Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to recognize two of my constituents from Aklavik, Mildred and Agnes Edwards. Mildred received the Minister's Choice Award earlier today for her passion to our culture, tradition, and preserving traditional knowledge. I also had the opportunity to serve alongside her when she was Chief of Aklavik and I was the Chief of Tsiigehtchic. We had a lot of good discussions at the board of directors and a lot of the meetings, so it is good to have her with us today. Thank you.
Masi. Recognition of visitors in the gallery. Member for Thebacha.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to recognize Rachel Dell, the curator of the Northern Life Museum and Culture Centre in Fort Smith. I would also like to recognize Corbin Sinclair from Fort Smith on receiving the Youth Award from the Minister's Culture and Heritage Circle. Mr. Sinclair is 17 and has embraced his culture through drumming, hand games, and Dene games. He demonstrates hand games at school and at cultural events. He attended the 2018 Arctic Winter Games, where he won a gold ulu for stick pole, and the 2019 Canada Winter Games, where he was a demonstrator of Dene and Inuit games. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Minister responsible for GNWT procurement policies has made a standing offer to hear complaints on the floor of the House concerning government procurement, and today I rise once again to bring forward the concerns of my constituents.
The Business Incentive Program statement of policy is to "provide an incentive to NWT-based businesses in a manner that recognizes the higher cost of operating in the NWT." I have a constituent now who asks why certain companies have been grandfathered into the Business Incentive Program registry without having to meet the same requirements as northern-based businesses. To quote their concern, "a grandfathered company can move its operations to Alberta, leave a one-person office, and bring in cheaper labour and equipment, but still enjoy the same BIP adjustment." My question for the Minister is: how does this grandfather clause of the BIP policy promote private sector growth and fairness in the NWT? Thank you.
Masi. Minister of Infrastructure.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This is one of the Member's favourite discussions that he is having on the floor of the House. To be honest with you, I can't even answer his question. If he would actually give someone a heads-up on a question, I might be able to answer it fully on the floor of this House, but the question that he is asking me right now, I have no idea. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
This issue isn't new to the Minister, and he should be able to know his file well enough that he doesn't need a heads-up. Section 2 of the Business Incentive Policy is all about the eligibility for register. That is section A through E, and then you have section F, which says that anyone on schedule 3 is grandfathered in and doesn't need to meet any of those other requirements. For companies that have moved their operations and are no longer resident-owned businesses, how does grandfathering them into a policy that benefits northern resident businesses consistent with the BIP policy?
I will take this question as notice.
Masi. The question has been taken as notice. Oral questions. Member for Mackenzie Delta.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In follow-up to my Member's statement, I have a few questions for the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources. As I mentioned, we have an issue with grizzly bears in the community of Aklavik, upwards of 14. I would like to ask the Minister: can the Minister update the House on what steps are being taken by ENR officers to deal with the grizzly bear problem? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Environment and Natural Resources.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I share the Member's concern with the number of grizzly bears that are in the community of Aklavik. We continue, obviously, to respond to bear reports. My understanding is that we have destroyed three grizzly bears in Aklavik due to public safety concerns. Our local renewable resource officer is on-call, and an additional renewable resource officer will be travelling to Aklavik to assist with monitoring the bear situation. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I am glad that the department is taking some action. Has relocation been looked at, and what would be the cost to relocate one or two grizzly bears or more?
I know that, from questions from the Member in the past week, he asked about the relocation. I had committed to getting costs. I have not seen those costs yet, but I would imagine that it would be fairly expensive. Again, we need to have a look at it and explore all options in trying to alleviate the grizzly bear problem in Aklavik.
I know that it has only been a week, but have discussions started with co-management partners on increasing grizzly bear hunting tags for bears?
