Thank you. And I hear the Member. And, you know, and this is why I've said I've I've even raised it with my own department to make sure that we're committing to reviewing and taking feedback. And, you know, and if we're going to look as a government as to what we're going to use, that doesn't just fall on my department. And, you know, that's the thing is I don't want to be using something that's different than what housing is using, than what income support is using, and all of our programs that we provide services. And so if there's that's a bigger discussion than this and so at this time, you know, I I hear what the Member's saying but that is a bigger discussion that you know, that we decide, like, where and what we're going to use. And I think those discussions are already starting to happen. So thank you.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Inuvik Boot Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. And, again, I apologize. I wasn't supposed to take this long. But, yeah, listen, our country is ran on the fact that if you make more, you pay more, and that's how our country's run, and I don't have an issue with that at all. Look at our tax brackets, and you can see that, Mr. Chair. But, again, I my only comment and I don't expect an answer is that I don't know why we have to be across the board with these things. We can look at individual programs and income testing differently as far as I'm concerned. But thank you.
Okay, thank you. Is there any further questions from Members before I continue on? I don't see any hands up, thank you.
There are additional information on item pages 217 to 222. Are there any questions? Thank you. Again, I'll read out I didn't hear, was there a question?
There are additional information items on pages 217 to 222 in your booklet. Is there any questions?
Don't see any questions sorry. Mr. Premier.
Thanks, and maybe I missed it. Did we call the vote for the supplementary health benefits? Because I recall we called it and then there was about three more people who spoke afterwards. So I'm not sure if it was official, or. Thanks.
We're just going to continue the next page here. We'll continue on. Thank you. There are, again on your booklets, page 217 to 222, are there any questions? Thank you. Members, please return now to the department summary found on page 185 with information items on pages 186 to 194. Are there any questions? Okay.
We started at 4:46. We'll just take a we'll just take a supper break now. We'll take a hang on a second.
Thank ou. I'll have to back up here from what I'm told. Anyway, I'll continue on here on pages no further questions. We had said that health and social services, supplementary health and benefit, operations expenditure summary, 20242025 Main Estimates $35,321,000. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you. There are additional items on page 217, 222. Committee, thank you. Are there any questions on pages 217, 222?
Don't see none, moving on. Thank you, Members. Please return now to the department summary found on pages 185 with information items on page 186 to 194. Are there any questions? Pages 185 with informational items on page 186 to 194.
I don't see no further questions. Seeing no further questions, committee sorry, I'll go to the Member from Frame Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll try to wave a blue page or a white page or something to gain your attention.
Yeah, on this one I wanted to follow up on a line of questioning I brought to the justice Minister when he was before us, and it was just related to programming we have in place related to addictions, social programming, things like that related to the drug and gang problem that we have. The question that I was putting to him was, you know, whether policing is the best option for this, and I would purport that it is a part of it and fully open to that. But the question for the health Minister is, I guess, is do we feel that we have the appropriate level of supports in place for fully addressing these issues, those being addictions, those being mental health, in her section of the budget to make some progress on these issues? It's a pretty general question. I'm just interested to hear from the Minister on the level of attention that's been paid to that.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm not sure where in the budget and if it's just the overall question on the entire budget, then I mean the budget that I have, I know that we have a business plan. We will be working within that to come up with, you know to, you know we're getting we've got the mandate now. You know, the mandate letters will come to the Ministers. We'll be looking into with our departments to look at where and how we move the business plan and the priorities of this government along. As to what you know, what those estimates might be, this budget here is you know, it's got some of the stuff that we have in there that's going to move things along. But I guess what I can say is, Mr. Chair, that there are many issues in the Northwest Territories. I mean, there's many issues that are plaguing our country nationally that, you know, that we all want to try and stress to fix. How we get there, I mean, we have dedicated staff that are you know, we have a Cabinet who's willing to work in collaboration with Indigenous governments to access funds and work together to try and provide the best programs and services that we can to the residents of the Northwest Territories. I've heard all my colleagues, you know, and their issues in their communities and their concerns, how you know, and I guess that's we'll do you know, we'll strive to be able to achieve the things that we need to do in our business plan and within our priorities in this government and if there are funds, you know, that's the that's the area that we work together to try and ensure that, you know, this is where a lot of the things that people are concerned about is how are we going to move forward with these priorities and, you know, we have to look at ways that we're going to generate money, we have to look at ways that we're going to work with Indigenous partners to leverage money from the feds, we have to look at the federal budget to leverage those dollars for the territories. And those don't all happen in the first six months of a government. And it's ongoing. And I look forward to continue to work with my colleagues on this side of the House and as well as my Cabinet colleagues and the leadership, and Indigenous leadership in these territories to make sure that our priorities are moving forward. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Frame Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yeah, and I do I do recognize that was a very general and high level question, but I guess the point I was getting at is that we do seem to have quite a focused plan for dealing with crime on the policing side and was just kind of hoping to hear from the Minister what we're doing on the social side. And a lot of that falls under her department. And to the point I mean, I was asked the question myself the other day and had a difficult time kind of coming up with an answer like are we doing enough? I think if we look outside and look to what Members are saying is going on in their communities and I look to the streets of my community, the answer is no. And I think that we need to, you know, keep up the pressure and continue to look at ways that we can address some of these issues. But I'll leave that as a comment, Mr. Chair. And that's it for me for now. Thanks.
