Thank you, Mr. Moses. Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The committee reviewed dozens of police reports from every community in the region. These monthly summaries from the RCMP are further testament to the carnage wrought by alcohol abuse, the suffering endured in every community, and the burden on police and other government services.
In a year, calls for service to RCMP in the Sahtu are approximately equal to the population of the region: 2,750 calls in 2012. Alcohol is a factor in most crimes and complaints.
Far more alarming is the number of assaults. In 2012, RCMP recorded 255 assaults in Sahtu communities. This is almost one assault for every 10 residents of the region.
In the first five months of 2013, RCMP recorded 120 offenses under the Liquor Act in Sahtu communities.
In Deline alone, a community of about 550 people, there were 43 recorded occurrences of bootlegging in this same period.
In every community the committee heard pleas for programs to help deal with the impact of alcohol abuse. As one man succinctly put it in Norman Wells, “You need help, where do you get it?” There must be effective ways to escape violence and to get well.
People eloquently described the need for safe houses, residential and on-the-land addictions treatment, and more education about alcohol and addictions.
In addition, people want better control of bootlegging. This includes more severe penalties for bootleggers.
It is abundantly clear that alcohol abuse is a societal issue that can only be reduced through a coordinated approach by individuals, families, schools, communities and various government departments. Ultimately, community leaders must lead the way in dealing with addictions issues and helping police deal with bootlegging.
The committee was persuaded that its recommendations must go beyond the limited scope of Bill 24. The integrity of the government is at stake. The same is true for community leadership. There will be no success in dealing with alcohol abuse without local ownership of the problem, local solutions and local action.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to pass the reading of the report to my colleague Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
The Standing Committee on Government Operations therefore recommends:
that the Department of Health and Social Services, the Department of Education and the NWT Liquor Commission increase awareness and prevention programs related to alcohol consumption and abuse. The NWT Liquor Commission must live up to its mandate to “promote the development of a healthy and responsible drinking culture,” and to “encourage and support the responsible use of alcohol;”
that the Department of Health and Social Services make on-the-land addictions treatment available in every community in the Northwest Territories;
that the Department of Health and Social Services re-establish a residential treatment facility in the Northwest Territories;
that the Department of Health and Social Services provide detox programs for any resident who is referred;
that the Department of Health and Social Services deliver coordinated after-care support in every community for those who complete addictions treatment programs;
that the Department of Justice include identification of, and support for, safe houses as part of community safety plans;
that the Department of Justice consider legislating stiffer penalties for bootleggers, and apply for forfeiture of vehicles and equipment used in appropriate cases;
that the Department of Justice deliver an information campaign to raise awareness of potential penalties to bootleggers;
that the Department of Justice strengthen the ability of RCMP detachments to identify and intercept bootleggers, and provide appropriate tools to detect criminal activity related to alcohol and drugs, such as infrared heat sensors and dogs;
that the Department of Justice and the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs assist communities that wish to establish and operate community alcohol committees to help control access to alcohol;
that the Department of Justice establish an effective mechanism for anonymous reporting of bootleggers and bootlegging;
that the Department of Finance and NWT Liquor Commission ensure that liquor stores accepting orders from residents of other communities abide by local restrictions on importing alcohol;
that the Department of Transportation establish thorough screening methods for passengers and cargo at all airports in the NWT, specifically related to assist detection of bootlegging;
that the Department of Finance, through the NWT Liquor Commission, consider restrictions on sales of large quantities of spirits that are not supported by ongoing or special licences, and that individuals purchasing large quantities of spirits be required to identify themselves and sign for their purchases; and finally,
that a fixed percentage of the government’s profit from liquor sales be allocated to augment addictions awareness and treatment programs.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Mr. Nadli.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It is significant that Bill 24 provides the Finance Minister may hold a plebiscite if certain conditions are met; it does not require the Minister to do so.
Following the amendment mentioned earlier, members of the Standing Committee on Government Operations support Bill 24 as presented and recommend it as ready for consideration in Committee of the Whole.
The committee understands the Finance Minister’s decision that under circumstances specific to this bill, Cabinet will not support it. The committee therefore respectfully requests that Cabinet abstain, or allow a free vote of its members.
Thank you, Mr. Nadli. To the motion.
Question.
Question has been called.
---Carried
Committee Report 7-17(4) has been received and will be moved into Committee of the Whole for further consideration.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wish to table the following three documents, entitled Traditional Knowledge Annual Report, Conference of Management Authority Species at Risk Annual Report 2012-2013, and Northwest Territories Species at Risk Committee Annual Report 2012-2013. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Mr. Abernethy.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wish to table the following two documents, entitled Northwest Territories Coroner Service 2012 Annual Report, and the 2012-2013 Report of the Legal Services Board of the Northwest Territories. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I give notice that on Thursday, October 24, 2013, I will move the following motion: I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Thebacha, that, notwithstanding Rule 4, when the House adjourns on October 24, 2013, it shall be adjourned until Monday, October 28, 2013.
