Quanani. The Northwest Territories Power Corporation does not have designated resource within its staff that deals with assessing federal or third party funding. I would note that the federal government does not enter into funding arrangements with provincial or territorial Crown corporations but will enter into funding arrangements for Crown corporations with provinces and territories. The necessary expertise to seek this federal and third party funding already exists within the Department of Infrastructure, and Finance as well. If we were to create a designated person, personnel in NTPC to seek funding from the federal government, that cost would have to be passed on to the ratepayers through increased electricity, and I'm not prepared to do that. Quanani.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Great Slave.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are for the Minister of MACA as the Minister responsible for the Emergency Management Office. Under the emergency management office, can the Minister please explain how the communications tree or matrix works during an emergency? Thank you.
Thank you, Member for Great Slave. Minister responsible for MACA.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, I'm going to provide a little clarity here.
During an emergency event, all levels of government in individual departments have roles to deliver. In this situation here, it was the RCMP who are responsible law enforcement. They were the lead agency on the tragedy tragic events that were happening, and they were the ones in charge of this situation. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I did ask about a general communications matrix, not about this specific incident. It doesn't seem that the Minister can explain that to me so maybe he can explain why residents went for 12 hours between Friday and Saturday with no update. The RCMP are busy doing their job. Why couldn't the government put out communications to reassure residents that things were still ongoing and they couldn't leave their homes? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as I said at the very beginning, the RCMP were in charge of this. We, as the Government of the Northwest Territories, do not want to give misinformation out there. We work with the town. We had conversations with the town. We had conversations with the RCMP. They are in charge of communications. They were getting that out there. For the 12 hours delay, I'm not sure why it happened, it was 12 hours. But I can guarantee you that we were in contact with the department with sorry, with the town and the RCMP on this matter. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think the Minister is missing my point. While the Minister and his colleagues were updated on everything that was going on, the residents of Fort Smith did not feel that they were and people were alarmed and they were afraid.
Can the Minister tell me when the decision was made that the community of Fort Smith, the town, would take the lead on communications? Was it a good 24 hours after everything started? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as I said, the RCMP were in charge. They had an EMO meeting on Saturday. They had a conversation. And the town decided that they would take charge of the communications, which is the local emergency. They are local. They're the ones in charge. So they took the lead on it. Basically, all they were doing was providing the information they received from the RCMP. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary, Member for Great Slave.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That's exactly my point. I don't understand why this government, if they are being notified by the RCMP, cannot turn around and utilize social media and other methods in order to inform residents. This is not a silo. This is a multidepartmental and multiagency function. And for this government to yet wash its hands yet again or the disadvantage of our citizens is not acceptable. I would like to ask that the Minister do a lessons learned here and improve the communications around emergencies, whether they be environmental disasters or whether they be social ones. He cannot wash his hands of this. It's an emergency measures office. Emergencies span everything. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, emergency process is local, regional, territory. We as Government of the Northwest Territories do not interfere and get out the communications for the communities. We work with the community. We follow their path, their direction. And if they ask us for the region we then go out there. We do not also interfere with the RCMP. They have a communication strategy and a plan. But on my understanding there will be a lessons learned with this. We will be working with Justice and Health and the community and the RCMP on this. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Written questions. Returns to written questions. Replies to the Commissioner's address. Petitions. Reports of committees on the review of bills. Reports of standing and special committees. Tabling of documents. Notices of motion. Motions. Notices of motion for the first reading of bills. First reading of the bills. Second reading of bills. Consideration in Committee of the Whole of bills and other matters: Bill 23, 29, and 38; Minister's Statement 20219(2); Tabled Document 561, 567, 578, 57919(2), with Member for Inuvik Twin Lakes in the chair.
What is the wish of committee? Member for Frame Lake.
Merci, Madam la Presidente. Committee wishes to consider Tabled Document 56119(2): Main Estimates 20222023, with Municipal and Community Affairs and Executive and Indigenous Affairs. Mahsi, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you, committee. We'll take a short recess and resume with our first item.
SHORT RECESS.
I now call Committee of the Whole back to order. Committee, we've agreed to consider Tabled Document 56119(2): Main Estimates 20222023. And we are going to continue with the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs.
Does the Minister wish to bring in witnesses?
Yes, Madam Chair.
SergeantatArms, please escort the witness into the Chamber.
Minister, will you please introduce your witness.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. With me here is deputy minister Gareau. Thank you.
Thank you, and welcome. Committee, we are going to continue on where we left off, and we were in the directorate. And I think I had Member of Monfwi first on my list but if she's not ready, is there any other Members for the Municipal and Community Affairs directorate?
All right, seeing none. Please turn to page 343, Municipal and Community Affairs, directorate, operations expenditure summary, 20222023 Main Estimates, $3,953,000. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you, committee. Please now turn to the Municipal and Community Affairs, public safety, at page 347 with information items on 348 and 349. Questions from Members on the Department of public safety? Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Madam Chair. As I've spoken about many times, we are the only place in Canada that doesn't employ building inspectors. We take one small part of the building code, and we give it to the Office of the Fire Marshal. But, you know, compared to Yukon and Nunavut or anywhere else, we don't actually apply the whole National Building Code and we don't really develop that expertise. And I know the Fire Prevention Act is scheduled. I heard the Minister speak during corporate services about all the work they are doing to find policy staff.