Thank you. Any other Members that want to speak to this line item on page 186 to 194? Okay, I'll continue on. Seeing no further questions oh, sorry. Member from Dehcho.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am looking at we could bring up, like in my riding, there's longterm and continuing care services. There's lots of my constituents or the older people that have to move to Yellowknife, Hay River, Fort Simpson, or even in some cases, to Behchoko. It's tough on them. So I wanted to look at possibly looking at having longterm care in one of my communities. Because the riding is I know Dehcho is a big place but the riding the Dehcho is, again Fort Providence, Kakisa, Hay River Reserve, and Enterprise. And there are people that, you know, want to stay home. They want to stay home because of the language, because of the food, the culture, the participating. And so eventually looking at having a longterm care facility in my in one of my communities. One of the communities that I represent would be ideally I know we have the closest one is Hay River but, again, people want to stay home. I have people in Yellowknife we have people in Yellowknife and Hay River right now and if they could, they would rather be at home. And right now I have a seniors home there that's not it's not a longterm care facility. It's a seniors home where they house seniors anywheres from 50 years and older. There's 13 units there. But it's not a longterm care facility. So that's what I wanted to bring up is just having a longterm care place in my community, even in Fort Providence where people can be can stay home. Thank you.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, right now we have longterm care facilities. And I know that the Member is aware of the one in Hay River. We have Yellowknife. We have new beds opening up in Yellowknife. We have a longterm care in the Beaufort Delta region, Fort Smith, and the Dehcho, the Sahtu. Currently, there are expansions going on into some of those facilities. And I hear the Member that, you know, the people want to stay home. I know I hear it that, you know, closer to home, closer to the language, closer to their loved ones, closer to but, you know, at this time, like, the capacity to be able to care for seniors in some of the communities, you know, we try to when we look at housing, for instance, if we were to you know, in our small communities, you know, we have issues with trying to house nurses already. We have issues with trying to house teachers in those communities. We have you know, we have if we were to open a longterm care in every one of our small communities, I mean we do a needs assessment based on the territory and where the needs are. People can, you know, access those services to be on an application. And the needs right now, you know, are greater than what we have in our facilities and so that's why there's expansions in some of the regional areas where we have the staff that could take care of those clients. What we are doing is we're trying to expand into the small communities in home support and home care in the evenings and on weekends, you know, so that way seniors can stay at home longer, longer than they could before when we only had minimal longterm care home care and home support in the communities that we're basically running through Monday to Friday work hours. So thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. I'll go to the Member from the Dehcho.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I really elders in the community have talked to me, and I've been I went to visit some elders when I was campaigning and going to visit them when I go back to Providence to stay, and they talked about having nobody to call after hours when if they don't have family members. So they call the health centre, and the nurse can't leave the building. She cannot leave the well, the nurses are not allowed to leave the building. So they can't even go and assist an elder that fell down. And they have nobody else to call so they call the RCMP. And the RCMP too, they're inundated with issues that they're dealing with in the community. But because there's nobody else to help the elder, they have to they have to call the RCMP. They would they were thinking about like, even asking to have some kind of a way where they can have some help, like a number where they could call at night if anything happens to them. That will be another thing. I'm not sure how that could be worked into one of these home care programs or something like that, because if there's a person that doesn't have any family and wants to stay home and is mobile and everything but got hurt or something at night, without having to call the RCMP there has to be something in place for individuals such as the person well, for elders that want to stay home, age in place. So they asked me to bring that up. Is there something that can be done to help them? Thank you.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I don't I don't have the level of detail of what the services are being provided in all of the Dehcho communities, but we can look at what services aren't provided right now and get back to the Member. And if there are concerns or, you know, as we're rolling out more and more communities that have the needs and if there is a needs assessment that needs to be done in those communities, you know, I like I said, I don't have that kind of level of detail here. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from the Dehcho.
Thank you. That's all I have for now, Mr. Chair. Thank you.
Thank you. Is there any further questions from Members? Okay. Before we the Member I have is from Monfwi but before we go to her, let's take a 30minute break unless your question? You're going to use the full ten minutes? Okay, the food's there. We'll take a 30minute break.
