Debates of May 15, 2007 (day 7)

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

---Carried

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Weledeh, that Bill 12, Public Health Act, be read for the second time.

Mr. Speaker, this bill replaces the Public Health Act and the Disease Registries Act. It provides a comprehensive framework for the protection and promotion of public health in the Northwest Territories. Consequential amendments are made to the Education Act, the Medical Profession Act and the Mental Health Act. The Public Health Act and the Disease Registries Act are repealed. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Motion is on the floor. Motion is in order. To the principle of the bill.

Question.

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

---Carried

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Nahendeh, that Bill 13, Change of Name Act, be read for the second time.

Mr. Speaker, this bill repeals and replaces the existing Change of Name Act, to provide an efficient scheme for changing the names of individuals, including giving enhanced public notice of name changes through accessible means of publication.

The registrar general of vital statistics will enter a change of name in the change of name register, publish notice of the change of name and provide notice of the change to certain authorities. The Minister may direct that the records of a change of name be sealed if he or she is satisfied that the change is intended to prevent significant harm to a person.

An objection to a change of name may be made to the registrar general, and the registrar general may revoke a change of name in certain circumstances. An appeal may be made to the Supreme Court.

A person may use his or her spouse's surname or, on breakdown or dissolution of the spousal relationship or the death of his or her spouse, resume using a surname that he or she had before the commencement of the spousal relationship without making an application under the act.

The Supreme Court may also change a person's name when it grants a divorce or makes an order annulling a marriage.

This bill makes consequential amendments to the Vital Statistics Act, to provide for making applications for changes of name to the registrar general appointed under the Vital Statistics Act. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Motion is on the floor. Motion is in order. To the principle of the bill.

Question.

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

---Carried

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Deh Cho, that Bill 14, Employment Standards Act, be read for the second time.

Mr. Speaker, this bill replaces the Labour Standards Act, the Employment Agencies Act and the Wages Recovery Act with a single statute.

The bill applies to all employers and employees, subject to certain exceptions, and restricts the circumstances in which persons 16 years of age or younger may be employed.

The bill fixes the standard and the maximum hours of work in a day and in a week, subject to certain exceptions, and provides entitlements to overtime pay, vacation pay and holiday pay, as well as to unpaid pregnancy leave, parental leave, sick leave, compassionate leave, bereavement leave and court leave. The minimum wage would be prescribed by regulation.

An employment standards officer would have primary responsibility for enforcing employment standards and would be empowered to hear complaints and to make orders, including orders to compensate or reinstate an employee. The bill also provides for the appointment of adjudicators to hear appeals under the act.

Employers would be required to maintain employment records and to provide advance notice of termination to affected employees and their trade union, if any, where the employment of large numbers of employees is terminated.

The bill provides for enforcement and establishes offences and penalties for contraventions of the act or regulations or of orders made under the act. Orders for wages are deemed to have special priority in relation to other security interests filed under the Personal Property Security Act and the Land Titles Act.

The bill authorizes the making of various regulations, including regulations implementing the act and regulations providing for licensing of employment agencies.

The Apprenticeship, Trade and Occupations Certification Act, the Financial Administration Act, the Interpretation Act and the Seizures Act are consequentially amended, and the Employment Agencies Act, Labour Standards Act and Wages Recovery Act are repealed. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Motion is on the floor. Motion is in order. To the principle of the bill.

Question.

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

---Carried

Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Monfwi, that Bill 16, An Act to Amend the Legislative Assembly and Executive Council Act, be read for the second time.

Mr. Speaker, this bill amends the Legislative Assembly and Executive Council Act to provide that a transition allowance may be paid to a Member who resigns his or her seat in the Legislative Assembly. The bill also provides that no Member may, by virtue of a break in service, receive a transition allowance that exceeds the annual indemnity. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Motion is on the floor. Motion is in order. To the principle of the bill.

Question.

Question is being called. All those in favour? Those opposed? Motion is carried.

---Carried

Honourable Member for Thebacha, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I seek unanimous consent to waive Rule 69(2) and have Bill 16, An Act to Amend the Legislative Assembly and Executive Council Act, moved into Committee of the Whole. Thank you.

