Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to follow up from my statement and ask some questions of the Education, Culture and Employment Minister about the Education Renewal and Innovation Project and how it’s going to be funded.
I recently received a letter from the Minister responding to questions that I raised in March of this year about the Education Renewal and Innovation Project. In that letter it indicates 10 initiatives from the ERI plan, well, actually 11 if you consider Junior Kindergarten, but the 10 initiatives are set to start in the 2014-15 school year. However, in the letter there was absolutely no reference to how these initiatives will be funded.
I would like to ask the Minister to explain how these 10 initiatives planned for the 2014-15 school year will be funded. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Lafferty.
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. This whole education renewal and innovation, as you know, I did a statement on that. We are going through the various stages of engagement with the general public. We have delivered the overall framework. Now we have to develop an action plan based on the feedback from the stakeholders, the educators, the school boards, the superintendents and MLAs and others. Other individuals are interested to providing their input. Based on that, we are going to have a cost factor where the new money is going to be approached. Those are some of the discussions we are going to have with the stakeholders.
The Minister mentions an action plan. I know that that has been out there for quite some time. We have been waiting for that. It was originally scheduled for January and I know committee suggested that it be pushed back. Another question would be: When are we going to see that action plan?
The letter indicates that some of these initiatives will be funded from existing budgets but that others will require funding to be put in place. I need a little bit further elaboration from the Minister.
Will there be new funding for these initiatives, or will he continue with the current funding from within policy that we happen to see right now? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, when I talk about the action plan, yes, it’s been directed to us that we need to have more time to engage the general public because it will be their document, their solutions, their ideas and their suggestions. So I have allowed more time for that to happen. We want to deliver a draft action plan by this fall – that’s the target date – and deliver that in the House potentially I am hoping by February session or sooner. It all depends on the engagement that we’re conducting.
When the Member is talking about using existing resources or new funding, those are a mixture of information that we need to discuss. If there is going to be an ask for new funding, by all means I will be there demanding that within my portfolio. Mahsi.
I’m very glad to hear that new funding may be on the horizon, but if these initiatives are being implemented in the ‘14-15 school year, the budget for that school year is already over and done, and I am not convinced that we are going to get new money.
I spoke a bit about contingencies for school boards in my statement. Yesterday the Minister, when he was talking about contingencies, stated that, “those monies should be expended into educational programming, so we support that as well.” I am very pleased to hear that the Minister supports spending contingency money on educational programming. He said it I think three times yesterday – I would have to check Hansard to be sure – but my concern is with the fairness of the support that is being provided.
I would like to know from the Minister, in terms of support, does he support forcing the boards to use their contingency dollars to make up for the reduced budgets that he’s implementing? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I am not forcing the school boards to use their surplus on various projects. It is at their discretion to use. We’re hoping and encouraging them to use it towards their educational programming within their district. We will continue as a department working closely with them. My department, as I stated yesterday, is meeting with them now and yesterday and continues to discuss part of the opportunities that we have before us. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Final, short supplementary, Ms. Bisaro.
Thanks, Mr. Speaker. The Minister and I have to respectfully agree to disagree. He is forcing the boards to make one of two bad options. They either use their contingency to fund the shortfall or they have to cut staff and increase their class sizes and reduce the quality of education.
The boards use this contingency money to fund extra staff, so they may get a special needs student who needs an assistant. They may get an extra 20 students in September that they need to find a staff person for.
I would like to know from the Minister, without a surplus, if my board has no surplus, in such a situation where I have an extra 20 or 25 students come September, can a school expect funding assistance from Education, Culture and Employment? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I just want to make it clear. If I was forcing the school boards to use their surplus, I would take all the surplus back, which I am not doing. It is at the discretion of the school boards to use the funding towards educational programming, and we highly encourage them to do that. Some of the boards have, as I stated in this House, substantial surpluses. When it comes to enrolment, if the enrolment goes up, then obviously the financial aspect of the school boards, their contribution increases as well. Those are areas that we continue to closely monitor and provide additional funds if that’s the case. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Moses.