What do you want to do, you want to continue? Minister?
I am just wondering where we are in the budget. Like we've approved all and not approved some sections. Are we back at the front? Is it general comments on the overall budget? Departmental overview, is it we're bouncing all over the place, so.
We're coming to the tail end of this document here. And the food is ready. We'll have a quick supper and we'll come right back and conclude this. We'll stop there. 30 minutes. Thank you.
SHORT RECESS
Thank you. We just had a short supper break. And I hope the translators had a chance to have something to eat as well. And we're good to go. Okay, we're going to continue on.
Just so it's clear, we're still on pages 186 to 194 and taking questions. I had Monfwi on here, but I think she's not back yet. But is there any other Members that have questions on pages 186 to 194 to the Minister?
Okay, Monfwi MLA Member is not here. I'll just continue on. I see no further questions from Members.
Committee, I will now call the departmental summary. Health and Social Services, operations expenditures, total department, 20242025 Main Estimates $644,228,000. Does the committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Inuvik Boot Lake.
Mr. Chair, I move that this committee defer the further consideration of the main estimates for the Department of Health and Social Services at this time. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. The motion is in order. To the motion.
Question.
Question has been called. All those in favour? All those opposed? The motion is carried. Consideration of the Department of Health and Social Services, operations expenditures, 20242025 Main Estimates, total department, is deferred.
---Carried
Thank you, Minister, and thank you to the witnesses for appearing before us. Sergeantatarms, please escort the witnesses from the Chamber.
Thank you, we'll continue on. Order. Anyways, we'll continue.
Committee, we have agreed to consider Tabled Document 9320(1), 20242025 Main Estimates. We will now consider the Department of Education, Culture and Employment.
Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, please proceed with our opening remarks.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am pleased to present the 20242025 Main Estimates for the Department of Education, Culture and Employment. Overall, the department's estimates propose a decrease of $9.858 million or 2.6 percent over the 20232024 Main Estimates. These estimates support the mandate objectives for the Department of Education, Culture and Employment while continuing to meet the GNWT's fiscal objectives to prioritize responsible and strategic spending.
Highlights of these proposed estimates include:
Forced growth funding of $484,000 to support the increased demand in the senior citizens supplementary benefit and increased lease costs of the Aurora College North Slave Campus;
Initiative funding of $2.599 million to support the early learning and child care system in the NWT through funding from the Government of Canada;
Transfers of $1.228 million from the Department of Health and Social Services to support the redesign of the child and youth counselling program;
Sunsets of $4.485 million which are comprised of sunsets of onetime federal funding for Building Skills 4 Success in the NWT program and complementary funding for Minority Language Education and Second Language Instruction and funding for the Education Renewal and Innovative Initiative and Education Act Modernization Initiative;
Other adjustments of $2.993 million for budget enhancements for Technology Service Centre Chargebacks; revised cash flow of federal funding for the Aurora College Transformation initiative; and onetime federal funding for three initiatives: The North Slave Regional Training Partnership, the Implementation of the National Action Plan to End GenderBased Violence, and the Memorandum of Understanding with the Canada Council for the Arts;
An increase in the amortization budget of $313,000; and,
Reductions of $12.99 million to support fiscal sustainability. These reductions span all activities of the department and include $280,000 under corporate management, $160,000 under early learning, $8.604 million under education, $547,000 under income security, $1.509 million under labour development and standards; and, $1.890 million under languages and culture.
These estimates support the priorities of the 20th Legislative Assembly and vision of Budget 2024, by:
supporting the mandate commitment to collaborate with Indigenous governments and residents to achieve the objectives of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples by engaging with Indigenous governments through the NWT Council of Leaders Secretariat and education partners on customizations and modernizations to the NWT Education Act. Recognizing and supporting the unique educational governance circumstances of the NWT, and doing so in partnership is critical foundational work necessary to create an education system that works for NWT students and families.
growing and enhancing the northern workforce by investing in skill development and by attracting skilled workers to the NWT. Our area of focus is supporting the NWT's early childhood education workforce by offering more professional development opportunities, continuing to provide for early learning and child care scholarships and, importantly, implementing an early childhood educator certification process. This certification process is an important step in recognizing and encouraging the value of training and experience for early childhood educators who provide care and learning opportunities to our youngest residents. Moving forward, it will support the department in providing wage increases to early childhood educators for increased training and experience and help to decrease the wage gap between early childhood educators and other educators in the NWT.
working with NWT educators and education bodies to adapt to the British Columbia junior kindergarten to Grade 12 curriculum for use in NWT schools. This redesigned curriculum aims to personalize learning, making it more studentcentered, flexible, and focused on literacy and numeracy skills, with an emphasis on deep, active learning to best prepare NWT students for their future.
supporting the GNWT's Fiscal Strategy by focusing efforts on ensuring reductions would not impact the NWT's most vulnerable residents. This includes NWT residents accessing income assistance, and programming aimed at supporting the early learning and child care sector. ECE reductions will instead focus on transitioning inperson training to virtual sessions and reducing or eliminating underspent budget areas.
