Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And I guess I know who the Minister is speaking about, and I thank him for his service as well in volunteering.
Mr. Speaker, has the Minister received any feedback or is he expecting or asked for feedback from those retired firefighters on their experiences and observation of this year's fire season and how will that feedback be used? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, we did talk to them. I've actually had, like I said, conversations with five of the or sorry, seven of the ten retirees. And the first thing, without even me prompting, you know, I just asked them why, and they said because we knew the season was going to be bad. We had an individual in Fort Smith who was retired and saw the situation and he already, before the evacuation, was getting ready to leave. When the officers the regional office superintendent reached out to him and asked he said, yeah, let's get to her. And he said look, it was a severe drought, the weather conditions, he said fires didn't act the way they normally do. And he said that the work that these people put their lives on the line and, unfortunately, we did lose one firefighter and we had a number of people injured, these people were fighting the fire situation that was different. We will be engaging them with our afteraction review plan because this was very knowledgeable. They had some of them 40 years of experience, and they've said they could not ever see this situation as bad as it was. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.
Merci, Monsieur le President. My questions are for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment on the recent jobs and demand report. As I noted in my statement, there's a large gap between what will be required for new jobs and where our residents stand in terms of educational attainment. So can the Minister tell us whether the department has reviewed this new report and what is the plan to close our educational gaps for jobs in demand? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member for Frame Lake. Minister responsible for Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Member will be happy to know that nobody is more excited about this report or nobody uses this report more than the Department of Education, Culture and Employment. It's an essential document. We always talk about having data, making datainformed decisions. Well, this is that data. So I'll go through some of the ways we use it here.
First, it's open to the public. So the public can look at this and they can make a determination of what they might want to do. So as the Member stated, school teachers are in high demand, the most high demand job over the next 20 years. And so, you know, that can drive people's, you know, paths in life.
The report is also used by postsecondary institutes. So the Aurora College's strategic mandate agreement document references labour market information and the need to align its program offerings with the labour market information. So that's actually right in the their mandate. The report is also the foundation for our skills for success initiative. And the two priorities in there are increasing skill levels through relevant education and training, and bridging education and employment gaps through targeted support. So it allows the department to tailor its programs based on that report.
In addition, we have our career and education advisors, which I've spoken about many times. These are the people who go out and they work with students, grade 9 to 12, to help them figure out how to get to that next point in life after school or what further school to take. They use this information, Mr. Speaker. And we're renewing the JK to 12 curriculum. That information is also useful in those efforts.
So, Mr. Speaker, that information is being well utilized across the department. Thank you.
Merci, Monsieur le President. The Minister's got me convinced. It's good. This is a good and useful report, and I commend it commend it to and those that prepared it.
In terms of educational gaps, a number of them come to mind between what our residents have currently achieved and what will be in demand. So can the Minister tell us how this report will influence our postsecondary education planning and work currently underway to close gaps between educational outcomes in regional centres and smaller communities? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And the Member's pointed out that, you know, there is a gap between what the jobs that are going to be in demand that are needed and the education and skills of a number of our residents. And the fact is that has been the case for a long time. We bring a lot of people up from the south because there are a lot of jobs here already that our residents can't fulfill. So, really, this is the land of opportunity. You talk to people who come up here from the south, and they'll tell you oh, I can't believe, you know, the opportunities. If you want to work, if you want to work hard, you can make something of yourself in the North. So and sorry, getting back to the Member's actual question here, as I've already mentioned how the college, it is intending to use these this report to ensure that its offerings are aligned with the jobs that are in demand. We have other institutes in the territory that are emerging, organizations offering programming. They can look at this when they're designing their programming. And we also have you know, maybe I'll leave it at that. I could just go on and on, but I'll let the Member ask his questions. Thank you.
Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for his enthusiasm and passion. It's clearly evident.
