Thank you. I can work with the Minister of Finance to figure that out. The amount that exists in the department of Education, Culture and Employment is zero because this is money that is applied for by the education councils, not by us. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Member for Yellowknife North.
Yes, thank you, and I recognize that, and that is the complication of me asking these questions. You have committed to reviewing the funding formula, but, to me, the conversation about the funding formula really is not complete without recognition that there are millions of dollars in the system that is not ours. I think that figure is extremely important to all conversations going forward. Moving on, I wanted to Northern Distance Learning. I understand we are in phase 3 right now. Are we meeting our expansion goals, and can you give me an idea of what communities are next?
Thank you, Member. Minister.
Thank you. Yes, we are meeting the goal we set out three years ago now. We will be expanding in the coming year to 20 communities. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you. I am happy to hear that is on track, and I look forward to further expansion. My next question is: the Education Act will be coming forward in the life of this Assembly. I am glad we are going to have the conversation about the funding formula. Can I just confirm that the scope of the Education Act amendments will include allowing us to devolve education to Indigenous governments should it be desired?
Thank you, Member. Minister.
Thank you. I think this would likely be more of a repeal-and-replace than a few amendments here and there. One of the main considerations is the fact that the Member just referenced that we need a piece of legislation that allows Indigenous governments to devolve the authorities that they have that our legislation currently doesn't allow. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Next up is the Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just going to add some questions to carry on from what my colleague from Yellowknife North mentioned about Jordan's Principle. I think there are two or three some of the schools already that are affected by this. I think it is really important. It kind of runs in parallel with a lot of the DEA work that is going on. My question I had for this was: how is this federal program going to affect the overall budget going forward? I know it's a pretty broad question, but is this going to be one of those programs that is going to run alongside it? Is it going to be for the better of the overall budget for education going forward? Thank you.
Thank you, Member. Minister.
Thank you. Our budget is going to continue to be our budget. Then there is this supplementary funding coming from the federal government. In the long term, like the previous Member stated, we do have to consider this. Is there a need for these 173 positions? If there is, why aren't they being funded from within the department? Why isn't that part of our funding formula? These are big conversations we have to have.
Some of the schools I have been to have an amazingly high amount of Jordan's Principle workers there, whether they are support assistants or teachers. You talk to the teachers in those schools, and they say they can't run their class without those assistants because there are students who just need somebody with them, not to take them out of the class, but just to give them a little more attention. Without those additional adult bodies in the room, classes become a little more disruptive, and it is hard for anyone to learn. It is going to be a major discussion over the coming years for sure. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you to the Minister for his response. I did hear the word "entrenched" going forward. To me, that sounds like at some point the Minister one of his colleagues will be lobbying for more federal funding for this program. Is that what I'm hearing? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Member. Minister.
Thank you. Absolutely. This has become vital. I think the feds see a need for it, and I can't speak for them. I can't say if it is entrenched. We could have a new government, and they could get drastically slashed. When I speak with the appropriate ministers, I will definitely be speaking to the value of this. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have nothing further.
Thank you. If there are no further questions, please turn to page 41. Education, Culture and Employment, early childhood and school services, operations expenditure summary, 2020-2021 Main Estimates, $202,806,000. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you. Next item will be income security beginning on page 45, with information item on page 48. Questions. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I would like to, with the chair's indulgence, bring in Mr. Saturnino for these next two sections. Mr. MacDonald may take his leave into the witness room, I guess.
That is fine. Please proceed. Bring in the witness. Minister.
Thank you. Making his first appearance at the witness table, Mr. Saturnino.
Thank you, Minister. Questions. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. It took me some time to realize that income assistance and income security are two different terms. My questions are in relation to Income Assistance. My question right now is: Income Assistance is a great program, but one of the issues I consistently have with my constituents is that they don't have a phone and they don't have the Internet, which doesn't allow them to look for jobs. Often, if they don't have a phone, they miss their appointments, which then means they miss their Income Assistance cheque. Then, it kind of spirals. They lose their housing, and we end up having people in poverty. My question to the Minister is: Is there a possibility of adding a communications allowance into the Income Assistance program and what that would cost?
Thank you, Member. Minister.
