Debates of March 8, 2005 (day 51)

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have one more motion to read. Mr. Chair, I move that this committee recommends to the Department of Executive to consider different options to use already existing personnel and resources to create a consistent system of coordination in the regions;

And further, that the options be presented to the Standing Committee on Accountability and Oversight prior to the committee review of the 2006-2009 Business Plans. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. The motion is in order. To the motion.

Question.

Question has been called. All those in favour? All those opposed? The motion is carried.

---Carried

Thank you. Page 2-13.

Agreed.

Program summary, operations expenditure summary, $8.946 million.

Agreed.

Can we now turn to volume two? Page 2-2. Sorry about that. Okay, can we go to page 2-4, volume two? Okay, Commissioner’s offices, infrastructure investment summary, total net book value and work in progress, $128,000.

Agreed.

Page 2-3, executive offices, infrastructure investment summary, total net book value and work in progress, $128,000.

Agreed.

Page 2-2, department summary, infrastructure investment summary, total net book value and work in progress, $3.386 million.

Agreed.

We will go back to volume one. Page 2-5, department summary, operations expenditure summary, $47.195 million.

Agreed.

Does the committee agree that the consideration of the department estimates is concluded?

Agreed.

Thank you. At this time, I would like to thank Mr. Handley and his witnesses. Thank you very much. What is the wish of the committee? Do you want to take a break? At this time, we will take a short break. Thank you.

---SHORT RECESS

Welcome back committee. I would like to ask Mr. Speaker if he would like to present the opening comments for the Legislative Assembly. Mr. Delorey.

Mr. Chairman, colleagues, I am pleased to present the 2005/2006 Main Estimates for the Legislative Assembly on behalf of your Board of Management.

The proposed operating expenses for the Legislative Assembly in 2005-06 are $14.477 million. In preparing the estimates for the Legislative Assembly this year, the Board of Management was mindful of the fiscal pressure facing the government as a whole. As such, this year’s operating expenses represent a decrease of just over 4.2 percent from last year’s revised main estimates. Likewise, the infrastructure acquisition plan includes no items for the Legislative Assembly this year. Those of you who have firsthand knowledge of the parking situation will be aware of how hard it was to come to this decision, as there are some things we know need addressing in the very near future.

The proposed reductions in this year’s estimates will have a noticeable impact on the services provided to Members and the public-at-large. Be it the elimination of six full-time employees, the reduction of committee meeting transcription or the capping of the Members’ capital accommodation allowance, these cuts will be felt throughout the organization. However, as you are no doubt aware by now, this year’s budget will result in reductions in the services provided by all government departments to the people of the NWT. Your Board of Management was keenly aware of this fact when it sat down to draft its estimates this year and is proud to propose a budget to Members that leads by example.

On a more positive note, the previous fiscal year was an eventful one not only because it was the first full year for this 15th Legislative Assembly, it was also an historic year in that it witnessed the recruitment and implementation of the NWT’s own Human Rights and Equal Pay commissions. A great deal of effort went into recruiting and appointing Members to the various offices and panels that make up these important arm’s length agencies. This fiscal year will be the first fully funded year for both the Human Rights and Equal Pay commissions.

Last year also saw the implementation of sweeping amendments to the Official Languages Act. These amendments resulted in a significant change to the scope and role of the Commissioner of Official Languages and the resulting transfer of funds from the Assembly to the Department of Education, Culture and Employment for the operation of the Aboriginal Languages Revitalization Board and the Official Languages Board. Again, 2005-06 is the first full fiscal year for the Office of the Languages Commissioner under its new scope.

In all these cases, I am confident that we have provided adequate funds for these arm’s length bodies to carry out their important mandates with the independence they require.

The year 2004-05 was witness to a second historic event when the leaders of aboriginal, territorial and community governments met for the first time under one roof on the Hay River Reserve in April. Perhaps as an indicator of the success of this first leaders' meeting, the interim president of the Aboriginal Summit proposed that a similar meeting of northern leaders take place on an annual basis. I am pleased to announce that this year’s estimates includes funding to host the second meeting in what I hope to be a long-standing tradition of northern leaders working together to build a shared vision of the NWT. This year’s meeting will take place in Inuvik from April 18th to 20th and will focus on the development of the Northern Strategy.

Mr. Chair, in follow-up to the fine work performed by the previous Board of Management, this year’s estimates include a modest amount of funding to begin the cultural enhancement of this great and symbolic institution as it enters its second decade of service. A fabulous group of individuals from all corners of our territory were recently appointed to serve on the first Cultural Enhancement Advisory Commission which will be ably chaired by the deputy speaker, Mrs. Groenewegen. I have high hopes for the work that this commission will do on behalf of the people of the NWT and look forward to seeing the results.

Finally Mr. Chair, this year’s estimates includes funding to begin the work of two important independent commissions: the Electoral Boundaries Commission and the Independent Commission to Review Members’ Compensation and Benefits. Both these commissions have a great deal of work to perform in order to submit their recommendations in time for consideration prior to the election of the 16th Legislative Assembly. You can rest assured that these commissions will receive full support from the Legislative Assembly, both financial and otherwise, in fulfilling their important mandates.