We will have to have those discussions with our co-management partners, because, as we know, a number of years ago, they implemented the grizzly bear tags because there was a lot of hunting of grizzly bears, but it seems like it has done what it is supposed to do and brought the population back up. We will have to have those discussions with our co-management partners to see if they would be receptive to maybe increasing the amount of tags. We will have those discussions and see where that takes us.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Mackenzie Delta.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I mentioned, we have a huge problem, especially after dark. Yesterday we had three bears coming into the community. Will the Minister make sure that the department have officers on patrol in the evenings while they are in the community, just to make sure that there is safety? Safety is always number one for the community. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I agree with the Member that protection of our citizens should be the number one priority of this government, and as such, as I said before, we do have another renewable resource officer who is going to the community, and I am sure that they will be doing some patrols to ensure that the bears are not becoming a problem and coming into the community. I think we've seen a number of cases of bears in the community, in some of the communities around the Northwest Territories. Our staff are being vigilant and, if we have to, we will bring in extra people to help with that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today my questions will be for the Minister of Infrastructure. When we are looking at the Manufactured Products Policy, and I was looking at it, and it said at least 25 percent has NWT value, the price is no more than 20 percent greater than similar products, FOB the site of a manufacturer, or 25 percent greater than a similar product, FOB the destination for final delivery. Can the Minister, please advise us what that policy entails, and what is the amount of percentage that manufacturers get in the North? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Infrastructure.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. You see, this is what happens when someone gives a heads-up and you give a full-hearted answer. There is no cap or ceiling identified in the Northwest Territories Manufactured Products Policy. The Northwest Territories manufactured products, however, is pursuant to or enabled by the Business Incentive Policy, and that means, technically, the ceiling of $500,000 would also apply to manufacturing.
That said, our manufacturing policy only pertains to goods for the maximum bid adjustment of $500,000 to apply. We would need to be in the position of buying $16 million worth of a single product. I think we can agree to deal with that when one gets there.
The Minister actually answered my next question, so I will go back to the first question. The question I asked is: what is the percentage? Is it 20, 25 percent for a northern manufacturing company? Is that what they are allowed, additional cost to it?
The Northwest Territories Manufactured Products Policy and the Business Incentive Policy follow the same principles of northern preference. However, our Manufactured Products Policy is an independent process and works slightly different. In order to be able to be purchased by the Government of the Northwest Territories under the manufactured policy, at least 25 percent of the product's value has to be created in the Northwest Territories by an eligible company registered under the Business Incentive Policy. Provided this requirement is met, the product can be priced up to 20 percent higher on a southern product, including freight on site at the manufacturing facility. The product can be priced up to 25 percent higher on a similar product including freight if it is priced at delivery as required location.
I thank the Minister. He kind of answered my third question, so I am just going to go to my last question here. When you look at the procurement policy, at (b), it says, where two or more manufactured supply, approved NWT manufactured products, only those manufacturers will be invited to bid on a contract. Can the Minister advise this House how that part of the policy works when we're talking about the free trade? Because the Minister has advised us in this House that BIP, with some challenges he has faced, and he was able to get it grandfathered, but can he explain how this policy actually is grandfathered in?
As I said in the House the other day, the most important element for Members to understand is the context of what the Canada Free Trade Agreement is. As the Minister of internal trade and external trade, these things have to be negotiated with other governments when we are signing this agreement, and that is the only reason that this government can negotiate an exemption. That is where we have to deal with the other provinces and countries when we are doing these agreements, and that one exemption that we fight for all the time is the Business Incentive Policy.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nunakput.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Earlier I spoke about transitional housing in Nunakput, and my questions are for the Minister of Housing: can the Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation give an update on the transitional housing in the Northwest Territories? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We have been working with a lot of our community governments as well as NGOs. At the same time, we are working, as the Member has known, as I've made statements in the House, on the Northern Pathways to Housing Program. Those have been successful. They have been pilot projects. In Simpson and Aklavik, we have seen some really good things moving forward, as well as in Behchoko. Moving forward from this program, I think we can work with our community governments to possibly access some of our co-investment dollars or the community housing support initiative dollars to address some of these transitional needs in housing. It is a big issue across the territory, and we will encourage our leadership to work with us to address those needs.
Look at my region. I believe there's at least one community that has a contract for the LHOs. I think programs like that seem to work for smaller remote communities. My second question is: how does the Government of the Northwest Territories implement services that are funded directly from the federal government to Indigenous governments across the Northwest Territories? I am going to use IRC and Housing, for an example.
One of the biggest things that we have done through the NWT Housing Corporation is we have been really advocating on behalf of the Indigenous governments in all of our communities across the Northwest Territories with the federal government. The Inuvialuit Regional Corporation is one of the communities that have been able to access funding dollars through ITK, and one of the things that came out of that was we started the housing summit, first housing summit, where we had all our leadership in attendance, and working on trying to build a one voice to take to our NIOs, our National Indigenous Organizations, as well as the federal government to ensure that we get the funding that the federal government has given to the NIOs to meet the needs throughout the territories. The housing summit that we had earlier this year is a good indication that we are getting that information out to our leadership and our non-governmental organizations.