So one of the interesting takeaways of this jobs in demand report is that not many jobs seem to be found or will be created in the resource sector. So can the Minister tell us what, if any, adjustments are being made to teach training programs, such as Skills 4 Success, in light of the jobs in demand report? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So the Skills 4 Success isn't a program. It's sort of an overarching framework. And within that framework, we can make adjustments based on things like these jobs in demand reports so we can tailor programs. I will say that a lot of the labour programs that ECE delivers, they're delivered using federal funds, and so there are parameters around those funds. But that being said, those are continuous we're continuously working with the federal government to adjust those parameters based on things like the jobs in demand report and what we hear from employers and from employees as well. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Frame Lake.
Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that. Obviously, effectiveness of our Student Financial Assistance Program is a cornerstone of postsecondary success. We say our program's among the best in Canada. But actual graduation or completion numbers tell perhaps a slightly different story when it comes to results. So can the Minister tell us whether the effectiveness of the Student Financial Assistance Program has been reviewed recently and what, if any, further changes might be coming in light of this new jobs in demand report? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The department actually recently completed a review. I guess we completed it back in June. It came to this House. We came looking for more money. We found more money internally, and we really enhanced the SFA program. The Member speaks to completion rates of postsecondary students. So one of the things that we've done is we've removed the barriers to completing programs in terms of the financials. So sometimes residents, they might not do very well in a semester. We're not going to punish them for that. We're going to continue to fund them so that they can move forward with their education. Some people need a bit more time. Mr. Speaker, I know all about that. I spent a few more years in postsecondary than maybe I should have but in the end it was all worth it. But, you know, the cost of going to university and going to college, getting postsecondary, it can be prohibitive for people, especially from small communities where, you know, there's maybe not jobs for students to save up to go to school, where the cost of living is very high. So we've also increased those amounts as well. So we have done our best with this last program review that we just finished to reduce those barriers to the greatest extent that we can. And the students going to school this semester are the first to avail themselves of these new rates and this new program. And so I hope that we see some great results. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Tu NedheWiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member's statement earlier, I brought this up again because I wanted to follow up as to what was happening in regards to Kosmos 954. You know, the chief was here earlier, Chief James Marlowe. I had breakfast with him the other morning, and we were talking about it again. And, you know, when this thing happened back in 1978, when it came down, you know, we used to have a vibrant little community in Fort Reliance, and along the corridor into Lutselk'e, Fort Resolution, and the town of Hay River, in that area, the corridor, where the satellite came down. And, you know, a lot of people that were around at that time, you know, are no longer here with us today as a result of the uranium that was in that satellite. I know I talked about this with the Premier, and it was mentioned that the you know, the satellite burned, and there was really no evidence that this stuff is around.
But, Mr. Speaker, can the Premier provide us with an update on the response from the Government of Canada to her request for information regarding Kosmos 954 crash and the potential health impacts and cleanup and participants in the local land users? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member for Tu NedheWiilideh. Madam Premier.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to start by thanking the Member for bringing this issue to my attention. As I stated when he first asked me the questions, I hadn't heard of this incident. So it's always good to learn more. I always say that, you continue learning for the rest of your life. It's important. So I do thank you for bringing that to my attention.
At that time, I made a commitment to the Member. I don't know if it was the first time he asked or the second. But for sure, I made a commitment that I would bring it to the attention of the federal government. I take it to heart when horrible things happen to anyone, especially the residents of the NWT. So I did, took the time, sat down, and penned a letter to the Prime Minister. Unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, that was before the evacuation. It's been fairly busy, and I haven't heard back from the Prime Minister's office on this topic to date. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. When I was in my community tour in Fort Resolution about two weeks ago, I had a chance to meet with an elder, Angus Beaulieu. And when I was meeting with him and his wife, we were talking about this Kosmos 954, and he talked about, you know, when that satellite came across, there were debris found on his house and in that area as well. But he had a dog that some of this debris fell on, and it wasn't too long that when the dog would start limping and walking and eventually passed as a result of that debris that was found.