In terms of forced growth expenditures, the Legislative Assembly is subject to the same inflationary pressures as other government departments. There is $193,000 in additional funding required this year to cover negotiated increases to compensation and benefits. In addition, the increasing cost of utilities and heating fuel continue to put the same pressure on the Legislative Assembly budget as they do to the budgets of individual northerners and businesses.

Mr. Chairman, I wish to take this opportunity to once again thank the Members of the Board of Management for their hard work on behalf of all Members in proposing this year’s estimates for the Legislative Assembly. The estimates before you today provide the financial and human resources necessary to meet the needs of the Legislative Assembly and allow it to carry out its essential mandate within a climate of fiscal restraint.

I look forward to responding to any comments or questions you may have. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Would you like to bring in any witnesses?

Yes, I would, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Is the committee in agreement that we allow witnesses?

Agreed.

Thank you, committee. Sergeant-at-Arms, can you escort the witnesses to the table?

For the record, could you please introduce your witnesses.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. On my left is Mr. Myles Moreside, director of corporate services; and to my right is Mr. Tim Mercer, Clerk of the Assembly.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Welcome, gentlemen. General comments. I have Mr. Menicoche first.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am happy to speak on this topic. It’s regarding the parking facility. Perhaps I can ask the Speaker what the long-term plans are for the improvement of parking. There seems to be some solution in the long term for that. As well, I have been using the facilities after hours and it’s always a pain for security to come and unlock the door. I believe, at one point, the previous Assembly was looking at a magnetic door opener. I just want to bring it up again and see if that is still in the plans or if that’s something that’s doable.

Actually, I think it is doable, because I heard some remarks that they are concerned about security, but in some buildings that have far more employees than us and are managing okay and seem to get in and out of their buildings after ours, so I don’t see what the big problem for ours would be to institute a system such as that. I would find that it would just make my job a little bit easier when I’m in Yellowknife. In fact, some of the considerations is you can use a common one downstairs, and when you are getting up to the offices…Well, I'm not too sure, but I think it is doable and workable, especially with the technology we have nowadays. Those are just a couple of things that I would like to bring up for now, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Menicoche for your comments. I know that the parking issue that he speaks about is one that has been brought up to the board and to me on a number of occasions and it is one that we know has to be dealt with. Because this year was a year of fiscal restraints, we didn’t look at putting any money into that area or anywhere else actually, within the Legislative Assembly budget.

We do have plans going down the road. Right now we are looking at different areas where we could increase the parking around the building and doing some work on getting some cost figures. Down the road, in a couple of years, in the 2006-07 budget, we have earmarked $675,000 to improve roadways in here, which would include some more parking areas. Keeping in mind that there may be some other developments within the area in Justice. That would give us a great ability to work in partnership with them in improving the roadway and the parking in this area. We are looking at that area going down the road; however, we do know that it is an area that has to be addressed in the very near future.

On the other issue that Mr. Menicoche brings up, with security in the building. That was also an issue that was looked at. I think it was somewhere in the year 2000, during the last Assembly; there were different issues that were looked at, at the same time as security was looked at in the building, and extra lighting, and that was one of the issues that was taken out of the plan to take any action on, mostly because of costs. There are a number of issues that come into play with it.

To secure this building properly where you would get into you office with just a pass key, once you are inside this building, the whole building is accessible, so there was a considerable cost -- I can’t remember exactly what the cost was -- to have that building secured where you would get in with just a swipe card, but I know there was a considerable cost to it. It was an issue that was looked at before, not to say that we couldn’t be looking at it again. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just with respect to the magnetic pass cards; is there an estimated cost, that makes it so prohibitive? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We would have to look back at the estimates that were put forward a few years ago or get a totally new estimate on it, but I wouldn’t want to even guess right now. I can’t quite remember the figures, so I wouldn’t want to guess. It would be something that we could get a cost on fairly easily, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Menicoche beat me to the chase in regard to the parking, but he also brought up another issue that I know I have concern with, although I wasn’t on planning on discussing it today, which is the doors. I will speak specifically to the parking and I do have concerns with the issue that this building represents itself as an open opportunity for people to come forward and have celebrations of life: weddings, special ceremonies, et cetera. It truly is one of the buildings for the people, and yet we have people park here, even park illegally, while events happen.

The Speaker I am sure is more than well aware of the circumstances that we have out there, and I just find it very difficult that we are not planning for this now in the short-term. I am looking for some proactive short-term solutions, so that we can address it through a major capital initiative, but we right now have people policing the parking lot. So if we had it during, for example, a concert situation; we have people out there policing it, making sure that folks all park on one side, but again we still are allowing our folks to park illegally. Does the Speaker have any suggestions on how to deal with this on the short term, until we can come forward with a capital initiative to address the roadway? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Again on the parking issue, it is an issue that I know is important to Members and to the public that do come here and use the building. Whenever there is an event here, we do put on extra security to try and prevent people from parking illegally out there, but we do know that when the Members are here and most of the parking stalls are taken, for extra people coming to use the Great Hall, it is an issue.