I appreciate the response. I am a strong believer that, when Indigenous governments get funding directly from the federal government, I think we need to work with Indigenous governments and the Government of the Northwest Territories to ensure that we implement that funding properly so that it is not lopsided. There are a few examples out there, but I won't dig too far. Can the Minister give an update on the community housing plans, and will the idea of tiny homes be a discussion during these planning sessions?
The community housing plans, as I've said, are going to be a game changer for our communities across the Northwest Territories on how we address housing. Every community has their own special needs, and when we develop these community housing plans, it's going to be the communities that are going to tell us what their priorities are, rather than us telling the communities what they need. This past weekend was also the first time that we just had a meeting with all of our district offices across the territory, on Saturday, as well as our board chairs. It was the first time that we sat down and listened to what the concerns were in all of the regions across the NWT and how do we address them. I want to let the MLAs know that I did let the board chairs know as well as the district office managers know that all MLAs have been bringing up these concerns to me and the office, and we are working on addressing those issues. The community housing plans are going to be a game changer moving forward to addressing our housing needs.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nunakput.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It's good to see that we are having meetings and having discussions about these issues. You know, action plans and follow-up as we move into the next government is very key. It's more of a comment than anything. I am just wondering what the Minister's plans are as we close up these last five days of this Assembly.
I have chatted with the staff and talked about putting a transitional document. I know we do have a transitional committee here within the next government, but I really wanted to make sure that, with something as important as housing, that I would sit down with my staff and we would look at creating some type of a transitional document moving into the next government. Over the past two governments, we have made some really big strides and we have had some great leadership from our past Ministers who were responsible for housing, and I just want to carry that forward and make sure that we continue the continuity of the programs, the services, the partnerships, and promoting the programs that we have, and continuing to work with the federal government, our Indigenous governments and making sure that they are prepared for housing issues moving into the 19th Assembly. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife Centre.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In some ways, my questions continue on from my colleague. In my statement today I talked about the growth of the Housing First program throughout the NWT and the success it has had moving chronically homeless people out of shelters and into stable transitional housing. It's very clear that the demand for Housing First has outstripped supply. Can the Minister tell us what advice he is including in his departmental transition report on Housing First? Thank you.
Masi. Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We will just obviously continue on this theme here. Here in Yellowknife, we have been working with a lot of our partners in terms of addressing some of the housing needs. Obviously, we do have the Housing First program; we have the rapid rehousing program with YWCA; and the Yellowknife Women's Society, we did make a good announcement; we are working with industry to see how we can address housing here in the Northwest Territories; Northern Pathways to Housing program that we have in the three communities that I just previously mentioned, we have been working with ECE and working with Health and Social Services to see how we can increase our shelter funding for homeless shelters and how it's just a one-stop program for applications to address that need. So there are a lot of things that have been going on over this government, and any input that Members and any input that our leadership across the territories and our non-governmental organizations can give us, we are willing to work with them, and we just need to sit down and have those discussions. The big one announcement that we have given was the co-investment fund and how can we access that and have a bigger partnership to address homelessness and transition or even housing needs of the NWT.
I appreciate that, not only does the Minister buy half-page ads to talk about his successes, he also gobbles up question period to do the very same thing. The City of Yellowknife has attempted to count the number of homeless people in Yellowknife, and I would like to know very specifically, without the words "community plan," is that work to understand to full dimensions of homelessness being undertaken in any other communities?
Obviously, the Northern Pathways to Housing program is one of our successes that we have seen, and we will continue to work on that. It's a piloted project. I just want to also say, Mr. Speaker, our staff have been doing a great job in meeting with our leadership, meeting with our non-government organizations to address homelessness, and we all need to work together. I think that's one of things that we came out of the housing summit that was up in Inuvik. We also have the Reaching Home program that we are pushing out, and our staff has been trying to get out to as many communities as they can across the NWT. Initially, we were looking at three community housing plans in this initial year, as a pilot program. After myself and the staff have been meeting with leadership, we have 12. I made a statement last week that we have 12 community plans on the go to address the housing needs in each of the communities.
So I just want to let all Members know and leadership, you know: reach out to us; we are willing to work with you, but we are going above and beyond to address the housing issues across the Northwest Territories, and our staff are working very hard to make sure that happens.
