We track board appointments. Where Ministers have the responsibility for making direct appointments, we leave that to the Ministers. I am not in the practice of reviewing all decisions in hindsight.
Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.
Merci, Monsieur le President. Thanks to the Premier for that, and I agree. Let's look forward, now. Lastly, there doesn't appear to be any policy or guidance around ministerial appointments for positions not on boards. Given the public concern around the recent appointment of the workers' advisor, can the Premier tell us whether he is now prepared to develop and implement a policy framework for all ministerial appointments? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
I guess, first of all, we will have to determine: this may be the one and only ministerial appointment in the Government of the Northwest Territories. I guess that would be my first step, to determine whether that is the case or not. If there is more than one ministerial appointment, then we would determine whether there are enough ministerial appointments that would warrant to have more oversight. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Oral questions. Member for Deh Cho.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the community of Fort Providence is very interested in the increasing amount of tourism that we are seeing in terms of small-community travel. My questions are to the Minister of ITI and Infrastructure: what actions have been taken in the last year toward getting a big sign erected to alert travellers that they are approaching the mighty Deh Cho? Mahsi.
Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Member has brought this to my attention today. Upon follow-up, the short answer is: none. The ITI staff has met regularly with the tri-council organization in his community. There are a number of discussions that have taken place there. Upon further follow-up, we have not had any discussions on what we talked about in the House. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
What are the steps to getting a sign placed along the highway?
To get a sign along the side of the highway, that is through the Department of Infrastructure. There are both guidelines and a formal process that is in place to approve all sign applications for signage along our highway network in the Northwest Territories. Signs need to meet a technical requirement. Any person or organization who wants to put up a sign must apply through an application process.
The Minister has agreed that a big Deh Cho sign in the roadside park is a good idea. I am thinking that it is the government's job to initiate projects like this on the road system. Will the Minister confirm that he will get this job done?
As I have said in previous questions from the Member and the House, I think that this is a great idea. On the second part of the question, I don't know if we need to be the initiator of it. I am going to talk to my superintendent in the region about having a conversation with the local community groups that need to be involved, but I think that this needs to be pushed as well from the local group, and maybe with some input from our MLA from the riding, to get some input from him, as well. I think that this needs to be collaborative approach, not just a one-sided approach, but we certainly need to work together on this. I know that I made a commitment in this House to have this discussion with his community, and we will do that.
Oral questions. Member for Deh Cho.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have reached out to talk to Members of the Deh Gah Bridge Society and DIGAA Enterprises, and they are willing and very interested in making this a possible reality. When will the Minister instruct the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment to develop a program for this sign project and seek input on the content from local governments? Mahsi.
As I said, I will get our superintendent to go in there to have a discussion with the tri-council group in the community. I know that there has been a lot of conversation with that group, particularly around the old landing site for the ferry landing, about turning that into a park, which would be a long-term project that we are trying to work on and have discussions with them. I know that there needs to be some restoration work, if I remember from my briefing with DFO on that, but I will be sure that our superintendent, when we goes there and meets with the tri-council again, initiates the conversation about this signage project along the highway. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have been approached by a number of businesspeople asking why their WSCC rates are going up. Unfortunately, I cannot answer their questions with certainty. Therefore, I have some questions for the Minister responsible for WSCC. Can the Minister explain why the rates are going up annually? Is this due to increased costs for administration of programs, a need for more staff, or is this cost related to injured workers? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Minister responsible for the Workers' Safety and Compensation Commission.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The mandate and the work that the WSCC does is to continue to promote workplace health and safety, as all Members know, and I think all Members can attest to and support the work that we do within WSCC. The increase in 2019 provisional rates, which is the rate used in deriving detailed employer rates, is attributed to the increased cost, as all Members would be aware, of the treatment and care of our injured workers, and we will continue to provide those services and work with our employees, as I mentioned, focusing on promoting workplace health and safety. The increase is attributed to the increased costs for the treatment and care of injured workers across the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It is my understanding that the Government of the Northwest Territories pays 88 cents per $100 on their payroll. It seems to be very low, especially when we look at departments such as Infrastructure, Health and Social Services, and Justice, in other words, Corrections. Can the Minister confirm that the departments are broken down into their own industry codes, or is the GNWT as a whole classified as one code?
As the government, the GNWT has one employer for all of our workers and people who do work on our behalf. It is classified under a single industry code, that code being class 81. Being an employer, GNWT as one employer, we are just focusing on that class 81.
That gives me a bit of a concern, when we have such a variety of people working for the Government of the Northwest Territories. If we did break down each department into their own code, similar to what we do with businesses, would we see businesses rates go down?
The employer base across the territory funds the system for anyone who needs treatment or care under our class 81. Changing the allocation of how that system works would obviously, for one thing, probably have a lot of administrative work that would need to go into that. If the Member is asking specifically on each department, some probably would go up. Some would probably go down.
As you know, we have employees who do different types of work, and it would really be based on each department. Some would probably go up; some would go down. That is why, with the GNWT being the sole employer, we follow the industry code, being class 81.
Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, thank you very much to the Minister for giving information and clarity to some of these questions. I still have some concerns, though. I can't see our rates going down too low for our secretaries and that, but with hospitals and corrections, I could see it going up. My last question, Mr. Speaker, is: is my understanding that the Minister's role is to ensure that everybody pays their own fair share, including the GNWT? Can the Minister explain what his role is with WSCC? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
The Minister has an arm's-length role working with the WSCC. As I mentioned, and as he said in his recent comments, with each department, and he mentioned a couple in terms of Justice, Corrections, Health and Social Services, compared to, you know, administration, the costs would be up and down. My role, like I said, is at arm's length, but we also have a governance council that does oversee the conduct of business and management of the WSCC. That is my current role, at an arm's length, but also working with the governance council to make sure that workplace health and safety for our employees is administered. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member's statement today I was talking about Indigenous ownership of mining and resource development projects. My questions are for the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment. In recent years, we have seen positive partnerships between Indigenous organizations, and the diamond mines in particular. They have provided a number of services to the diamond mines, but now the talk is about actually starting to hold some equity ownership in potential projects. I would like to ask the Minister: can the Minister speak about how the government can help encourage Indigenous partnership at a high level in resource projects? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Our role would be as partners and supporters of Indigenous governments to do this. We are very interested in working closely with Indigenous governments and their development corporations, our federal partners, the federal government, to achieve the shared goals of economic empowerment, for sure. It is a conversation that has already started rolling out. We had an economic summit in Inuvik last fall. The Premier had one. Myself and the Minister of Finance were there. We are committed to continuing these types of conversations. I think the summit was a good starting point to have these discussions, and we are very interested in helping Indigenous governments who want to go down this road to be able to participate in this manner. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you to the Minister for that reply. That is good information to start to get an understanding and a handle on sort of the direction that we are going and some of the first steps that could be understood from a number of interested parties. I would like to maybe expand upon that a little bit and just ask the Minister: many Indigenous companies, as I have mentioned, provide services to the mines. What ways can the government support them as they prepare to take next steps towards equity ownership?
I will give you a few examples of what we are doing already. As many people in this House know, we have our regional mineral development strategies that we are working with the regions on this, developing them, for those who want to participate in that manner. We are doing two, I think, in this budget cycle again. Our government is already bringing Indigenous governments into the fold as we reach out to the investors of the Global Resource Conference. That is another good example, but we also have funding available from our government to support capacity-building in these areas. We believe that these have proven out to be effective to help the Indigenous governments that want to participate.
Thank you to the Minister for his reply. This is good information. I would like to take it another step further and ask the Minister if the government is working on any kinds of strategies at all in terms of what strategies can the government use to encourage to possibly even incubate communications and partnerships between Indigenous companies and the resource industry?
As I said, we have our regional strategies. Those are good over the long term, I think, to help the Indigenous governments on where they want to go on this. Our own mineral development and petroleum strategies lay out concrete actions to support Indigenous governments. They are clearly laid out in that. Ultimately, it really comes down to engagement. It is something that we have proven that we are very good at encouraging. We have seen that at Round Up already, the last two times that we have been down there. We have a defined structure that is already in place with the public and Indigenous governments and industry to work together, and we will continue to work on that. That is a solid foundation that puts us head and shoulders above the rest of the country, I believe. With our competitors around resource development, we will continue to encourage that and work with the Indigenous governments that want to pursue this.
Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you to the Minister for his rely. This all seems to be very positive information. In the past, we have set some degree of precedent in this regard. This is not new to the Northwest Territories. Many will recall that the Mackenzie Valley pipeline was also one third Indigenous-owned, and so I would just like to ask the Minister: how can this government continue to work toward developing these types of Indigenous equity partnerships in the future? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I think we have clearly laid out that we know, to encourage development in the Northwest Territories, that we have to work with all our partners and all our residents across the Northwest Territories in collaboration. I think, with just a quick thought in my head when we are talking about this, it goes back to the announcement we just made with the federal government around the Taltson project. It is quite clear that this government is focused on bringing Indigenous governments into the fold on how we want these projects to move forward. This gives you a very good example of how it laid out the financial support that is going to be laid there to see how they want to be able to participate in these things going forward.
Darrell Beaulieu and his group have had a couple of economic symposiums. There were some great speakers who also took place there. You know the First Nation Major Project Coalition was there. Dr. Ken Coltson talked about how these projects, right across the country, how Indigenous governments can be able to participate and how they could help support all the Indigenous governments together on how they can figure out how to do this.
Equity is a big challenge on some of these things, but there are a number of things going on on a number of fronts on trying to figure out Indigenous participation and resource development can take place in this country. We will certainly keep our ear to the ground and figure out we can do this for the groups that want to do it. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Oral questions. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
Marsi cho, Mr. Speaker. In my Member's statement I talked about the cost of living mandate. I have questions for the Premier. I would like to ask the Premier if he agrees that retrofitting homes for energy efficiency would reduce the cost of living for people. Thank you.
Honourable Premier.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Certainly, I agree with the Member's statement. The Government of the Northwest Territories released its 2030 Energy Strategy in 2018, and that will help address the cost of living by increasing support for energy efficiency and conservation, including a goal of increasing residential energy efficiency by 15 percent. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Another item for cost of living, according to me, anyway, is affordable daycare. Does the Premier support all efforts of creating affordable daycare?
Affordable childcare is important for families. I support responsible policy and program development that supports the Government of the Northwest Territories' mandate item of making childcare available and affordable for families.
Staying with daycare, can the Premier tell the House what progress has been made from the beginning of this government until now on moving toward affordable daycare?
I think our government has done a lot in this area, especially with junior kindergarten. I think it has certainly made it a lot better for a lot of families, and other initiatives that have been undertaken by this government. We all recognize that, with daycare, more people can work and also make it easier for the family. Also, we are increasing training for licensees that provide daycare as well.
Oral questions. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