And further, at any time prior to October 28, 2013, if the Speaker is satisfied, after consultation with the Executive Council and Members of the Legislative Assembly, that the public interest requires that the House should meet at an earlier time during the adjournment, the Speaker may give notice and thereupon the House shall meet at the time stated in such notice and shall transact its business as it has been duly adjourned to that time. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Item 16, notices of motion for first reading of bills. Item 17, motions. Item 18, first reading of bills. Item 19, second reading of bills. Item 20, consideration in Committee of the Whole of bills and other matters: Bill 3, Wildlife Act; Bill 13, An Act to Repeal the Curfew Act; Bill 14, An Act to Repeal the Pawnbrokers and Second-hand Dealers Act; Bill 15, Gunshot and Stab Wound Mandatory Disclosure Act; Bill 16, An Act to Amend the Justices of the Peace Act; Bill 17, An Act to Amend the Protection Against Family Violence Act; Bill 18, Apology Act; Bill 19, Miscellaneous Statute Law Amendment Act, 2013; Bill 21, An Act to Amend the Dental Profession Act; Bill 22, Territorial Emblems and Honours Act; Bill 24, An Act to Amend the Liquor Act; Tabled Document 70-17(4), Electoral Boundaries Commission, Final Report, May 2013; and Tabled Document 107-17(4), NWT Capital Estimates 2014-2015, with Finance Minister Mr. Miltenberger, Education, Culture and Employment, Transportation, NWT Housing Corporation. By the authority given to me as Speaker, by Motion 1-17(4), I hereby authorize the House to sit beyond the daily hour of adjournment to consider business before the House, with Mr. Dolynny in the chair.
Thank you. Committee, we’ll call Committee of the Whole to order. What is the wish of committee? Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. We wish to continue with Tabled Document 107-17(4), NWT Capital Estimates 2014-15, to conclude, hopefully, the Department of Education and then Transportation, then, time willing, NWT Housing Corporation.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Okay, committee, we’ll commence after a short break.
---SHORT RECESS
All right. Committee, welcome back. Committee, we are on capital estimates, activity summary, page 8-7, on Education, Culture and Employment, and with that, I have Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I would like to reiterate the pressing needs…
Sorry, Mr. Yakeleya. We’ll just go to the Minister here first to see if he has witnesses. Minister Lafferty.
Yes, Mr. Chair, I do have witnesses.
Does committee agree we can bring witnesses in the House?
Agreed.
Sergeant-at-Arms, if you could please escort our witnesses in.
Again, Minister Lafferty, if you can introduce your witnesses to the House,
Mahsi, Mr. Chair. I have to my left, Dana Heide. He is the associate deputy minister with the Department of Education, Culture and Employment. We have Tammy Allison, who is the coordinator of capital planning within ECE. Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Thank you, Ms. Allison and Mr. Heide, for returning here. Again, we will go to Member Yakeleya. Go ahead.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just wanted to say again that the needs in this department, with regard to the infrastructure needs…and certainly being reminded by the Minister of Finance as to the amount of funding we have, and putting the funding where it makes sense and it makes a good business case. I just want to remind the Minister and his officials here of the support that is going to be needed in forthcoming years in the Sahtu region.
I want to ask the Minister in regard to the support for families, single parents. There is a great deal of opportunity coming up in the Sahtu that would greatly appreciate support in the department for early childhood daycare homes. I understand that currently there was one in Norman Wells that closed down, and Norman Wells is a pretty busy place where both parents are working due to the high cost of living in that community, and now they’re going to face more pressure because of the issue of conversion of the energy source they will be needing in that community.
I’m looking at this department in this capital planning process to see where the single parents and the families can get help in the communities in the Sahtu. If there is a plan out there that would look at the Sahtu communities, to look at seeing what type of requirements and criteria are needed to bring in daycare homes for our communities. I stated, sometime in my Member’s statement, that there are employment rates that are quite low in regard to people working in Sahtu communities other than Norman Wells, and that there is a high percentage of families that are headed by single parents. Even in Norman Wells both parents are working to support their homes and there is really no support for them in regard to daycare types of programs and homes. So I’m hoping that the Minister would bring forth a type of plan in terms of partnerships, where we could have daycare homes in our communities. That’s one point.
