Thank you, Minister. Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, when the Minister talked about gaps, that would mean that just the tax-based communities would be responsible for the huge gaps that lie in between the tax-based communities? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. We will do a review again, but currently, the only communities that can actually provide ground ambulance supports are those communities that have the infrastructure in place to be able to initiate the call and to be able to respond to a call. As pointed out before, since the New Deal in 2007, communities themselves make their own capital plans, and so within that, they decide if they want to do something such as building a fire department or an ambulance service or any of these services within their communities, or if they would rather use other services. At this point, only the communities that have those services are going to be at the table. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. That is all I have.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Anything further? Mr. O'Reilly.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am looking at page 326. I'm at the top, program details. Consumer affairs is listed at $150,000. Last week, I raised in the House concerns around our weak Consumer Protection Act, and I was pleased to hear the Minister say that there was supposed to be some sort of a plain language brochure that goes out soon to help consumers understand what their rights are under the existing legislation.
When was the last time there was any change or increase to the consumer affairs line in the MACA budget? Thanks, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. O'Reilly. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. At this point, we do not know when the last time an increase was made to the consumer affairs portion of the department. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. O'Reilly.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I don't know how far back that goes. It looks like we haven't actually even tried to keep pace with the cost of living or Consumer Price Index in terms of bolstering resources for that, so there has been an erosion over time.
Is the Minister committed to looking at the work that we do in consumer affairs with regard to possibly increasing the budget for next year's main estimates? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. O'Reilly. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. When we are developing the next year's budget, we can take a look at the consumer affairs; however, I do have to point out that over three years we've had less than two dozen cases that we've had to deal with. So unless our numbers pick up dramatically I can't see that there would be an increase at this point. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. O'Reilly. Nothing further from Mr. O'Reilly. Mr. Thompson.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'd like the first question to clarify when we're talking about the six communities, tax-based communities, sitting around the table, are we including all the six tax-based or is it specifically for ground ambulance and highway rescue? In other words, communities that have highway rescue and ground ambulance, or is it all six tax-based communities? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes. So it will be the six tax-based communities. I'm going to run them off: Yellowknife, Hay River, Fort Simpson, Fort Smith, Norman Wells, and Inuvik. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Thompson.
I just wanted to clarify that. In regard to program management, it's $660,000 and then on page 327 it has $365,000. This is for 911, correct? This is where the money is and $365,000 is the furniture and stuff like that, building it, and then the other remaining is for the implementation for 911? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, if you look at page 326 you'll see that the total for 911 implementation is $616,000. That is broken down with the $132,000 for a 911 emergency coordinator; the $365,000, as the Member stated, is implementing furniture, office space, et cetera; and then the last $119,000 is for the contract services for the implementation of 911. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Thompson. Nothing further from Mr. Thompson. Having no further comments or questions, I will call this activity. Municipal and Community Affairs, public safety, operations expenditure summary, activity total, $2,142,000. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you, committee. Moving on to the next activity, regional operations, pages 329 to 333. Mr. Thompson.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. The first question would be on 331, and we talk about recreation funding of $825,000. Can the Minister inform if this funding has been totally allocated? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, this money is allocated to each community, so all of the communities have actually got their allocations. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Thompson.
Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I thank the Minister for the clarification. In regard to the other contributions, has all this allocation of this money been spoken for and utilized this fiscal year? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. To date, yes, all of the budget allocations should be out. If the Member would like, we can bring back confirmation of that if the Member wishes. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Thompson.
Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I thank the Minister for that. Yes, I would really appreciate it if we could see if all this funding is being utilized to this date. Thank you, Mr. Chair. If the Minister can make that commitment.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Minister.
I will make that commitment. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Thompson.
Thank you. On page 333, I talked about the reduction of the one position. Can the Minister advise us why this position is being cut? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. This position was cut because we were looking at efficiencies and using our services and supports the best way possible. So not every region has a works advisor position; it was only a couple of them that did. What we're going to do is we're taking away the one position, which will leave two other regions with positions, Fort Smith and Inuvik. Fort Smith will cover the southern side of the lake and Inuvik will cover the northern side of the lake. As well, we have five managers who can actually provide support as well.
With the new technology, the fibre link and the video conferencing that we have in place we are fairly positive that we will be able to provide the same level of services. This also allows us to use our supports more strongly and to be able to share the resources. So if one staff member has skills in one area, we'll be able to time share that with others, so just being more effective and more efficient with the resources that we have. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Thompson.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I guess I'm struggling with this decision. If you're taking it out of Fort Simpson, which we have six small communities, four very small communities that are designated authorities, and to keep it in Fort Smith, which is Hay River and Fort Smith, they're not going to use those resources. They're not going to tap into this as much as the small communities need it.
I understand the technology, but my biggest concern is: where is the department's commitment to developing the capacity in these small communities? If you're using technology by Internet and that, great, but where is the face-to-face and why aren't we looking at that? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. We have some funding through our gas tax agreement that will provide for travel. The agreement does not provide for salaries, for wages actually, so therefore we'll be using the money that we are allocated for travel to provide the support for face-to-face as well. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Thompson.
Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I thank the Minister for that. It's great that you have the money, but if you're going to be more cost efficient and effective, would you not put it where the position needs to do most of the work? So if it's within Nahendeh, which has the six communities, Fort Providence and Kakisa are closer than Fort Smith is. Why isn't the department looking at it? Unless it's just bigger centres and that's why we're doing it. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Minister.
Deputy Minister.
Thank you. Ms. Young.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. So we took a look at a number of considerations when we were trying to figure out where the best location was for services as well as looking at where we may have opportunities to support from elsewhere.
We are aware that there are challenges in not having all of these facilities or positions in every region, but we did try to take into account that we did have some travel dollars available, we have new technology available, and we want to build on the strength of some of our capital staff in the regions. So where the cut came or didn't come was not as much of a part of the consideration as it was making sure that we were going to be able to provide services across all of the regions with the number of positions that we had left and then taking a look at where we had incumbents, where we had staff retiring or on other types of leave so we could balance that out a little bit. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
