Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Member is taking offence to the comments that I made by telling the truth, I will withdraw that comment and apologize. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I’m not really sure what this is under, but I mean I didn’t know that we could stand up and ask Ministers in this House about things that are not within their purview as their department. I mean, Mr. McLeod is the Minister responsible for Municipal and Community Affairs. I don’t think that his personal attendance in this House or where he was on any given day is within the purview of his department. I think the question is out of order. Thank you.
Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. To the point of order, Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I don’t believe Mrs. Groenewegen respectfully has a point of order. I think it was more of a statement, as she just said here a second ago. The reality here is I’m asking the Minister about their office and their ability to do their responsibilities that fall within them.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. First of all to that point of order, I’m going to settle the first point of order. There is no point of order. The Minister was travelling on his duty as a Member to do his job to represent us in Alaska.
On the second point of order, Mrs. Groenewegen.
---Interjection
Okay. To the point of order. To the second point of order. Mr. Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’ll try not to get these points of order confused here, but what we have is a questioning of the integrity of a Minister who has duties outside this House, who was on legitimate government business, representing us at an international event, that he was driving, and while I haven’t personally made that drive, I know it takes a considerable amount of time. I think the questioning of the integrity of the Minister that somehow he was out of this House for false pretenses is not really constructive. It is a point of order and Minister McLeod acted with the full knowledge of this House and the authority from Cabinet and the Premier. So it’s an unfortunate line of questioning that I think has already sort of coloured the early days of this session. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. To the point of order, Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m glad to be given an opportunity because I did forget to mention earlier that it is the normal practice of the Cabinet to inform all Members of the absence of a Minister. I have inquired through our process and channels to see if that was that ever given. We were never given notice that this particular Minister would be absent from the House, hence not being prepared to be able to ask and certainly get the answers to the question.
As for the other aspect of travelling on duty, I’m going to say that I have a different perspective on that, especially because when the Premier says, “I wish to inform Members of this House, R.C. McLeod will be absent from the House today to attend personal matters,” not work-related matters, not responsibility or duties of the House, but he said “personal matters.” So, hence my line of questioning about being responsible and able to ask questions in the House. Thank you.
Mr. Hawkins, I already drew judgment on that first point of order and Mr. McLeod did apologize to the House and he is travelling on duty as a Member in his position. To the second point of order, that’s what we were talking about on Mrs. Groenewegen. So I should have cut Mr. Miltenberger off at the time, but now on the second point of order, Mrs. Groenewegen, that’s what we’re speaking on.
For the first point of order, there is no point of order. He did apologize to the House. Mr. Bromley, to the second point of order.
Absolutely, Mr. Speaker, and thank you for that. I think there has been some confusion here and I believe the first point of order was taken care of. That’s my understanding.
I’m speaking to the point that Mrs. Groenewegen has raised. I do believe that all Members of the House have a role in bringing accountability and for every Member to show up to the best of their ability and so on. If that requires asking questions respectfully, there should be an opportunity to do that.
So I just wanted to make sure that there is agreement that accountability is part of our role, as long as we do it respectfully and so on. I would expect that the Ministers would be able to respond to questions on accountability very well. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The Minister did respond very well. To the second point of order, Mrs. Groenewegen, would you like to speak to it?
Mr. Speaker, I just didn’t know that we could stand up in the House and start asking Members across the floor about where they were and what they were doing. I could understand perhaps if there was a concern that maybe the Premier might be asked a question, but I didn’t know we could stand up and ask questions that are out there that do not relate to the matters or the mandate of the department. I mean, this is a very personal question. This is a personal question about Minister McLeod’s whereabouts when the House was sitting. I may be wrong, Mr. Speaker, and if I am I apologize, but I normally have been of the understanding that we can stand up and ask questions about what these Members oversee in their mandate and in their role as Ministers of departments and we could talk about those things that were within their knowledge under that purview, but to ask personal questions about their whereabouts, I just don’t think this is the forum for it. I could be wrong, and if I am I apologize. Thank you.
Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Under which rule in regard to the question came in under, but at the end of the day the line of questioning really quickly, it is a line of questioning that is privy for the Member. So on the second point of order, I will advise you, there’s, no, the ruling number, Mrs. Groenewegen, okay. So thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. There’s no point of order. I just want to remind the Members it’s good to be back…
---Laughter
…and see that everybody is ready to do their work. So where were we? The Member for Deh Cho, Mr. Nadli.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is in regard to accountability and I want to know who is accountable for the tiny morel mushrooms.
