Recognition of visitors in the gallery. Member from Range Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'd like to recognize one of my constituents, Mr. David Wasylciw. He is also a YK1 district education district board chair and one of the key figures behind Open NWT, which has done a lot to expand awareness of our proceedings here today and our institution.
I'd also like to recognize Maddie Hodson who is one of the pages with us today. Thank you for helping with our proceedings.
Recognition of visitors in the gallery. Member from Tu NedheWiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'd like to recognize as well the Chief Melanie Norwegian from Jean Marie River and Fred Menacho. Mahsi. Welcome.
Thank you. Recognition of visitors in the gallery. Member from Deh Cho.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I too would like to recognize Chief Melanie Norwegian Menacho and her husband Fred Menacho of JMR. Welcome.
Recognition of visitors in the gallery. Member from Thebacha.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I would like to recognize Austin Blanchard and Kelly Modeste, correction officers that were here for the budget speech from Fort Smith. Thank you.
Recognition of visitors in the gallery. Member from Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'd like to recognize Mr. Tony Brushett who is the executive director of the Salvation Army here in Yellowknife.
Thank you. Recognition of visitors in the gallery. If we missed anyone, we thank you very much to be here, and welcome to your House. It's great to have an audience.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I have neither a podium nor new shoes, but I will do my best.
Mr. Speaker, I'm delighted to stand today to reply to the Budget Address, if not for its content but for the fact that we are at last able to make real decisions that will affect the aspirations and needs of the people we represent. It has been 192 days since we were all elected to serve our constituents in this Chamber, and since then the pace of our new government has been measured and cautious. We have, as a caucus, opted to take our time to stay in our comfort zone and take decisions slowly as we move to more consequential choices that will define the actions of the 20th Assembly and ultimately deliver on results to Northerners in all of our communities.
While I appreciate that we must continue to move together as one to realize the dream of true consensus government, it is a bit too slow for what the Northwest Territories needs right now. Northerners know we have difficult years ahead and equally difficult decisions that must be made today if we are to preserve a future for our land and our peoples, but slow and steady we have been.
First, with an interim budget that promised little more than to keep the lights on while we went on to plan bigger and better things, our priorities, four collaborative themes that serve as the axis for which the 20th Assembly for the 20th Assembly and guide our decisionmaking.
Suitability, accessibility, and affordability of housing;
A strong economic foundation;
Access to health care and addressing the effects of trauma; and,
Safe residents and communities.
These political priorities are something we all agree to in this House, and I am confident that Northerners agree to these as well, as the correct choice to chart for our government. But these priorities are not precise actions for our government to take. Rather, they represent the ideal outcomes of the work we set out to accomplish for the next three years. The precise measurable actions that will be taken are in the mandate a document produced by the Premier and Cabinet. At least it was supposed to be.
Instead, the mandate further refines the priorities by adding additional aspirational goals as bulleted lists nested under each priority. Oh, and, Mr. Speaker, the mandate also splits the third priority in half into access to health care and addressing the effects of trauma. So now we're up to five priorities. Mr. Speaker, we're getting closer to some real commitments. But you won't find them in the mandate. No, instead, you have to look at the fouryear business plans, documents that will be tabled later today. These have been created by the departments to meet the priorities in the mandate, priorities based on the priorities of the Assembly. The business plans are significantly better than the mandate as they offer clear and tangible outcomes that the government intends to put in place through its efforts over the life of the 20th Assembly. The public and Regular Members can use these to measure the effectiveness of Cabinet and hold us all to account for the promises we have made. But there's still something missing, Mr. Speaker.
These plans lack cohesion towards a shared vision for the territory. They are the best efforts produced by a single ministry in a vast government enterprise of thousands of workers. I'm told behind closed doors I will have to wait for mandate letters to be issued before I truly get to see the full picture of how this government will eventually work together. But I am tired of waiting. It seems that there is also another there's always another process around the corner, another step that must be taken before we can get to governing this territory.
I want to empower our Cabinet to lead, but there's too much hesitancy to seize the initiative especially when the answer is always another process, another procedure, another plan. It feels as if we're in a cycle of perpetual planning instead of taking any kind of action.
Mr. Speaker, the Chamber of Mines in Nunavut have been loud in sounding the alarm bell for the future of our economy with their Eyes Wide Open report. The key message of this report is, quote, "at the most basic level, there appears to be no clear unified vision for the territory. The consequence is a lack of urgency that might have otherwise resulted in investments to revitalize the resource sector or that gave way to a thorough exploration into whatever is to be the alternative."
