Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to follow up on my statement and ask some questions to the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. When I questioned the Minister previously, he told me that he would consider reviewing policy. I’d like to ask the Minister, to start off, considering the information regarding locked-in RRSPs right across the country, will he consider revising our income support policy with regards to registered retirement savings plans? Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Lafferty.
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Within our policy there are amendments every now and then, and this is an area that I spoke to last week I believe it was. Making some changes to a policy obviously comes from the general public’s feedback and also the MLAs. If there is an area that we need to make some changes, then there is an opportunity to do so.
To the Minister: I guess I would say that if there is a willingness to make changes, this would seem to me to be a change that should be made sooner rather than later. The Minister seems to suggest that he has to wait for changes to be suggested from the public or from us as MLAs. Well, I’m making the suggestion. It seems to me that the policy says that it’s okay to save for certain things but it’s not okay to save for other things.
If the money is not available to be cashed in, I’d like to ask the Minister, will he not wait for more complaints but will he, in the next month, look at revising this policy?
When we speak to income support and Income Assistance program, it is a program of last resort that helps the most vulnerable of community members in the Northwest Territories. When I speak of vulnerable citizens, I mean those that do not have anything to fall back on as opposed to RRSP, that there is financial support that is available to them.
We have to be very careful how we deal with policy changes when it comes to these particular areas. That’s why I am very cautious of changing the policies with respect to this particular area that we are faced with.
I can appreciate that we need to be cautious, but I only asked the Minister if he would consider looking at revising the policy.
I would like to ask the Minister if he would like me to forward the information on RRSPs in other jurisdictions which I have gathered.
Any information that the Members can contribute to our decision-making will be valuable. Also, my department, obviously, has done some research, as well, so we can compile all that information, and if changes are necessary then we have to seriously look at those areas.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Final, short supplementary, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. To the Minister: I guess if his department has done some research, he should know by now that we are out of step with the rest of the country, and I think we ought to get back in step.
I asked the Minister a number of weeks ago whether or not there’s a cost to the department to allow somebody to keep their RRSP to allow them to have something to fall back on when they eventually retire or when they get to old age.
I would like to ask the Minister, again, is there, in his mind, any cost to the government for allowing an individual to keep their RRSP?
Anytime we do a payment plan or subsidy to our clientele, obviously, there is a cost factor to it. I don’t have the actual figures because this is the first of its kind of RRSP clientele requesting income security area. We need to do further work in this area of the cost factor. Once the Member is compiling all the information with my department, we should have a clear idea of where we stand on this.
Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.
