Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I believe it was yesterday in the House, the Minister of Justice was talking about integrated service delivery and the goal being to, you know, make government processes designed for the people and not necessarily what is easiest for government. For almost a year now, the Yellowknife department of motor vehicles has not accepted walkin appointments. You have to get an appointment. I've had numerous constituent issues regarding this. So my I believe this is clearly easier for the department to run it that way but not necessarily the public. So my question for the Minister of Infrastructure is when is the Yellowknife DMV going to be reopened for walkins?
Thank you, Member for Yellowknife North. Minister responsible for Infrastructure.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Yellowknife DMV office, like all government offices, has an approved exposure control plan in place to be able to protect the staff and the general public. So this plan was was limit the number of clients allowed in the DMV office, are no more than eight at a time. So in order for us to ensure compliance with this exposure plan, the Yellowknife DMV had to implement appointmentonly service and have a security person onsite. The DMV will not be able to reopen to walkins until the COVID19 restrictions are lifted, or even reduced. The chief public health officer we are very hopeful that the updated Emerging Wisely plan document will be able to address this or at least provide us with some timelines so that we could be able to be reopen to the public. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I guess I'll save some of my questions for Dr. Kandola when we can reopen the Yellowknife DMV.
During COVID, the DMV was completely closed for a period. But they were actually offered more and more services online and some of the traditional inperson services were being done by email. I guess my question to the Minister of Infrastructure is what is preventing all services from being offered online? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the GNWT has a robust online service menu, which includes things like renewing and replacing driver's licences, general ID, book/cancel/reschedule driver exams, renew/print/cancel vehicle registration, commercial truck permits the list goes on. So because of the nature of these some of these services, they cannot be completed online. Transfer of a driver's licence or ID card, obtaining new vehicle registration require inperson verification of documents for the authenticity of the as well, just to be able to identify person requesting this service. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And I guess I one day hope that there's a path forward where the Yellowknife DMV can look to do what most capitals across Canada and most, you know, government service officers in other jurisdictions do, which is have a portion of their hours be available, either on evenings or weekends, just for a small few hours for those people who cannot get time off work to make normal 9to5 hours. Is there any possibility of that happening, Mr. Speaker?
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we have reviewed the possibility of extending hours of the YK issuing office. As the Member mentioned, he's been trying to get this office open evenings and weekends for the past year and he has not had any success with several DMs and several Ministers. Because, and I want to say that there are many different factors considering, including the costs, staff safety, cost of services. Also the UNW Collective Agreement. Opening we did analyze the cost of opening on Saturdays and it was about a $170,000 a year. So these costs would have to be passed on to the clients, resulting in increased fees, and no one wants that. We also would be able to require to have a client program officer in headquarters be able to provide overrides or authorizations as well as require system support from the Department of Finance. The staff at the issuing office have to deal with sometimes irate clients on, you know, perhaps a regular basis, and these clients are usually dealt with by the manager. So that means the manager would have to be onsite after hours as well, so putting additional stress on some of our staff. And, this is very important, the UNW Collective Agreement defines a regular workday as Monday to Friday between 8:30 and 5. And any change to this requirement would mean that the union it would be an agreement with the union and the employer.
So I'm sorry, I mean, I agreed plenty times with the previous MLA but this time, there is no plans to extend the hours of operation at the Yellowknife issuing office. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary, Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Costs, irate clients, union barriers, that could have been an answer to pretty much the reason why we can't do anything in this Assembly, Mr. Speaker. I guess I would like to speak to costs.
Right now the DMV is not even open 9 to 5. It closes at 4o'clock or 4:30, depending. Is there a possibility where we actually reduce the weekday hours to be open parttime on weekends? I think we could actually reduce the overall hours, or give some people a window outside of that time, and maybe we can go we have a new Collective Agreement coming out, maybe there's some sort of path to allow flexible hours, you know, for our workers. Is there some sort of path forward where we get around the cost obstacle by changing the hours of the DMV? I'm settled to being closed Monday and open Saturday; whatever is possible here, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Member's very adamant to get this office open. He's even willing to settle for less weekday for hours for half a day to be open, thinking it's still not going to cost us money. It's going to cost us money, Mr. Speaker. So however, you know, on a flip side, we are looking at, you know, willing to direct some of the department to look at options perhaps, as a path forward to be able to increase hours during the work week. But any potential solution for this, Mr. Speaker, would be dependent on discussions with the UNW and our employees and the department to see if we can make this work. Little light at the end of the tunnel but not yet. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.