This report has shocking predictions that include the NWT losing more than a thousand residents as a direct result of the diminished resource sector with Yellowknife experiencing as much as 70 percent of those losses. This, of course, means the GNWT stands to lose over $100 million in revenue in a scenario where the resource sector disappears further exacerbating our strained financial resources. This commentary is important for us to consider because it's critical of something I raised earlier the lack of a cohesive vision from the government as a whole.
This budget suffers from the same problem of divided government as the business plans. Each department followed their marching orders from the Financial Management Board to deliver cuts to meet the fiscal strategy while realigning spending towards the mandate priorities in isolation of one another. Well, what we have here today is a financial Frankenstein's monster, collated interdepartmental budgets brought together by the Minister of Finance, with a first to tell you that she does not make the budget but plays little more than a coordinating role. If we need proof of a lack of vision and cohesive agenda, look no further than the $10 million spending cap on forced growth and new initiatives that this government committed to in its fiscal strategy. This budget proposes to exceed it by $39.7 million. The good news is this is not an austerity budget. The bad news is it's not an anything budget. It does not propose anything transformative, nor does it promise deep cuts and job losses. It fails to reduce spending in a significant way that will restore balance as per the fiscal strategy, and it fails to significantly invest in this Assembly's priorities and, importantly, our communities.
The municipal funding gap remains unresolved with local governments underfunded to the tune of $52 million. The small community employment support program and capital access program are both being gutted to save the GNWT $2.5 million at the expense of much needed investment in small Indigenous communities across the NWT. But perhaps most alarming are the proposed cuts to Housing NWT. The department is reducing its budget by 10 percent or nearly $13 million. Some of these reductions are sunsetting federal dollars. Others are driven by FMB mandated reductions, including $583,000 cut from the rental affordability assistance funding. In practical terms, though there will be 226 units that NWT Housing plans to build in the 20th Assembly, none of them are new. They are existing commitments that represent no net increase to housing stock in the NWT. Using this example, we see a department whose core mandate is essential to realize the top priority of the 20th Assembly prevented from doing so because cuts were mandated by process, and everybody had to chip in.
The thinking behind this budget did not start from a place of how do we deliver on housing priorities and make necessary cuts to achieve that. And therein lies the problem. We need leadership from the centre, and that means consensusbased decisionmaking needs to change.
I want to be clear that I do not I do believe we have Ministers who get it and want to break down silos and get results to make an impact. What we lack is the courage to break free of the systems within our institutions that prevent that from happening. If this Assembly is to succeed, this Cabinet needs to embrace a radical departure from the status quo if we are to see different results. I will acknowledge that the Premier alluded to this in his speech yesterday when presenting the mandate, and the finance Minister today spoke about being creative, imaginative, and taking more risks.
Mr. Speaker, talk is cheap, and Northerners are expecting action. This budget does not deliver on change. It doesn't even try.
Mr. Speaker, most important to me and many Northerners and I think all Northerners is our health care system. Of all responsibilities of this government and all governments in Canada, this is the most important because it is struggling not only in the services it provides to our residents but as a matter of financial sustainability. The Auditor General has taken the uncommon approach to draw the attention of the public to ongoing questions of health care spending because, quite frankly, it is destabilizing the very system of our government's financial resources. This budget proposes health and social services spending of $644 million, a 6 percent increase from last year. This is not a case of underinvestment. It is a case of good value for money and ensuring these dollars are improving patient outcomes and recruiting and retaining new clinicians, doctors, nurses, and allied health professionals. Our results on both fronts have been poor for many years, and spending more is not resulting in better care. We must get health care spending under control and make it both efficient and effective. And just as well because we need to get health care management under control.
Health care professionals I've spoken to have warned me that they have true belief that the present state of a health care system and the daytoday functioning at Stanton Hospital are placing the public at risk, and they fear that something serious and irreversible will happen soon. There is a staffing crisis at the hospital and throughout the health care system. Nurses on the frontline often work short. It is even alleged that they are required to take unsafe patient assignments that are against internal policies and against Canadian standards of practice. Given the grave situation on the frontline, it should come as no surprise that the health authorities have made great use of private health agencies. Last year alone, NTHSSA spent $4.4 million on private health agency nurses, the equivalent of 31 registered nurse positions. A longterm reliance on agency nurses will cripple the budget and overall health care system. If agency nurses are going to be used in a great number, I foresee a huge exodus of local nurses and locum nurses. This will reduce services available to Northerners and raise costs ever higher for the provision of basic health care in our communities.