Mr. Speaker, has the Premier had any discussions or collaboration between the GNWT and Government of Canada to initiate further research into the effects of Kosmos 954 crash and the subsequent cleanup and suggestions in her letter to the Prime Minister. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As the Member stated, I did write to the Prime Minister. I did ask him for more research on it or the research that they have. The Member shared his story with me, the story of community members. But I know that there must be some research out there. So I did ask to see it. Again, unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, the last time I met with the Prime Minister it's really hard to get meetings with the Prime Minister to start with, but the last meeting I had was in Edmonton and it was during the evacuation. And unfortunately, I focused on the fires and the lack of infrastructure and the needs of the North. So I do assume that before the end of this government, I will meet again with the Prime Minister, and I will follow up to see if there's any research that he can provide us or any work that they're doing to address this issue. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and thank you, Premier. 1978, when the satellite came down, it was a year later that another Russian satellite that came down I can't remember where it was in I think it was in South America, in and around that area. You know, and it happened not just once but twice. And it's I think we need to you know, the Prime Minister of Canada really needs to take ownership of this and listen to what the people are saying here in the Northwest Territories. Listen to what my constituents are saying here in our riding. And, you know, it's the evidence are there. The proof is there.
So can the Premier inform the House, this House, of any measures that the GNWT is considering or has already taken to address concerns about the higher rates of cancer among cleanup participants and local land users in the Tu NedheWiilideh riding? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I don't have information on hand of specific things we've done for specifically for the Tu NedheWiilideh righting regarding cancer. But I can say that I do know that the stats of people in the North, the stats of Indigenous people, do have higher rates of cancer. And that's concerning. It's concerning to me. It should be concerning to all of us in the North. The direct reasons for that could be varied. Definitely a link to smoking. You know, it was a lot of people back in the day that mining has always been a critical resource in the Northwest Territories. There were a lot of people that were exposed to substances that we didn't know much about, arsenic in the capital city. My father worked in the uranium mines and actually died of cancer himself, so. Never did tracing of that. But there were many things. So I think that what I want to say to residents is that it's really important that you do regular checkups. And, Mr. Speaker, I hate to preach, you know, and not do it myself because I'm conscious that I'm not the worst of taking care of myself but as soon as I'm done here, that will be one thing I do is a full checkup. And I would support any resident, especially Indigenous people because of the rates of cancer, please get regular checkups. Early detection when it comes to cancer is the key. So, Mr. Speaker, that's what I'd like to say. Thank you.
Thank you, Madam Premier. Final short supplementary. Member for Tu NedheWiilideh.
It's our last day; we can't keep it short. Anyway, thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, you know, when I was chairman for the impact review board, I chaired the Giant Mine Remediation Project. And, you know, that was a really big file for us and the impacts of that, the arsenic trioxide and, you know, even it was said that arsenic was underground. There's 237,000 tonnes of that, equivalent to seven and a half storey buildings in Yellowknife. But anyway, they called it the boogie man during the public hearings. And, you know, when we were going through that process, we brought expert people around the world that know arsenic trioxide, and it was a really good public hearing and process that we went through.
So, Mr. Speaker, you know, in light of the ongoing public concerns about the potential presence of radioactive material from Kosmos 954 crash, what actions are the Premier planning to take to ensure the health and safety of the people living in the affected area and to provide support to those who may have impacted by these intergenerational events over the 45 years? And to fix that, we need to bring this also again, you know, I'm calling for a public inquiry. I just want to know what the Premier thinks about this. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I committed to earlier in the line of questions, I will follow up with the Prime Minister. I believe things that fly out of the sky are not the territorial government's responsibility. It's the federal government's responsibility. Again, it's it was horrible to hear the story of resident in Tu NedheWiilideh and what happened to them. As for a public inquiry, Mr. Speaker, on that I can't make a commitment. This is the last day of session. There's a protocol that no new initiatives unless given notice to Members. So I respect that. But I think that it is something that perhaps the Member, when he's reelected again, should be asking the next leaders in Cabinet, if he's not a Member of Cabinet. If he's a Member of Cabinet, he's going to have to ask himself. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Madam Premier. Oral questions. Member for Nunakput.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Can the finance Minister explain to me why our government did not push back harder against carbon tax being imposed on the NWT at the time? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member for Nunakput. Minister responsible for Finance.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, if the Member wanted me to run down this clock for 35 minutes by describing all the efforts that we've gone into, I'm certainly happy to do that. I won't, Mr. Speaker, though it is tempting.