---Laughter
So my question is to the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources. I just became aware recently, to be quite honest, in terms of the significance of mushrooms. I wasn’t very aware. I knew they existed and I have actually personally seen them in the bush when you walk through the bush and come across these small vegetative growths on the ground and sometimes you find them in trees. I didn’t understand their significance until recently.
Of course, in that exercise in finding out the significance of the mushrooms, there is a growing interest in terms of their monetary value, and recently there have been discussions on another form of mushrooms, which is chakra that grows on trees.
Because of the growing interest and need for some interim steps so that the department regulates and manages perhaps the onslaught of people that might come up to the NWT, my question to the Minister is: Can the Minister explain what his department has achieved in addressing the motion since it was passed in March 2014? Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Nadli. The Minister of ENR, Mr. Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As a government, we have been aware of this issue now for some time. It was brought up in this House, if I recollect, very clearly in the last government. There was a commitment made that once the Wildlife Act was passed that we would be moving on to the Forestry Act. It is outdated and right now does not give us legal authority to manage things like the morel mushrooms. We recognize that.
At the same time, we’ve worked with the communities, we’ve worked with ITI, ITI has been providing business support to the Member’s constituents and we as a department have been working with the communities to try to make sure that the pickers that come in from out of territory at least have a business licence and that they are complying with all the local laws of the land. At this point that type of coordinated effort is what we are doing as we look at coming forward with a legislative proposal to modernize and update and redo the Forestry Act. Thank you.
I’d like to thank the Minister for working with communities in terms of trying to get a handle in terms of the growing interest in these mushrooms that grow abundantly in the wild and especially this time of the year.
In developing the interim measures, can the Minister state to the House who was consulted in coming to the interim measure that have been put in place at this point? Mahsi.
As we’ve dealt with this issue, it has evolved over the years. The morel mushrooms tend to follow the season after the fire season. So as fires have come and gone across the Northwest Territories, the issue of morel mushrooms has come up in the South Slave, outside of Yellowknife, in the Member’s constituency, and we’ve been looking at ways to try to deal with and make sure we can manage within the incoming of significant numbers of pickers, given the amount of morel mushrooms. But it is a very transient, intense industry that’s tied to the brief lifespan of the morel mushrooms. We’ve been working with communities. The Member himself has been very active in writing to the department, to myself, to Minister Ramsay at ITI, so we’ve been working collectively over the years with the MLAs, with the various regions and centres, Fort Smith, Yellowknife, wherever the issues have come up. In this case now in Fort Providence, to see how we could best manage this as we try to improve the arsenal, we have tools available to deal with this issue in the most effective way possible.
Part of the measures that have been put in place is a price, and I want to ask the Minister what is the cost of a business licence for mushroom harvesters and how were those rates determined?
I don’t have that exact figure or the process for setting the rates for business licences. I will talk to the Minister of ITI and I will commit to get that information for the Member.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger, final short supplementary, Mr. Nadli.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to thank the Minister for his reply and, of course, working with communities. I know some have predicted, especially people that work in, of course, predicting the weather. They have indicated that it could be a hot, dry season this year, and of course, the department is also equally responsible for forest fire management, but with this tiny little morel that grows in the wild, I mean, are we ready in terms of managing and monitoring and regulating perhaps the transient people that might come up North?
We will continue to deal with the issue of morel harvesters as we have in the past, recognizing that it’s work and a process that needs improving, which we are embarking on, and we will continue to work with the Member and with other communities where this issue comes, depending on where the fires are, and what happens with the morel harvest itself. Right now we have to deal with the tools we have, but we are committed to improving our ability to regulate that particular transient industry.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. The Member for Hay River North, Mr. Bouchard.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my statement I talked about the exciting first day of session and under the new regime of devolution. My questions today will be for the Premier of the Northwest Territories. He has indicated that a public review of the devolution legislation will begin, and he has indicated a website, but I’m just wondering: can the Premier elaborate on how this public consultation will happen on the review of devolution legislation?
