I appreciate that. Mr. Speaker, with the CERB payments and the disability payments across the territory, and especially into our riding of Nunakput, can the Minister explain to me why are we debt collecting for the federal government and we are these are programs that are impacted because residents have received this federal funding, but are we still debt collecting for CERB and disability payments across the territory? Thank you.
Thank you, Member for Nunakput. Minister responsible for Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'm going to need a bit more detail on the Member's comments. I know he had a statement. He was throwing around some acronyms, throwing around a bunch of numbers. So I can say that the CERB program, that was exempted from the calculations for income assistance. So there were people who claimed that who are on income assistance, and I understand that the federal government has been clawing some of those payments back or requiring repayment of some of those payments if the individuals weren't eligible. The CRB program, which came after the CERB program, was not exempted and so that was counted against people's income assistance. And so if they did not claim that, then that would have been counted against their income assistance and recovered. I can't speak to some of the other issues that the Member is mentioning. But as far as I know, we don't do debt collection on behalf of the federal government. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Acronyms or not, we're clawing back funding that should be going to the residents that are that these different programs that we're supposed to provide. CERB payments, yeah, okay. The second, is this round two for the territorial government? It's disability payments that they're being clawed back on. And I've been told by individuals in my riding that they're being clawed back so they're being penalized. So why do CERB one, or the first part of CERB for the to no claw backs and then number two they're clawing back when we approved in the House that they weren't going to do this. They told us that, so why are they doing that? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'm not quite clear what the Member is referencing, what he means by disability payments. I'm going to need a bit more detail on this. I know that the folks who administer income assistance, they are as compassionate as they can be. We do have regulations. And so they must the program is regulated and so they must follow those regulations. It is the law. And so while they are compassionate as they can be, there are some parameters that they have to follow. So I'm happy to look into this further. And if the Member can provide a bit more concrete information about what he's referencing and perhaps even some constituent names, we can actually dig into their individual files and ensure that everything is happening the way it is supposed to be. We don't want people to, you know to not have what they need to get by. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So I will get the Minister those names in regards to the family, single mother of five children is being deducted $41,000 and not getting income support and being penalized by our government when they should be providing service. I think that we have to try to keep the, I guess, services that are needed by the single people. And we're not this is not by choice for taking income support. It's because they have no choice and there's no jobs where we're from.
Mr. Speaker, I really think right across the whole, with the forgiving the CERB payment, is this Minister and I'm going to bring it forward in the next government, to take out the CERB payment claw backs on the second one and the disability payments that the federal government did, and they are being taken away from our people back home under this program, so is the Minister willing to look at that and taking those payments and claw backs and give it back to the people instead of doing the federal government's dirty work. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As far as I know, we don't claw back disability payments. We don't do debt collection for the federal government. So I look forward to the Member providing some more concrete information that I can look into. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Nunakput.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. At the end of the day, we're not giving these people enough support. Can the Minister commit to forgiving clients who receive federal supports during the pandemic and ensuring they continue to receive their income support and resources? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This government did exempt a significant amount of the federal supports that were provided to residents by the Government of Canada. We made clear that certain income from the government would be deducted. And so there should be no reason now why income support is clawing anything back because those residents would have claimed that they were receiving that income at that time. I'll also note that although it is delayed, the rollout of the new income assistance program, this government has increased income has approved increases to income assistance that we haven't seen in a generation. There's significantly more exceptions. There's more incentive for people to get out there and find work, or rather we're removing the disincentives to work. So we have made significant progress. It's just a matter of getting that program rolled out. I'd like to think if it wasn't for the evacuations, it would be coming out next month but that's yet to be determined. But I know staff are working hard to try and get this program off the ground so that we can better support residents. Because I agree, what we've been providing for the past, you know, 20 years, it's remained relatively static. And the prices have gone up in the past 20 years so change was needed. We committed to that at the beginning of this government, and we've made those changes. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.
