Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m going to follow up on my Member’s statement. In our main estimates it shows that there has been an increase to the forced growth for two not-for-profit organizations. I’d like to commend the Premier for taking that initiative to get our organizations, that do excellent work on behalf of government, and getting their wages and benefits up to par with what we pay our government employees. So my first question is to the Premier.
When we’re going through an exercise like this, who initiates that process? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. The honourable Premier, Mr. McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In this case it was the NGOs in question. Thank you.
So, moving forward just in terms of awareness and an education component, hopefully some of our non-profit organizations that we do fund are listening and can take that same process, but sometimes those organizations don’t want to come knocking at the door.
Would the Premier make a recommendation to his Cabinet Ministers to go and talk to their non-profit organizations and see if they do in fact need an increase in their funding for salaries and wages and benefits to keep up to par? Thank you.
The Government of the Northwest Territories has what we call a Third-Party Accountability Framework and that is to deal with third parties who provide services and programs to the Government of the Northwest Territories. In the interest of accountability and transparency, we have a framework in which we determine the level of accountability for third-party agencies, which includes political risk, financial risk and results risk, and on the basis of that rating we put them into three categories, which determines the funding process that we use. Thank you.
Can I ask the Premier, when was the framework developed and what year did it come into effect and, in fact, if that framework will be reviewed? Thank you.
Thank you. The framework was developed in 2004 and in 2011 it was updated with a Program Managers Guide for Funding NGOs. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Moses.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Just making a recommendation to the Premier, would the Premier, in the framework, make it mandatory that forced growth with all our non-profit organizations be reviewed or even the framework be reviewed every four years or every time there’s a GNWT negotiating the Collective Agreement for our GNWT employees and do the same for our not-for-profit sector? The ones that we fund.
Thank you. The Third-Party Accountability Framework results in three categories of third-party funding. The first category is for major service delivery bodies and that provides for multi-year funding through the business planning process.
The second category is for other service delivery and commercial Crown corporations that don’t have large infrastructure, and in those cases there’s a mandatory budget consultation with the funding departments.
The third category is for the much smaller, quasi-judicial, smaller NGOs and those are annual funding requests or application-based. Through that process they would approach their department for funding.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’ll have questions for the Minister of the NWT Power Corporation.
My question for the Minister is: Can the Minister of the NWT Power Corp inform this House which of our 33 communities the NWT Power Corp does not service as the distribution agent and explain why that is not the case? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. The Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Power Corporation, Mr. Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That would be Hay River, Yellowknife, Providence, Wekweeti, Enterprise, Trout Lake. Thank you.
Would the Minister of the NWT Power Corporation explain why the NWT Power Corp isn’t the agent for distribution of power in those particular communities or from his ability to explain how we got where we are today to have individual franchise agreements for those particular communities and not in the others that remain out of the 33? Thank you.
Thank you. The way our system is structured, communities make the choice of who they would like to make an agreement with to provide their electrical services. There’s a process through the franchise process to do that and communities have done that over the years. Thank you.
We’re all well aware that the Cabinet has the authority, as does the Executive Council, to exempt the NWT Power Corp from delivering a dividend payment to the government. By the way, when I say dividend I mean profit.
Is the Minister able to speak to how long this happens to be the case and when was the last time the government directed the NWT Power Corp to deliver a dividend? As this government waived the dividend, what is the intent of why they’ve waived it?
The Power Corporation does have a rate of return, but as has been demonstrated over the last number of years, there have been cost pressures on the Power Corporation that far exceed to manage without the government’s ability to come and cushion the blow on the ratepayers. The 37 or 38 million dollars we put in to cushion the impact of what would have been a rate cliff because the prices of fuel hadn’t been raised over the last number of years. The most recent one would have been the low water surcharge that we’ve covered off as a contribution to the Power Corporation. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. If the NWT government has the ability to waive the dividend, can the Minister speak particularly to the franchise agreement? I believe they are 10-year agreements. Would the Minister be able to speak to that detail on whether they are all 10-year agreements and does the territorial government have what one could define as an exit clause if they need to find a new direction for the people of the Northwest Territories? Thank you.
Those franchise agreements are arrangements between the communities and power provider. I would have to commit to the Member to find out the length of time of the agreements. I don’t have that knowledge readily at my fingertips. The GNWT does not have a role to play as the communities look at their franchise arrangements. For example, the community of Inuvik just signed an agreement with the Inuvik Gas for a 10-year period. That was work they carried out as the community government. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment. I would like to follow up on an announcement that the Minister made on January 28th when he was in Vancouver. The Minister announced a Mining Industry Advisory Board. Since that time, there’s been some comment by my colleague in the Assembly raising some questions. We’ve had questions from two organizations concerned about the environment that are also raising questions.
I would like to ask questions to the Minister around what he is intending with this advisory board. First of all, the announcement stated that the board members will have direct experience in the NWT minerals industry. That suggests that they will be limited to just the minerals industry.
What is going to be the composition of this board? How many members and who will they be representing? Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The honourable Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The composition of the board will be made up of folks who have a wide range of experiencing in the mining industry, not only here in the Northwest Territories but across the country. The full complement will be somewhere between five to seven members. Thank you.
Thanks to the Minister. So a wide-ranging experience in the mining industry. How are these people going to be chosen? Are they simply going to be representatives of mining companies? Are they going to be representatives of chambers of mines? Will there be any representation from social interests? As the Minister stated in his press release, “something that will encourage economic growth while maintaining high regulatory, environmental and social standards.” So that’s a concern that has been expressed. What will the representation be on this five or seven?
