comes back, we will see it added back in.
I have no further questions. I just wanted to see if there was a commitment that that funding did come back because of all the good work of that program. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. I have nobody further on my list. Page 9-27, activity summary, Justice, community justice and corrections, operations expenditure summary, $40.616 million. Are we agreed?
Agreed.
Thank you, committee. Page 9-28, activity summary, Justice, community justice and corrections, grants and contributions, contributions, total contributions, $2.075 million. Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to follow up on my colleague’s question there. Here on this page, the first item we have a decrease of $316,000 to community justice committees and projects. I wonder if we can get an explanation of that. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister Abernethy.
That is the money I just mentioned, the federal money that sunsetted and we hope, we believe it is going to be coming back. If it comes back, you will see it come back by way of a supp.
Madam Chair, I’m trying to compare the two. On page 27 there’s a reduction of about $170,000 and here there is a reduction of about $316,000 in community justice. I’m just wondering, for clarity, are those territorial dollars on page 27 and federal dollars on 28, or do dollars on page 28 compose part of the effort under community justice at the bottom on page 27?
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Ms. Schofield.
Madam Chair, on page 9-28, which sees the $316,000 reduction in grants and contributions is in relation to the Aboriginal Justice Strategy. On page 9-27 there is a combination of additions and subtractions, so we had added in additional funds for the Community Safety Strategy so it is the net effect. That is why it doesn’t match up with the $316,000. Thank you.
Thank you.
Committee, page 9-28, activity summary, Justice, community justice and corrections, grants and contributions, contributions, total contributions, $2.075 million. Agreed?
Agreed.
Thank you. Page 9-29, information item, Justice, community justice and corrections, active positions. Are there any questions?
Agreed.
Page 9-31, Justice, activity summary, services to the public, operations expenditure summary, $5.372 million. Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I’m wondering if this is where the program for men who use violence is housed and also the early intervention for non-violent offenders. There is a program that I believe was being tried out last year. Are those relevant on this page? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister Abernethy.
Madam Chair, that was in the community justice section. This is more legal services, coroner services, childrens lawyer, public trustee, those types of things. The services he is talking about are in the previous section.
Son of a gun. I’ll skip those questions.
I would like to talk a little bit about the Family Violence Action Plan funding. I assume that is relevant on this page. At least I see a reference on the next page of this subtext to this. I’m assuming family violence funding is indeed in this. What is the department doing in response to the 19 recommendations for phase 3 of the Family Violence Action Plan? Thank you.
Madam Chair, the Member is correct. I am wrong. The protection of family violence falls under this section. This is where the money is housed.
With respect to those 19 recommendations, I actually had an opportunity to meet with the coalition last week. We had an opportunity to sit down and look at the 19 recommendations. Without minimizing the importance of the 19 recommendations, they indicated they are all important. They have indicated to me and others that they want a priority put on three, particularly a social media campaign, a program for men who use violence, and community outreach. I believe we will be moving forward with a supp. I know we will be moving forward with a supp that will actually bring some money into the program, for men who abuse or use violence, this sitting to increase the funding to that program as Members and the coalition have requested.
We will continue to work with Members and the coalition, trying to find some solutions. We heard a lot of talk about phase 1, phase 2 and phase 3. During that conversation, it became clear that we really need to stop talking about phases and we need to start talking about core funding. These moves will move that funding for program for men who use violence into a core funding avenue, if you will. It will become a program that we will be delivering ongoing.
Thanks to the Minister for those comments. I couldn’t write fast enough. If you could just repeat the three priorities that the coalition identified and maybe I will squeeze in a question at the same time. I wonder if there are any results on the courses offered for men who use violence. Thank you.
I’m just going to make a couple of comments for Mr. Bromley and then I’ll just go to Kim for some of the specifics.
The three key messages and priorities from the coalition building upon the 19 are social media campaign – I’m happy to sit down with the Member and share the document that I had – the program for men who use violence, which is a 24-week program; and community outreach. Quite frankly, I asked them for some additional information on what they mean by a social media campaign and what they would like to envision seeing. I haven’t got that back from them yet. I’m happy to have a conversation with you and committee afterwards, once we get that information back from them. From a Justice point of view, the one that really obviously hit home was the program for men who use violence and we have brought it forward by way of supp to increase the funding. For specifics, I’ll go to Ms. Schofield.
Ms. Schofield.
The program isn’t actually implemented yet. There weren’t enough resources to fully implement the program. At the end of this Legislative Assembly, if the supplementary funding is approved, we’ll have appropriate funding to fully implement the abuser program. At that time, when it’s fully operational, we’ll have results in and measures to report back to committee. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Ms. Schofield. Mr. Bromley.
I think there is another one that is early intervention for nonviolent and the divorce proceedings towards the best options for the children. I think those things are really great programs. I am very happy to see them going forward. I think committee remains very interested in any results as those accumulate on all of those. I’ll leave it at that. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Mr. Abernethy.
The Member is right; there have been some other courses as part of that. There is an eight-week course that’s been delivered three times for men who use violence through the DVTO court. If the Member wishes, I’m happy to share the information with him on a bit of an analysis of the programs, how many we have run, what kind of results, what kind of turnout we had, and I will share that with committee as well.
Thank you, Minister Abernethy. We will move on to Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Madam Chair. In our quest to always improve services and I guess professionalism to our public, can the Minister indicate when will corporate registries, the system itself, be accessible on-line?
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Minister Abernethy.
Thanks, Madam Chair. I don’t know. I’m happy to get that information for you.
I look forward to that information. Seeing the Public Utilities Board is now part of the Department of Justice operations and it finds itself here in the services to public category and we have a fairly heavy year, Madam Chair, with the new NWT Power rate application, has the Minister or the department – and I know there’s no change in budget here – is there any rationale that this potentially could add a lot of workload or a lot of hidden cost in relationship to this new rate application? Maybe the Minister can elaborate on that, please, Madam Chair.
That change doesn’t take effect until July 1st. We’re sure it will come with some workload, but it’s minimal. The board is an independent board that is responsible for their own operations and administration. We appoint the board and we provide some general administrative direction as far as keeping things affordable, but we don’t interfere with their rulings or their decisions.
So I’m sensing that we’re not pre-empting that there’s going to be a heavier workload for this Public Utilities Board given the fact that this is going to be a fairly elaborate rate application that’s going to be brought down to the people of the Northwest Territories.
Sorry. I misunderstood. I thought he was questioning the Department of Justice experiencing a greater workload as a result of having the PUB ultimately report there. This is going to be busy here for the Public Utilities Board. General rate applications have been done before. This isn’t anything new. The budget is set. We are confident that they are professionals and will get the work done like any other general rate application that has occurred.
Thank you, Mr. Minister. Nothing further on my list. We are on page 9-31, activity summary, Justice, services to the public, operations expenditure summary, $5.372 million. Agreed?
Agreed.
Page 9-32, activity summary, Justice, services to the public, grants and contributions, contributions, $105,000. Mr. Bromley.