The second point, and my last point, is looking for this government here to look at the emerging need of a Sahtu technical institute. Start planning for our region. Through the combination of various meetings of organizations and this government here, I believe that a small Sahtu technical institute can be established within the life of this government, and that we can see where our people could take some additional specialized training, or just general training in heavy equipment mechanics trade that is going to match the needs of the oil and gas companies that are coming into the Sahtu, or the supporting services. These companies have to support the oil and gas industry and also support the communities in electrical, plumbing, pipefitters or painters, so we need to start building that type of infrastructure.
It would be good to hear from this government that this department will look at some of this much needed infrastructure that could happen in the Sahtu. For the last 10 years we have received some of the infrastructure, but also in the last 10 years we have sort of seen a – I’m not too sure how to call it – a zigzag in terms of infrastructure. Today we know that we’re very early in the stages of developing the Sahtu, and that’s all because of the oil and gas exploration and the potential that could be there to develop it further into something that is quite astounding in regard to taking the oil out of the Sahtu.
I’d like to ask the Minister what infrastructure phases that he can start in regard to building these types of buildings or places in our region. In the past we didn’t have that, and that was understandable, but today it’s a different story. When you have 11 parcels that are taken up and over $600 million committed just for the exploration, that tells you that there’s something happening there. When you have one company spend over $40 million on an all-weather road out in the bush, that tells you that there’s something going on there, and so I hope that is some strong indication to what potentially could happen in the Sahtu. That’s what I’m looking forward to in this infrastructure budget with the Department of Education, Culture and Employment.
I’ll leave it at that there and hope that the Minister would come forward in the future, within the life of this government, to demonstrate that yes, he’s heard us and is working towards it within our cycle and our plan. We don’t have much time left in this government here to see any type of really significant changes. I’m hoping for these two; that would mean a lot for the people of the Sahtu. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Minister Lafferty.
Mahsi, Mr. Chair. Definitely, by all means we will be through standing committee and also the capital planning process with all of these requests from MLAs and this will be one of them.
The Sahtu region is going to be very busy, as we know. We are closely monitoring their situation. We’re working very closely with the leadership. They were here today, as well, touring the Legislative Assembly. They had various meetings and I did have a chat with them as well. They want to have future meetings regarding various initiatives that are happening in the Sahtu region.
The child care in Norman Wells is an area that we can certainly re-evaluate the situation. I agree with the Member that we need to encourage the community members to access the workforce environment. We must encourage them by all means.
Again, the Member alluded to partnership. Definitely this is an area I am always interested in, having an open dialogue with the leadership, with the MLA, how best to serve the constituency of the Sahtu region and, more specifically, if it happens to be Norman Wells, how can we make this work. Let’s find a solution. I am more open to that. These are some of the challenges we are faced with and I believe it creates more opportunities for us.
Child care and training institutes also go hand in hand. I have talked to it yesterday already, that we are working with regional training committee members that involve industries and other stakeholders from the region. They have developed and produced a community needs assessment and we need to work with that. That will capture the daycare as well. From that, we need to put it forward as part of the capital planning process for next year or the following year, as the Member has alluded to, and we need to build on that.
Training needs to be looked into by the committee. We obviously will need to build on this. I agree with the Member that this is an area that we need to push forward. We are very closely monitoring it as well. Mahsi, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Committee, again, we are on 8-7. Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I would like to follow up on a conversation here and conversations earlier today on child care spaces and what facilities we are putting in place.
First of all, how many child care spaces or facilities do we have in the Northwest Territories? What is the capacity of our child care facilities across the Northwest Territories?
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. For that we’ll go to Mr. Lafferty.
Mahsi, Mr. Chair. Just going through these binders that we have, we don’t have the specific daycare establishments or the actual numbers, but we can provide that to Members.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. I’m sure Members will appreciate that. Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. If we could, at the same time, provide that by community, the number of new spaces and the affordability of those child care spaces, that would be appreciated.
What is in the budget for new child care spaces and facilities this time around here? Thank you.
Mr. Chair, as outlined in the description, we don’t necessarily have it in the capital plan at this point, but we are discussing it through the Early Childhood Development Framework and whether it is the next year or the following year. As Member Yakeleya also alluded to the interest and the need in his region, we need to identify what is required in all the regions and what is existing right now, and we will be providing that to Members. At this point, when we look at capital infrastructure, we don’t have a set of capital infrastructure pertaining to the daycare. Mahsi.
Thank you, Minister Lafferty. As well, we can maybe get a commitment to Mr. Bromley regarding the affordability and daycare facilities by community, as requested. Mr. Lafferty.
Yes, Mr. Chair, we will provide that detailed information.