The Member is seeking unanimous consent to waive Rule 69(2) and have Bill 16, An Act to Amend the Legislative Assembly and Executive Council Act, moved into Committee of the Whole. Are there any nays? There are no nays. Bill 16 has had second reading and is referred to Committee of the Whole.

Thank you. I'd like to call Committee of the Whole to order and ask what is the wish of the committee. Mr. Lafferty.

Mahsi, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, the committee wishes to consider Bill 8, Supplementary Appropriation Act, No. 1, 2007-2008. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. We will do that after a short break. Thank you.

---SHORT RECESS

Good afternoon. I will call Committee of the Whole Back to order. Thank you, Members. Yesterday, we left off on page 11. I’d like to ask the Minister if he would like to bring in any witnesses.

Yes, Mr. Chairman.

Does committee agree?

Agreed.

Sergeant-at-Arms, can you escort the witnesses in, please. Thank you.

Mr. Minister, maybe you can introduce your witnesses, please, for the record.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. To my right is Mr. Sandy Kalgutkar, the director of budget evaluation, to my left, I should say; to my right is Mr. Charles Tolley, the manager of budget development.

Yesterday, we left off on page 11. Please turn to page 11 of Bill 8, Supplementary Appropriation Act, No. 1, 2007-2008. Municipal and Community Affairs, operations expenditures, directorate, not previously authorized, negative $6,000.

Agreed.

Community operations, not previously authorized, $1.222 million.

Agreed.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I moved that $291,000 be deleted from the activity regional operations under the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs operations expenditures, not previously authorized, on page 11, for the provision of funding for two regional resource development impact advisor positions. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The motion is on the floor. We will hand out the motion right now. Thank you.

The motion is going to be handed out shortly, so we will take a short break. Thank you.

---SHORT RECESS

There is a motion on the floor. The motion is in order. To the motion. Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I wanted to move this motion because I feel that we have some positions already dedicated to resource development and with everything slowing down, I don’t see the need, to be quite honest with you, to have two more regional development impact advisory positions in the regions. I am concerned as to where they would go. I have no idea if they are going to be going to Yellowknife, Hay River or Inuvik.

I just feel, Mr. Chair, that we continue to come up with all these titles and put money into it and that money could be better spent, in my opinion, on programs. We have some programs out there that money could be put towards. You look in the paper, Mr. Chair, and you see some of the titles that they come up with and the amount of money that they are paid at. I am just starting to see that we are not in the job or the position of creating employment. It seems to me like it’s too much of what we are doing lately and I really feel that this $291,000 could be better spent elsewhere and with the pipeline talk and all the resource development slowing down to a snail’s pace, then I see no need for two regional impact advisory positions. I think we should have the capacity within the 4,600 employees of the GNWT to do the work that we are asking these two people to do. It’s a lot of money, Mr. Chair. For that reason, I was more than happy to move this motion to delete the $291,000 and I will stand by it. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. To the motion. Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to ask the Minister if he could provide some detail on these positions. I can’t ask questions on a motion, Mr. Chair? Okay. Well, then we’ll go with …

Thank you. You have to speak to the motion, Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. We understand from some of the background research that committee has done into this, that the location of these two positions has yet to be determined. So we don’t know which regions or which communities they are going to go to. In fact, similar positions that have been recruited for in the past have been extremely difficult to recruit to. On this one, I am with Mr. McLeod. I looking at the amount of resources, both PY and financial, and it should be noted here that this is $291,000 for two positions. I am assuming that includes travel and related expense to this job. So these are not inexpensive positions. One thing that our information did not give me a good insight into, Mr. Chairman, was the function. Just what do these jobs do? They are called regional resource development impact advisors. I know that we have a lot of resource related advisors and expertise already in the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment. We have a pipeline office created by the GNWT ostensibly to coordinate and bring this kind of thing together. What function are these positions have for MACA? I was not able to secure a satisfying answer on how the performance and the objectives and results are measured from what these positions would do. So in the sense that we seem to have beefed up a whole bunch of preparation capacity and awareness on pipeline and resource impacts, but to the point where I can’t really see what is the value of putting almost $300,000 of taxpayers’ money into this.