Finding a solution will require significant investment and time. We could create an environment that would attract health care talent and be one of the premiere employment facilities nationally, just like it used to be only ten years ago. But if we make this a priority and bring the management of health care dollars under closer scrutiny, we must phase out the use of private agency nurses by the end of 2026 as many other jurisdictions in Canada are currently doing.
Mr. Speaker, it is important to point out where I think this budget gets it right. And perhaps my opinion is solely colored by the priorities of my Range Lake riding but, nonetheless, they are new and promising initiatives being proposed.
I commend the Premier for making public safety and community policing a top priority of his ministry of Justice. There is a welcomed and much needed investment of $1.8 million on crime reduction resources, including nine new RCMP members and a dedicated organized crime unit in Gdivision. Likewise, the Department of Justice promises an ambitious and novel legislative agenda with the Trespass Act, Civil Forfeiture Act, and Safer Communities and Neighbourhoods Act as clear examples of tools that will assist in enhancing community policing in Yellowknife and all our communities.
The Department of Infrastructure has a good handle on its many capital projects with clear and often costed timelines indicated in its business plan. There is planning in place for the electrification of highways, implementation of electric vehicles, or EVs, and the expansion of the Taltson hydroelectric dam necessary investments in clean energy that cannot come soon enough.
Likewise, Industry, Tourism and Investment has the Sisyphean ordeal of reviving a flagging economy. The much delayed and deflated Mineral Resources Act implementation remains a concern, but I am confident that the Minister's well aware of what needs to be done and is bringing forward spending to get it done in this budget. I wish there was more support for the minerals industry, particularly an increase to the mining incentive policy, funding that results in five times the amount of funding invested in local NWT communities. There is low hanging fruit in many of the programs that are successes that we should be investing in a time of economic contraction.
Mr. Speaker, as it stands, this is not a budget that I can support without significant change. While I acknowledge it's not my place to make the budget, it is my place to recommend changes that support the needs of Range Lake, Yellowknife, and for all Northerners. I simply do not believe there's enough imagination and ambition to move the government forward towards growth and change in the years ahead. We must get this right from the start. We cannot afford to start on the wrong foot and risk the progress that Northerners expect from us and elected us to deliver on their behalf. I made a promise not to let them down, and it is promise I intend to keep. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Could the ITI Minister tell me what work is currently planned in the City of Yellowknife to increase access to our waterfronts? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member from Great Slave. ITI.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, first I want to start off by saying let's make a splash has to be one of my favorite sentences so far this year in this House. So thank you to the Member for reading her Youth Parliamentarian Member's statement.
So currently in the City of Yellowknife, Mr. Speaker, the ITI is working collaboratively with ECE on the Robertson Drive Dock. The project is currently in the design and planning phase, and the design and planning phase will take place in 2024 with the construction expecting to commence in the summer of 2025. The total budget for this project is $3 million. And any future harbour development will be pursued in close collaboration, of course, with Yellowknives Dene First Nation along with the City of Yellowknife being involved in community engagement as well.
In addition to that, Mr. Speaker, as our waterways are federally regulated, there's also the Department of Fisheries and Oceans small craft harbours unit, who I know is doing their own feasibility study regarding potential development of a small craft harbour dock as well. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you to the Minister for that. Recognizing, of course, that our water levels are quite low this year, hoping, crossing all fingers and appendages that it goes back up, can the Minister speak to any desire that her department has to work with the City of Yellowknife and YKDFN to increase further recreational opportunities along the shores of our beautiful lake? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you for the question. We definitely see the importance of having places for Northerners to go and recreate and the direct linkages of that to mental health and being out on the land.