ECE will also focus on improving program delivery efficiency through reviews of the Northern Distance Learning Program, Inclusive Schooling Ministerial Directive, and the Territorial Support Team service.
That concludes my opening remarks, Mr. Chair. Thank you.
Thank you. Does the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment wish to bring a witness into the House?
Sergeantatarms, please escort the witness into the Chamber. Thank you. Minister, please introduce your witnesses.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, on my left I have Mr. Jamie Fulford. And on my right, I have Ms. Katherine McDonald.
Thank you. I will now open the floor for general comments on the Department of Education, Culture and Employment. Do any Members have general comments? I'm going to go to the Member from Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Overall, I definitely appreciate that the department seems to have gone through with a fine tooth comb looking for reductions and efficiencies to be found, and some of them seem to make sense. But what I am struggling to see is a clear vision for what we are trying to achieve besides saving money and being more efficient. And the message that comes out to me is that we're committing to do more with less. You know, we're shaving off here and there, we're making do, we're doing more with less, which could be possible, but my main concern is that we actually know what we're doing and we're committed to doing it better, particularly when it comes to education, labour force development, apprenticeships, skills development. You know, we've seen in the business plans in this budget that the plan over the next four years is to review the northern distance learning program, the inclusive schooling directive, the adult literacy programs, but with the goal of looking for efficiencies. And I'm wondering what is the vision that we're actually trying to achieve?
And I know that the Minister has been a strong advocate for education, particularly JK to 12 education, and equitable access to education and support services throughout her time in this building. So I wonder if she could explain what is the narrative that you want us to get out of this budget in terms of what we're hoping to accomplish in the next year with this budget, especially in terms of education, labour force development, skill development?
Thank you. For general comments, I'll go to the Minister.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. And, Mr. Chair, I appreciate the comments of the Member. And I'd say one of the crucial things or comment that the Member made that really struck me was his comments around know what we are doing and commit to doing it better and know what we're doing with our dollars. And one of the things that we really focused on when we were going through and looking at ways that we could get creative with our budgeting was looking at the dollars that we were not spending, and so that gave us the opportunity to actually kind of trim the fat off the top, if you will, to make sure that when we are spending dollars, that we know what we're spending them on at the end of the day and that we can be more purposeful with how we spend dollars within the Department of education. One of the conversations as a whole of government is how do we want to spend dollars on new initiatives. And we need dollars in order to be able to turn those into new initiatives. And so I think that's where knowing what we are doing with our dollars is really important and being very purposeful with them.
As far as the question around, you know, what would I like to be remembered by or this budget remembered by for having kind of our collective stamp on it is I think it's really important that we put systems in place that live on beyond us as politicians so that it is not a bandaid fix or a temporary fix. It only looks at a four in this case threeyear kind of mandate but is something that will continue to serve residents when you know, when we are no longer the ones in this building and a fresh and eager set of politicians come in and continue on the good working kind of foundation that we as a team are putting together. And so what I am looking at these days and I talked a lot about it today is pathways to employment, pathways to education, pathways to entrepreneurship when it comes to income assistance. But that also, in my heart, extends to education and how we are making sure that we are creating systems and support networks that also empower our youth to see themselves in those pathways to know they exist and to know that it is possible for them. And so I would say that for me, it's about being creative and making sure that we are creating accessible pathways for all residents of the territories and for them to see themselves in it. And I don't think that you need to necessarily in every turn have millions of dollars to be able to do that. I think sometimes it's looking at how we work. But absolutely, there are times where we do need an investment of dollars. And hopefully through this exercise, we'll be able to have those. Thank you.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Yellowknife North on general comments.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I don't have any more comments at this point. I certainly have questions and comments throughout but that was that's enough for the general comments. Thank you.
Thank you. We're going to continue on, Members, on general comments.
Okay, thank you. Seeing no more general comments, does the committee agree to proceed with the detail contained in the tabled documents? Committee, we will now defer the departmental summary and review of the estimates by activity summary beginning with corporate management starting on page 36 with information items on page 38. Are there any questions?
I'm going to go to the Member from Great Slave.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Very simple question. Can the Minister please tell me how many staff work in the planning, research, and evaluation part of corporate management? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I have a headquarters number of 38. And sorry, the policy planning sorry, planning, research, and evaluation is seven.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Great Slave.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Nothing further.
