Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The questions will be for the Minister responsible for human resources, and they'll be short and sweet.
Mr. Speaker, in recognition that the Affirmative Action Policy has evolved since inception, what does this government see as the barriers to reaching Indigenous employment targets under this policy? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member for Hay River South. Minister responsible for Finance.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the barriers are multifold, and that's a part of the reason why we have launched the Indigenous Recruitment and Retention Framework. It's one that looks not only to recruitment, which is certainly one of the barriers, but also to retention. And Mr. Speaker, the barriers, as I've stated, they're manyfold, meaning that they're not only structural within the Affirmative Action Policy or other tools or techniques or a lack thereof, they go into the very fact of people's you know, the need to understand who we are as a territory, living well together, and other aspects of that, understanding who we are as a territory, and all of the work that happens over at ECE to ensure that the residents of the territory have the best possible education so they are able to apply to all the jobs that are available to them. So multifold, Mr. Speaker, but that's, again, a big part of why there is now our framework to respond to them. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And now 30 years later, will the Minister commit to finding workable solutions to overcome those barriers? Thank you.
Yes, Mr. Speaker. And, Mr. Speaker, again, I don't want to be belabour the Indigenous Recruitment and Retention Framework, but if one spends time on both the framework and on the action plan that goes with it, it is now an effort to look at each department's needs, each department's barriers. There are different barriers in different departments because of the nature of the work in those departments, because of the nature of the jobs in those departments, and that's exactly the point of having this, is that there's now going to be that individual look but within a framework, with measurable targets, and with those targets tied to the performance measures of the senior people within those departments. So yes, absolutely, that's exactly the point. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Will the Minister commit to a complete review of all current positions within the government with a focus to staff those that are vacant or about to become vacant with Indigenous persons through direct competition for Indigenous persons only or direct appointments or transfers? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So Mr. Speaker, I can't make that commitment. Every department does have its own area of responsibility for their hiring and for their positions and vacancies. But again, one of the points here for each department is that once they have targets that they have to meet, they're going to have to use all the tools and tricks available to them, whether that's the various policy items that I know the Member's already spoken of, the Indigenous recruitment, retention or sorry, the Indigenous Gateway Program, internal management training, education plans, all of that needs to be used so that each department's meeting their targets.
It's not enough to simply put people into roles that they for the sake of the numbers. That's not what we want. We want to have a public service where people are being brought in and then trained up within and moved into positions that are appropriate to their training and being given the training to achieve them. So that requires a plan and it requires some thoughtfulness. Mr. Speaker, I do think we are now on that path. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary, Member for Hay River South.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we need to be bold if we want to see change. So I ask the Minister, will the Minister commit to a temporary suspension of the Affirmative Action Policy and departmental targets and replace it with a oneyear moratorium on nonIndigenous hires and transfers throughout this government in favour of a focus on Indigenous recruitment? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate that we're trying to find solutions but if we simply we are already going to do a review of the Affirmative Action Policy. We are certainly looking at the Public Service Act. We're doing the recruitment and retention framework, and we now are looking at having a GNWT action plan. The framework and the action plan are new. We didn't have that overarching look at what's going on across the entire GNWT before. And again, I don't want to minimize how important that is. So if I'm to suddenly turn around and say well, we're just going to up end all of the way in which we hire right now, the work that it will take to do that is going to stop the work that we're doing on the Affirmative Action Policy. It's going to stop the work to roll out the framework. And Mr. Speaker, those are both things that are looking at the real structure and the barriers that we have and the systemic barriers that we have. That work has to get done. I want it to get done. And I want it to get done in this Assembly, Mr. Speaker. And so that's where I want to focus our attention. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Deh Cho.