Yellowknife has access to Fred Henne Park. That is maintained by ITI. There's also a host of parks and wayside parks, campgrounds, along the Ingraham Trail that all Northerners also have access to. I think it's important that, you know, ITI or to state sorry, that ITI provides funding programs for the City of Yellowknife to expand its current visitor services that are described in the MOU that the City of Yellowknife currently holds with the Yellowknives Dene First Nation through their joint economic development strategy. And ITI also has a host of funding mechanisms where, because a lot of our waterfront properties are either privately owned or are in withdrawal, what we do is we fund different business ventures to hopefully encourage some spinoffs for residents to be able to do business on the water, do business along the shores. And I look forward to supporting more opportunities like that for Northerners. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Minister for that. However, you know, some of the places that she spoke of, while are a favorite of many Yellowknifers Fred Henne, Ingraham Trail we have many residents in Great Slave who do not have access to vehicles, who do not have access to, you know, possibly getting out to those locales on a tiny budget that they might have. So can the Minister speak or commit to speak to the City of Yellowknife to look at properties that they might hold and some developments that might be possible in the future for entrepreneurs working in conjunction collaboratively or stronger together, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Absolutely, I'm always game to work with any partners. ITI currently also supports the city's tourism strategy, the Yellowknife visitors centre, and the Yellowknife Wayfinding signage, for existing recreational opportunities. I think this is also a great time to let people know about the City of Yellowknife's new buses. And also the City of Yellowknife has an access for all program. So if somebody can't afford is a low income family, can't afford buses, there is an access for all pass that gives people access to buses and also facilities in Yellowknife. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of ITI. Final supplementary. Member from Great Slave.
I'm good. Thank you.
Oral questions. Member from Frame Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I spoke earlier about the CYC program. This question is for the Minister of ECE or Health and Social Services.
Mr. Speaker, I have constituents who are being told their children no longer have access to counsellors in the schools. The departments have said that reductions will be replaced by prevention and early intervention. It's difficult for me to see how this will occur without counsellors present. So can the Ministers help me correct the dots. What does this mean? What does it mean to prevent an prevention and early intervention mean without counsellors in the schools? Thank you
Thank you, Member from Frame Lake. I am going to take a guess, and I'm going to ask the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my answers on this one might be a little bit long, but I'm going to try and keep them short.
So there was a review done, and it was found that not all schools have the same amount of access. Because it was really hard to fill these positions across the territory. It was also found that some community schools were looking for something different than a clinician, a clinically trained master’s degree counsellor. Some communities wanted to have Indigenous counsellors in their school. So a program was devised that allowed people to have a lot more autonomy in their classrooms and in their schools for the mental health needs that were required for students in that community and in that school system.
So what does it mean to have prevention? It means that we need to look at ways to reach more students than just the ones who are able to get in front of a clinician or with a counsellor, that our schools have a lot of mental health needs. Right now, there's a tremendous amount of depression and anxiety, and how can we go upstream and as a school body address the needs of our students more globally. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Minister for that answer. So it sounds like there was some problems specifically in some communities. But did these specific problems really necessitate a wholesale dismantling of a program that in many schools was working? I'm hearing from constituents that they're disappointed their children no longer have access to counsellors. So did we really need to dismantle the whole program or just solve one problem?
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I think with this case here, it's important to let the Member know, and let all parents know, that students still have access to clinicians in schools. In addition, I've had multiple conversations about this with my colleague from Health and Social Services. If a student needs to access a counsellor in their school and doesn't have the ability to travel to primary care to access a counsellor, that they can actually speak to the school. The student can even do that to maintain privacy. And the counsellor can come into the school. It's not a matter of the student having to always leave the school.
In addition to that, if the school education body or the school itself wants to use their 55 percent of the funding in order to hire an additional clinical counsellor, they're able to use that funding to do that. They just need to make sure that they're also going upstream and providing those preventative care support services so that more students have access to mental health. Because I think it's about changing the stigma. It is about having very open conversations and everybody learning what it means to take care of ourselves as a whole human. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Minister for that answer. That is encouraging and, in fact, more encouraging than what I've heard when I originally emailed the departments.
So I still have a constituent who has concerns about continuity of care. Their child appears to be losing access to a counsellor. How are the departments coordinating to ensure this continuity of care? It sounds like there may be counsellors in the schools. So how are the departments coordinating this and ensuring that they're engaging with parents who are concerned about this, their children losing access. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I really appreciate this question because I think it's important for everybody to hear. If something goes to an MLA and comes to me and then from me, it goes to a deputy minister and down the chain and then makes its way to the school board and then to the school, I really encourage people to start by having these conversations with the school about what their child needs. If they're not getting a response from the school, all of our schools have education bodies with elected officials that are there to serve our residents as well. If an education body is not doing its job, I encourage people to come to me and let's see what we can do together. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. Final supplementary.