I'm just I'm still slightly unsure about what the first phase of the Fire Prevention Act that we are hopefully going to see in the life of this Assembly will look like and whether it will, you know, do something like create building inspectors or building inspection office? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Member. Minister for MACA.
Thank you, Madam Chair. For that detail, I'll go to the deputy minister. Thank you.
Thank you. Deputy minister Gareau.
Thank you. MACA's currently chairing a working group with several departments on it, and we're in the process of developing a discussion paper to go out to public engagement.
The purpose of the public engagement is to get feedback on what the scope of the legislative project should be, whether or not it should include building inspection provisions or whether or not we're just looking at updating the current Fire Prevention Act.
As the Member did note, NWT is the only jurisdiction in Canada without building inspection legislation and the informal feedback we have heard to date is that there is support for building inspection legislation. But we do want to go through the process and have formal comments and hear the formal feedback to inform the legislative proposal. Thank you.
Thank you. Member for Yellowknife North.
Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. I probably a larger conversation here about I know departments have their processes and have to go through them but, you know, we have 18 months left in this Assembly, and I at some point, we just need to stop talking to anyone and stop talking to the communities and get the Building Inspection Act considering we're the only place in Canada without one, would be my opinion. But I'll leave it to the department to do their processes.
My question is there's I know the Office of the Fire Marshal only has a $500,000 budget. It's a pretty small office with quite a lot of responsibility. Not only does it have to, you know, supervise every single GNWT Infrastructure project, it has to supervise all the private ones as well through a series of inspections from the design phase right to the permitting.
I believe sometimes the office contracts the plan review function to private individuals who are professionals in this area. I note when Nunavut created the building inspectors they kind of just decided that they weren't ever going to build that capacity and it's easier to contract out the plan review function. The turnaround times are amazing, I'm told, by the professionals in that area.
I'm just wondering how much of whether we are doing that and how much of this budget is spent on contract services for that function, and do we have that information? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Member. Minister of MACA.
Thank you. For that detail, I'll turn to the deputy minister. Thank you.
Thank you. Deputy minister Gareau.
Thank you. In 20212022, there has not been use of contractors to assist the OFM. However, going forward we are in the process of developing an RFP to engage contractors on an asandwhen basis. There is quite a bit of volume going through the office and a small complement so we do want to have that additional capacity going forward. Thank you.
Thank you. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Yeah, I am very happy to hear that, and I know that there will be a number of contractors who are familiar with those the likely people who will bid on that RFP and have worked with them across the North in different territories, and I think we ease the workload of those people at the Office of the Fire Marshal by doing that. So I look forward to seeing that RFP.
I wanted to talk about the contract services line item here of $30 million. I'm going I'm quite confident that this is the flood money. Can I just get an update on when we expect to have completed our reimbursement to the federal government under the disaster assistance policy and when we expect to submit that for the flooding? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Minister of MACA.
Yeah, so he's correct, it is flood. But for that detail of when it's going to be completed, I'll turn to the deputy minister. Thank you.
Thank you. Deputy minister.
Thank you. We expect to have the majority of work done by March 31st, the end of the fiscal year. We expect that we will still have potentially invoices and bills rolling in past that date. But our intent is to well, we have already started building the claim and working with Public Safety Canada to ensure we're compiling the claim correctly. We don't have a date yet for when we will be submitting but it will be as soon as possible once we've once we have all of our expenses known and our paperwork in line. Thank you.
Thank you. Member for Yellowknife North.
Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. I would like the Minister to speak to any work that's being done to increase our emergency management ability. I'll note that we budget $330,000, which is two or three staff to you know, if you look at the actuals, I mean obviously last year was a bad year, but I don't even know if three staff can administer $35 million and then the year before that, they had to administer a few million more, you know, just to track that amount of money requires more than three staff, let alone actually be on the ground responding to emergencies. And I think given the climate change realities, we are likely to see many more of these, unfortunately, in a variety of aspects.
So if the Minister could speak to, you know, the fact that emergency management is only $330,000 budgeted, whether that is sufficient and what we can do to staff up that and make sure we are prepared? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Minister of MACA.
Thank you, Madam Chair. So we are looking at allocating five more positions from the regional level. We're in the process of that. We are also in the process of working with the COVID Secretariat, and there's potential of three positions coming to us as that. So we are building the team, regional and headquarters. Previously, we are looking at where positions are best suited and right now, we feel comfortable with our allotment of these eight positions where we have them located going forward right now. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Are there any further questions under public safety from Members? Member for Thebacha.
Thank you, Madam Chair. The Office of the Fire Marshal, you know, it's been this is, we're in our third year, Madam Chair, and we have asked for briefings at the government operations committee and at various times, and we still never got that briefing and then we're in our third year as elected Members.
First of all, I also want to know how many people work in that office. And, you know, it has a lot to do with the relationship also, Madam Chair, with the business community and there are times when there's there has to be a really good balance between what that office does and communications with the business community. So I'm just wondering about that. Thank you, Madam Chair.