I guess another aspect of this was that while it was suggested that these two positions would be located in one of four communities; Inuvik, Norman Wells, Fort Simpson or Hay River, depending on the choice of the successful candidate if they are found. Now these are regional resource development advisors. In the North Slave region and in the South Slave region, except for what we might call Hay River and Fort Simpson, there is not a lot of oil and gas activity going on, but there is a bunch of other stuff. Would these positions have anything to do with resource activity going on, for instance, in this region, in the Yellowknife region? According to this list here, by the selection of which communities they could be stationed in, probably not. So, Mr. Chairman, I don’t see the value in this. I support the motion.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. On my list, I have Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am going to support the motion that is before us for many of the reasons my colleagues have talked about. With all due respect, I think to my colleague from the Sahtu and others, I know these are regional positions, but I have been consistent with challenging the government on job position growth and I am believer, Mr. Chairman, that the government has a systemic inability to manage its human resources, always has had and continues to have. We really need to focus more on the future and come up with a comprehensive plan.

What I see happening, Mr. Chairman, is the government just reacting to things, knee-jerk reactions and hiring people as a result of knee-jerk reactions. This is just a case in point. The Hay River pipeline office is another case in point. The macroeconomic policy shop is another case in point, if I could. Those positions are in Yellowknife. I question those. I question these. I think we really need to put the brakes on position growth at least until the 16th Assembly comes through the doors and they can conduct a zero-base review of all positions government wide. I don’t agree with these positions. Coordination on the pipeline file, in my opinion, continues to be haphazard at best. Again, these were only supposed to be for two years, these positions. We are going to keep them around for another couple of years. Haven’t they concluded the work they were intended to do? There is no resource, Mr. Chairman. There is none. So are we fooling ourselves or what? I can’t see us supporting this, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Next on the list I have Mr. Michael McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I spoke to this yesterday and I wanted to say a few more comments, make a few more comments. This is a continuation of positions that were allocated a couple of years ago on term, four positions, that have sunsetted now. The idea was to have some bodies in the communities that were impacted by, first of all, the pipeline project and other resource development that is going on. A lot of work has been done. Yesterday, there were comments a made that MACA should have all the baseline information that the communities have in terms of infrastructure and capacity. That hasn’t been the case. We haven’t done that kind of inventory as to what each community has, what each community owns, what kind of people are in the community. Those things had to be compiled. That’s a process that we’ve embarked on and we’ve completed roughly 50 percent of the communities. There are a lot of issues still out there. We need these people to continue with the ongoing discussions for the socio-impact agreement and some of the sub-agreements that need to be done. We need to work with the communities to develop proposals and access some of the new federal funding that has come available and we have to continue towards facilitating conferences and things of that nature, to ensure our communities share the information. ‘

This has been something that has been raised to us in a number of situations. We have been lobbied by the aboriginal governments, the Inuvialuit, the Gwich’in, but we need to pay attention to the communities. This is a method of responding to that request. I guess if you believe there is no resource development out there, we wouldn’t need these positions, but there is. It’s in the different regions.

The other question that was raised was about where these were going to be located. The intention was to locate them in Inuvik and Norman Wells to deal with the pressures in those areas. So, Mr. Speaker, the process is still the biggest thing is to be able to represent the communities. The proponent for the pipeline has indicated to us that they need one voice to deal for the communities. The larger centres have had intervener funding provided for them so they can deal with their own issues within the municipalities. All the other communities, aside from the four large centres, don’t have any intervener funding. So they would have to do it on their own. The proponent has indicated that they are not going to work with each community individually. They will deal with one government department. That department is MACA. If they need to go into the community, if they need to use the resources, there will be only one agency that they will deal with.

It is going to be very difficult to live up to all of those responsibilities if we don’t have some positions dedicated to it. Mr. Speaker, in a nutshell, that is why we needed these positions. I am hoping that we are going to have the support that we can have these positions on the ground in the communities to deal with all of the pressures that they are facing. Thank you.