Oral questions. Member from Mackenzie Delta.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for Minister of ECE. We have a number of seniors who take advantage of the seniors’ heating fuel program. Although they are grateful for the assistance from the department, it is brought to my attention that they are paying three times the amount that is allocated to them over their fixed income just to make it through the month.
Will the Minister and her department look at recalculating the subsidy program so that it meets the needs of our seniors across the Northwest Territories? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member from Mackenzie Delta. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the seniors’ home heating subsidy is not intended to cover a hundred percent of someone's home heating costs. The goal of the program is to cover up to 80 percent of someone's home heating costs. That being said, if there are seniors that are spending 75 percent of their fixed income on home heating fuel, I would question if they're on the right program. In addition to the seniors’ home heating subsidy, there's also income assistance. If people aren't on both at the same time, so I question if somebody should be in a different program and would encourage them to reach out to their client navigator. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. With the high cost of living and the everincreasing cost of heating fuel, will the Minister and her department look at increasing the amount of fuel that is allocated to the seniors of the Northwest Territories, especially in the colder months? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there's been routine reviews of this program over the years, and it's one that the department keeps a close eye on knowing how important it is to seniors across the territory. In addition, in the last two years there have been one time topups acknowledging the additional cost of fuel across the territory and how that has an impact to seniors. And so ECE's been able to by kind of taking dollars from other programs, put them into this program to be able to serve seniors as best as possible. That being said, Mr. Speaker, I will also continue to work to attempt to secure more permanent funds for the program, and the House has my commitment on that. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you to the Minister for that commitment.
Can the Minister look at reviewing the policies and procedures related to the program in question and involve the recipients of this program to meet their needs and not that of the government? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I said, this program was reviewed last year. It's one that the department continues to closely monitor. Because our goal is to ensure that seniors’ home heating fuel is covered to, like I said, 80 percent. And so it's one that we keep a close eye on because we know that the cost of fuel fluctuates, and so we will continue to do that because we know it's an important program for seniors across the territory. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. Oral questions. Member from Inuvik Boot Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'll give the Minister of ECE a break. We'll go to the Minister of housing. In my statement, I did mention the longterm care facility that's been on the books in Inuvik for quite some time, since 2015, so around nine years. So I'd like to ask my colleague from Inuvik, and the Honourable Minister of Health and Social Services, what the current plan is for the longterm facility in Inuvik? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member from Inuvik Boot Lake. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment Health and Social Services. Try and give you a promotion there today or demotion, whatever. Back to you, Health and Social Services. There we go.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'll keep this one. And thank you to the Member. I think this project has been discussed in our community for, as he mentioned, way back from 2015. And I know in 2020, there was a reevaluation of longterm care beds needs, and one of the impact that happened was that we as a government wanted to put more investment into seniors aging in place with dignity. So that means supporting seniors in their homes as long as they can and not and moving away from these centralized areas where we would end up having to send them. So what the current plan is right now is we just I think the geotechnical analysis has just been complete. And so now they are, hopefully for the fall, they'll be going out to RFP for schematic design phase. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you, Minister. That is excellent news. It's a little overdue, but certainly I'm happy to hear that work is being done on it.
Given the impact in our community, and obviously the jobs that this would create as well, both longterm positions and shortterm positions in the construction, has the department considered working with the Indigenous governments as proposed or similar to as proposed in 2018? I know that's a few years ago, but are they looking at working with Indigenous governments on this project, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I know that the plan where the plan was before. And I know the Member was very involved in that plan. And I agree that the facility itself, you know, with what he's saying, with the RFP going out, you know, I would encourage if there when the RFP goes out, or encourage that if Indigenous governments are, you know, wanting to look into this area, you know, those are discussions that, you know, we can have. But at this point I guess the RFP will go out for the schematic design and, you know, later to come back with a plan to build, so. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you, again, for that answer. One of the things in the proposal that was proposed was working with an existing participant in the industry, whether that be Avens for example or different industry that do that work. One of the abilities of having an Indigenous government run the organization would be to allow them to then look at contracting that out with a sunset clause to eventually train people, work with Aurora College, and eventually have local people trained to do that work at first with a contractor and, again, have a sunset clause 4, 8, 12 years.
Has the department considered working with existing contractors, such as Avens, or working with other, I guess, industry professionals to come in and do that work?