Mr. Speaker, there was an extraordinary effort by a number of Members of Cabinet, and a number of Members of Cabinets across this country, asking the federal government to make changes to their policy not the least of which would be to allow heating fuel to continue to be exempted for residential homes, which would make such a difference in northern, rural, and remote communities. They denied that request, Mr. Speaker, or frankly, just simply ignored it and didn't respond to it. Mr. Speaker, we asked also about having different forms of allowances to exempt the North. Again, the best we could do, Mr. Speaker, is be able to hang on to our own program, which we also had to go and do and had to negotiate just to hang on to our program, which would give us the flexibility to be able to tier our own cost of living supports and give us the flexibility in order to ensure that we could continue to maintain a system that would respond to our industry in a way that is very different from what's happening down south. So those are just some of the efforts, again, Mr. Speaker. I've talked about them at length. We've written letters. I've shared those letters. I've raised the issue on numerous occasions at FBT meetings that are public or that are attended by groups. I raised it directly with Ministers. And here we are. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I was the one that brought up the tiered system in regard to try to push it forward for having that in our territory under the carbon tax. Can the Minister explain to me why there are no virtually no exemptions on any of the items relating to the carbon tax in the communities? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, I most certainly will not attempt to describe or explain what the federal government did or did not do with respect to the carbon tax. Mr. Speaker, I can say, just for the sake of information, that community electric power generation for communities is exempted. And obviously, again, our cost of living offset is meant to then adjust to the fact that we know that not only will expenses for in a household be going up, but business expenses go up and some of that will then spill over into individual consumers. And so what we tried to do was adjust our cost of living offset to acknowledge all of that. And, again, I have said before the consensus system here is such that we can make adjustments like having the tiered system. I think that was to the benefit of our system, and I'm glad that we have control of our system to be able to make that change. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Can the Minister explain why the government is no longer allowing rebates of carbon tax to be given to NWT residents? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. One of the changes that the federal government made was to remove the ability for point of sale rebates. We were not allowed to affect anything that would negate the carbon signal is what it is. So, essentially, they no longer want it to be a hidden thing. They want everyone to know exactly how much the carbon tax is. In theory, I believe, again, not wanting to certainly speak for the feds, but is the idea that this then makes us all more aware of how much fuel you're using. It doesn't do much good when you don't have any other choice of what you can use other than fuel to heat your homes. But there we have it, Mr. Speaker. Again, what we've tried to do is build it in to our cost of living offsets and our rebate programs, including the community government grants, something that will help offset those increased costs that we're no longer allowed to have a point of sale or the negation of the point of sale on. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Nunakput.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. You know, Mr. Speaker, can the Minister explain why there's no exemption on the carbon tax such as for transportation of food, airplane fuel, home heating fuels, and the federal government blaming everybody but themselves for this carbon tax when you got the biggest emitters, such as India, China, and the US not paying carbon tax, and Canada's paying the carbon tax and putting the burden on the people. I know this is out of our control but everybody's being blamed but the federal government. This carbon tax should have been a nogo in this House. And in regards to when we brought forward and we brought the big the argument, I guess, on the vote to take this on, there should have been a tiered system in place. There should have been airplane fuel, heating fuel, and the transportation being supplemented. But it's not.
Mr. Speaker, can the Minister just explain why there's no exemptions on carbon tax on such these transportation, airplane fuel, and heating fuels in our territory? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, aviation gasoline and jet fuel is exempted still for now. Who knows what the feds might do next? But it is exempted for now. But most certainly diesel, gasoline that powers all the trucks that carry a lot of our cargo, that carry the other fuel to heat the homes, that power the barges that bring our much of our resupply to communities, those fuels are under the carbon tax.