The appointments to the board will be at my discretion. Again, Mr. Speaker, these will be industry experts. We will be looking for a cross-section of experience from producers to explorers to folks in the service side. We are still working on who is going to populate this advisory board. It’s an industry advisory board; it’s not a social advocacy board. We will populate it with people we will get information from that will help us develop a mining industry here in the Northwest Territories.
I will add that there’s ample opportunity for folks if they are interested in providing commentary on how we develop the industry here by writing letters. I have a couple of letters, as the Member has indicated, today and yesterday or the other day in the House. I welcome anybody’s feedback on this.
As the Mineral Development Strategy laid out, this is an important part of us being a successful mining jurisdiction. We have a really strong history when it comes to mining. We’ve seen numbers on exploration grow 32 percent last year. We were the only territory of the three that have seen their numbers continue to climb last year.
We really need to focus on how is it the Northwest Territories can be a jurisdiction where people want to invest money and we want to look at opportunities. I know Mr. Bromley talked about increasing our government revenue. That’s going to happen by developing the resources we have here in the territory. Thank you.
I thank the Minister for his Member’s statement. I have no qualms with increasing mining in the territory. I know we need the economic development. However, when we have economic development, the offshoot and the results have an effect on our social conditions. I think it is extremely important that we have a cross-section, not just people who are experts in mining but people who are experts on the impact of mining.
Can the Minister provide me and Members on this side of the House with a terms of reference for this committee? Thank you.
Again, this is an industry advisory panel to the Minister. They will also be able to provide input to other Ministers as needed. In the Northwest Territories today, we have a very stringent regulatory system. Again, there’s ample opportunity for the public and groups to comment on developments as they occur. We can’t lose sight of the fact that this is an industry advisory panel and nothing more, Mr. Speaker. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Final, short supplementary, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I guess I need to say to the Minister that industry itself is concerned with the impacts it has on the social conditions in communities that they’re close to. So I guess there are no terms of reference. I would like to ask the Minister, that as terms of reference are developed, as this project goes forward, if he will involve committee in providing some feedback to this board as it is developed. Thank you.
I would be happy to provide Members with a terms of reference on the make-up, composition of this committee. Again, this advisory board is going to be populated at the discretion of the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment. I will get the best people on that board to give this government and myself the best advice we can receive so we can have a jurisdiction companies want to invest in to help us develop the resources we have here in the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. The honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Blake.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a couple of questions for the Minister of Justice. It’s been almost a year now since there was an offer for proposals to offer on-the-land programming in the Mackenzie Delta region. Why did it take so long and also has the department selected a successful candidate to offer the program? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Blake. The honourable Minister of Justice, Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to thank the Members for their support for wilderness and on-the-land programming. I know there are a number of Members interested in seeing the Department of Justice move forward with this initiative. Last year we were unsuccessful. Earlier this year, on January 20th, we had an REOI, a request for expressions of interest, across the Northwest Territories looking for proponents to help us get a wilderness, camp set up so we can have programs for inmates here in the Northwest Territories. That closed on the 20th of this year, 2015, and we had a number of folks respond to that, several. Our hope is to have a meeting of those interested proponents take place sometime in the very near future and we’ll be notifying those folks by the end of this month. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, that’s great. In the past we had a great program offered just outside of Aklavik.
When does the Minister see the programs starting again in the Delta region? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, that would be dependent upon us finding a successful proponent, somebody the department can work with in the Mackenzie Delta. I know we’ve had some success there in the past and we’re very much interested. I think this is a real key priority for the department, is to see on-the-land wilderness-type programing for inmates here in the Northwest Territories. So we’re going to do whatever we can to work with the folks that responded to our request for expression of interest. We’ll work with them; we’ll try to get a program up and running. I wouldn’t want to hazard a guess as to when that might happen, but the wheels are in motion today to ensure that that happens. Thank you.
I’d just like to ask the Minister, what type of facility is required to offer this program? Thank you.
There would be a wide range of equipment and facilities that would be required, and again, the department is interested in talking to interested folks across the territory that have responded, about what equipment they have, what services they have, what facilities they have, so that we can get a program up and running here in the NWT once again. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to ask my last question to Mr. Lafferty, Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. We know that from the Sahtu needs assessment studies and indications from other reports that if you have Grade 12 or a post-secondary university or college degree, your chances of getting a job are a lot better than a dropout. We also know that people, like some of my friends, who have Grade 7 who have a successful business, so there’s a balance. There are Henry Fords and there are Thomas Edisons and Alexander Graham Bells in our small communities.
I want to ask the Minister, has his department challenged the communities to get the best thinkers and the formula for success for our young people in our communities so that the communities can be involved in getting the kids to school, do the hard work? Is there any type of innovative thinking that can happen in the communities to get our kids off to a good start? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Minister of Education, Mr. Lafferty.
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. All of the above, yes. Those are key discussions we are currently having with the regional groups, the stakeholders and those people that are actively engaged with educating our kids; as well, the school boards, the leadership.
We’ve had regional forums, as well, when we spoke about Aboriginal Student Achievement and leading towards Early Childhood Development Framework, the 10-year framework, and also Education Renewal and Innovation. So there’s a lot of work ahead of us, and that will certainly capture what the Member’s raising the concerns over the years and we are dealing with that as we speak. Mahsi.
I want to again ask the Minister to challenge the schools. You know, there are people in what the Budget Dialogue talked about, putting hammers and screwdrivers and wrenches into the young hands. You know, there are kids that are very, very intelligent, very smart. You know, just the hard work. So how do we get them into the schools maybe where it’s exciting where they want to be in school? Is there a challenge in the schools that the Minister can challenge the school and say, any schools in the Northwest Territories who have a certain percentage of attendees, you’ll somehow be rewarded with some type of school prize? Thank you.