Thank you. I appreciate where the Member is coming from. In our modern world, everyone has cellphones. Everyone uses the Internet. It has become sort of a necessity of life. It has been recognized as such by multiple organizations. We do allow clients to use phones and the internet in the Income Assistance office. In this budget, though, we aren't contemplating adding a phone or Internet allowance. There has been some work done on that. Just looking at a basic phone plan and a basic Internet plan on your phone, we are pushing, I think, an additional $2 million or so is what it would cost. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I look forward to having further conversations of this. I appreciate getting that number of $2 million. I see that Income Assistance, we all know, is increasingly going up. It went up $2 million from the last part. I think one of my beliefs here, perhaps we can have this conversation later, is that if you actually give a person a phone and the internet, they are more likely to get a job. They are more likely to be able to get in contact with the numerous services they are interacting with. We have seen through Integrated Case Management that often our most vulnerable clients not having a phone is one of the biggest issues that causes the spiral into poverty. In that analysis, has the Minister looked into whether providing people with a phone or the internet would actually save us any money?
Thank you, Member. Minister.
No, I haven't looked into that. It would be difficult to sort of extrapolate that from other jurisdictions, to say, "This has worked in other jurisdictions, so it will also work in the territory." We are vastly different from most places that would do this type of research. I have been very open with the Members that I want to have an Income Assistance program that helps people get back into the job market. A lot of people on Income Assistance, they are in and out. Some, there are additional barriers that keep them out of that job market. What are those and how can we assist them to get into that job market? If this is something that shows some merit, maybe was can look further into it. Again, there are a lot of asks, especially in ECE. We can't pay for everything that we would like. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I look forward to having these conversations, and I think it just seems common sense that not having a phone is a barrier to getting a job, so maybe we could look into this more. My next question is, in regard to Income Assistance, for the $34 million we spend a year, how much do we spend in administration? That would be the staff and the people to actually provide money to the end users.
Thank you, Member. Minister.
Thank you. We can't parse out Income Assistance from the entire Income Security program. Income Assistance is about, I'd have to look at the exact number, here, $32 million, but the client service officers who distribute Income Assistance also deal with the Senior Home Heating Subsidy and a number of other programs. So, of the total of $52 million that is spent on those programs, $6.5 million is spent on administration. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. You will hear me over the next four years make multiple pitches for a guaranteed liveable income. I think one of the strongest arguments is the fact that $6.5 million of this $32 million, depending on which numbers we're talking about, exactly, is spent in administration costs. I'll leave that debate for another time. One of my other concerns with Income Assistance is it often requires people coming into the offices. There is a lot of paperwork involved. I believe this is in the mandate and there is some work being done on single-window service. Are there presently efforts in the department to move more of Income Assistance applications online?
Thank you, Member. Minister.
Thank you. At this point, we haven't done that work. A lot of times, people are bringing in pay stubs, they're bringing in things from the bank, and those are being brought in for verification. It isn't something that really lends itself, but that being said, I'll look into what other jurisdictions are doing and see if there are efficiencies to be found in that way. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the Minister's commitment to look into that and see what other jurisdictions are doing. Ultimately, I think one of the beautiful things about it is, if we create these online service portals, and we're seeing this done for more and more departments, then in certain cases you don't need the administrative staff. They essentially are replaced by the internet, which then means we have more money to provide people the actual Income Assistance, and, you know, perhaps a phone. I think there is a strong, once again, cost-savings argument to creating an online portal for Income Assistance. I'll just leave that as a comment.
Thank you, Member. Minister.
Thank you. Online portals aren't free. I mean, there are always costs associated with them. I've seen them in the previous government, and honestly, if we had an online portal, it would free up time for our client service officers who, I think, are all overworked and who would probably appreciate being able to have the time to do what they're supposed to be doing and not be running themselves ragged. I don't know if it would result in any savings in wages. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Member for Yellowknife North.
No, thank you, sir.
Thank you. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just looking at two line items here, and a quick comment, then some questions. I'm looking at the Senior Citizen Supplementary Benefit and Senior Home Heating Subsidy, those two line items. There's not a whole lot of change in there. I want to make some comments on our mandate, with our mandate item to enable seniors to age in place with dignity. We had a couple of commitments, and that's to increase the Senior Home Heating Subsidy and to create a separate Income Assistance program for seniors or persons with disabilities, in our mandate. I would like to ask the Minister what is his vision or plan going forward to increase these numbers and/or how would it look in the next budget moving forward? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Member. Minister.