Thank you, Mr. Bouchard. The honourable Premier, Mr. McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We started even before devolution came into effect, by a public information campaign so that the people in the public could understand what devolution was all about. We’ve activated the website. We put information in all the newspapers with regard to devolution. We have an interactive website now where we will be asking the public to correspond with, and we will be collecting all of that information with the objective of having it in place in the fall. Then we expect it will take about a month to gather all of the feedback that we get through the website, and then we would report back to the committees and to the Assembly. We also will be working with the committees on this review.
I guess my next question is about the timing. The Premier indicated that he was going to be working with committee, but we are going into a summer session and we won’t be here for the summertime until we come back in the fall. I’m just wondering about the timing and would the department or the government look at extending that time so that it comes into the fall when most of the Assembly comes back as well as most of the people in the Northwest Territories go on the land and go have their kids away from school. So the focus is definitely not on politics.
Would the government look at extending that to a six-month period maybe until Christmastime, so they would get full consultation with the public?
Like the Member, we want to make sure we have a very thorough, transparent review of the devolution legislation, so we’d be quite prepared to extend the review to whatever period of time would be seen to be appropriate; December or even later to the next year, keeping in mind that the longer we extend, the more we get into transitional arrangements. But I think to be very thorough and transparent, we would be prepared to do that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
The Premier indicated that they are doing a survey of the website. I wonder if there is going to be any consultation, like any public meetings. I know the assemblies are coming forward in the summertime.
Are we planning to have some meetings in the different communities throughout the Northwest Territories to get public feedback that way?
We will want to look at that. We attend all of the annual assemblies. To make sure we have a thorough and transparent process, we will take that into consideration. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Bouchard.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The next question I had was about devolution and the new positions. We’ve taken on some federal positions, but we’ve also created. I’m just wondering what the update is on those positions.
Have we hired all those people? Are we 50 percent complete? For the new positions we created for devolution, have we hired everybody? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
We’ve created 206 new territorial government jobs to provide for devolution, and as of May 6th there were 60 vacant positions. Now that we’re near the end of May, I expect the majority of those jobs have been filled, but I will commit to reviewing the numbers again and provide the information to the Member. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Range Lake, Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Earlier today I indicated in my Member’s statement we had an inconsistent application of our human resource five-day special leave provision for our civil air search and rescue and firefighter GNWT volunteers. More specifically, most of the required southern training for these volunteers occurs on weekends. So when these GNWT volunteers want to access special leave days for travel on a Friday and return on a Monday, they are denied by their supervisor. Currently, Mr. Speaker, that travel is not explicitly included in the five-day special leave, and it is within this context I wish to address the Minister of Human Resources.
Can the Minister indicate to the House why his department would not consider allowing travel to attend required training courses as part of the five-day special leave provision within our Human Resources Policy? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. The honourable Minister of Human Resources, Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The special leave provision is part of the negotiations between the union and the Government of the Northwest Territories. If the leave, as laid out in the Human Resource Manual for firefighters and the CASARA people is a special leave, as the Member indicated, they would be following what is negotiated within the policy within the special leave requirements. Thank you.
The GNWT Human Resource Manual also has a list of various boards where GNWT employees, if appointed or elected, may access special leave for travel to attend meetings as part of their duties. Sadly, CASARA NWT board members are not on such a list.
Can the Minister indicate why CASARA NWT board members are not included and would the Minister consider such an addition? Thank you.
As I indicated, it’s something that is negotiated. If the individuals, the members of the public service that are with firefighters and CASARA wish to be on that list, then that’s something that we would look at in discussions with the union the next time our negotiation mandates are developed. Thank you.
Upon further analysis, it was evident that even the GNWT volunteer firefighters face similar hurdles when accessing special leave days to maintain their professional qualifications. This begs me to ask: how many other volunteer groups out there who contribute to the safety and security of our residents are affected with this inconsistent policy?
Can the Minister indicate to the House how he and his department will address this shortcoming? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I am currently looking into a specific request from the Inuvik group, with the idea of coming up with a solution that is satisfactory to this group and also the firefighters, as they are captured within the same section. So this is what we’re doing.
It sounds to me, just on the value of what we’re talking about right here, that it is important individuals playing an important role and that the Government of the Northwest Territories should do all they can to try to support both of these groups. Thank you.