There may be some very simple things that we could do for the present time to put more awareness out there, to let people know that there is not a lot of extra parking here and that if they do park illegally, they are going to have their vehicles removed. But that is not the answer for the long-run.

People choose to come here to use the building for different events as well, and maybe it is incumbent upon us to maybe let them know the parking situation that we have around here and the importance that we know that it is going to have to be addressed in the near future. Is it possible to look at doing something very quickly? I am sure if people were to come to the Board of Management with that specific request, certainly we would have to put a request into FMBS or whoever to see if we can get some extra funding to get that done in the near future. It is certainly not a matter that we don’t want to do it, it is just finding the resources to do it right now. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I guess at this time then, I would like to put a request into your position right now, as Chairman of the Board of Management as well as Speaker of the building, to get some assurances that we will look into it in this fiscal year about addressing it again.

It is a building that welcomes people. Just at the opening up of this session when Mr. Roland read in his budget, there were cars parked every which way and I have to say that I am embarrassed; truly I am embarrassed that we invite people to come here to see and follow along and be part of our opening budget, but yet we have nowhere for them to park. I would like to hear that the Speaker will look into it, at least in this fiscal cycle and see if we can come up with some at least short-term solution, other than telling people to park and cab it here. If I could get that assurance from the Speaker at this time, that will be more than sufficient. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will do that, I will bring that to the Board of Management and we will see what ways we can address that and see how much commitment there is for extra resources to deal with that situation. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. A couple of areas, and I appreciate the Speaker's presentation here. This is his first presentation before committee.

---Applause

Welcome to the witness chair, Mr. Delorey, Mr. Speaker. In his comments he mentioned one of the innovations we are undertaking here is the creation of the Cultural Enhancement Advisory Committee to this Assembly. Mr. Speaker, this committee had its origins in the last Assembly, in the 14th, when one of Mr. Delorey’s predecessors commissioned the report on what could be done in and around the building to more dramatically reflect the cultures and the peoples of the NWT. The Board of Management undertook to take this report up, and one of its prime recommendations was the creation of this committee.

The board will recall that in a meeting, I think it was late last year, I took a concern to the board about the policy base by which this Assembly had enacted this committee and by which it was going to guide its affairs. The question that I would like to put to the Speaker, given that I fully support a much broader cultural program for this building and certainly don’t want to interfere at all with what the committee will undertake, but I have not seen evidence of a development of a policy or the basis of how we want this program to continue. Would the Speaker please advise where and how we might expect that aspect of our governance to develop? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The new Cultural Enhancement Commission that has been formed came out of a recommendation from the report that came to the Board of Management from the previous Assembly, and one of the recommendations in there was the creation of this Cultural Enhancement Commission.

We did receive Mr. Braden’s comments and his concerns with this commission. We discussed them at the board level and the board felt that there had been enough input into the preparing of that proposal, that document, that report to the Assembly, that we could proceed with establishing that commission.

The commission has not gotten together yet, but there were some guiding principles in there about what they were meant to do and they will be strictly an advisory board, advising the Board of Management on different areas of cultural enhancement around the building. I know that it is a very important area for the building and for all the Members here. I think if there was one area that we lost on when there was a division between Nunavut and the Northwest Territories, a lot of the cultural works in the building went with the Nunavut government. I know that there is a lot of interest in increasing the cultural enhancement of the building, so I look forward to the work of this commission.

The policy that Mr. Braden is talking about; we haven’t established a policy per se, but they do have a mandate or guiding principles of what they will be looking at. Once they come together, they will be establishing what kind of working relationship they are going to have with the board and on what areas they are going to be looking at. It is pretty broad in what areas they can make recommendations back to the Board of Management. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Some of the things that the Speaker has outlined are indeed still of concern to me. We are creating this advisory committee, and to paraphrase the Speaker -- to work out the basis of its relationship with the Board of Management -- I would respectfully suggest that that is backwards. It should be the Board of Management that is laying out the terms of reference and how we would like the commission to serve the Assembly.

I look at this, Mr. Chairman, in the overall context of good governance, that we have a responsibility here to be clear and direct in our expectations of these boards and agencies and commissions. In fact there is major review underway right now, more than 100, that have been created over 30 years. Here we are creating a new one and yet we don’t have a policy base or the kinds of things that I think should be in place.

Mr. Chairman, I don’t want to get into an argument here tonight, but I would like to place on public record my concerns that this is a very welcome and a very valuable part of how this building and how this institution reflects the people of the North, and I would hope that in the coming months as this commission does come together that a constructive working relationship can indeed be created and hopefully through that a policy base that we can all rely on.

I can stop there, Mr. Chairman. I did have one other item I wanted to bring to the committee's attention, but if the Speaker would have any further comment to what I have just said.