Mr. Speaker, I've said this before, that the federal government does go to international conferences, acknowledges the fact that other developing countries, developed without access to the kind of industrial processes that have benefitted western nations and is acknowledging that maybe there needs to be an adjustment on an international scale, and yet, here we are in the North where the more southern parts of Canada have benefitted from the ability to industrialize when they did and using all of the carbon fuels that they did, and in the North we don't have the same level of infrastructure, we don't have the corridors that they do, we don't have the energy corridors, we are disconnected from the northern North American energy system, and yet here we are paying that tax. I share the Member's frustration, Mr. Speaker. But in a jurisdictional system, the carbon tax was going to get imposed whether we liked it or not, and they would simply take it. So we've held on to our own system. We've carved our own path. We're not going to start finding ways to reduce our carbon usage because that ultimately is going to save money, but we're going to need the feds to step up and help. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We spent four years talking about the procurement review. We've had a number of recommendations to change the Business Incentive Policy over those four years. So one last time, for the Minister of ITI, will we see any changes to the Business Incentive Policy in the life of this government? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member for Yellowknife North. Minister responsible for Industry, Tourism and Investment.
Yes, Mr. Speaker. Yes, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, all of the proposed revisions that were in the recommendations from the panel are going to be captured in a revision to the BIP. Thank you.
Yeah, thank you, Mr. Speaker. I believe that means we are getting a new definition of a northern business. Can the Minister just confirm that and, if so, what that division will be? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, that does mean that we are getting a new definition, but sometimes what's old is new again. And so, really, what has happened, and what the recommendation of the panel was, is to go back to an earlier form of definition. So that definition will consider well, and it has to adjust the BIP to the definition of a northerner, what defines someone who's a northern individual. And it's meant now to be for six months of residency, not 12, which is really looking at a way of increasing people moving to the North and opening businesses. We had some instances that came in the course of the review of people saying that they took their business elsewhere because it simply would be too long to be recognized as a resident here. But more importantly, to the point, Mr. Speaker, what we have now, in addition to the existing businesses, where beneficial ownership of 51 percent is considered, we are also now looking at businesses where the if it's a whether, you know, corporation, partnership, proprietorship, where the majority of the employees conduct operations here and there's a Northwest Territories based manager that oversees the operations. That's the change, Mr. Speaker. It really takes us back to what we were in a situation of before. Having gone through it before, we are well placed to know what was working with this old and now old version and what had worked previously. So happy to accept the recommendation of the panel on this. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I feel quite confident that Walmart does not have the majority of its employees in the Northwest Territories or 51 percent of its owners do not reside here. And just to confirm, does this mean that Schedule 3, the old grandfathered southern businesses, including Walmart, are going to be removed from the BIP policy? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there will not be any need for a schedule anymore. However, whether the business is on that schedule, and there are a few, will or will now not be under the BIP, Mr. Speaker, they should go through the process if they want to fall under BIP, they should go back I, in fact, just received an email this morning from a northern business but where the owner actually does live across the border, but it's an entirely northernbased business. I would encourage folks now to reach out to their ITI regional offices, let's take a look at whether or not they will fall under this definition. I'm not going to go one by one with them right now here. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Monfwi.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this is important for my constituents because many were left out of the process. So the question is for ECE, or it could be for justice as well, and it's the same person, so.
Mr. Speaker, students who attended Chief Jimmy Bruneau school from 1972 and those students who resided at Chief Jimmy Bruneau School residence from 1972 to 1974 and from 1992 to 2004 were left out of the residential school and day school class action lawsuit. The students who attended these school experienced the same abuse. I have heard these students have been excluded, but I am uncertain why. Can the Minister of ECE clarify whether these students have been excluded due to the Society Act or for what reason? Thank you.
