Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are also for the Minister of Finance. I am eagerly awaiting the 2023-2024 Public Service Annual Report, which is a really nerdy thing to say. Can the Minister sneak peek a preview and tell us if the exits by reason shows an increase or decrease in resignations? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member for Great Slave. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I've had a sneak peek. I can tell you that it's going to be tabled here in the House next week so certainly don't want to give too much away. But in the theme of a teaser, let's say that the number of exits by resignations is down from 523 down to 480 in 2023-2024. The number of exits down -- and generally down overall from 951 in 2022-2023 to 810 overall in 2023-2024. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That's some tentatively possibly good news. When it was last mentioned in the 2022-2023 annual report, the leadership development program was on a hiatus since July of 2020 and an expected new option was to launch this year, Mr. Speaker. So can the Minister tell me the status of this program? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There were some delays in getting this program back up and running to the caliber or quality that we were hoping for. I am pleased to say that we partnered with Aurora College and that there is now the leadership development program. It started just this month. Again, pleased to also say it is fully subscribed for level one which is currently running. Level two starts in January of 2025, and that will continue until August 2025. I don't know where that is at in terms of if it's interest level but, again, very happy to see that the first round is fully subscribed. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, a little bit of tentative good news there. Unfortunately, I was let down by the 2024 Employee Satisfaction Action Plan that was released with the 2023 survey results. It's vague. It doesn't speak deeply to tangible improvements probably because it start with "we need to build a plan." So how does the Minister wish to address employee morale based on the eight actions in that plan but also beyond them? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I want to be quite frank that building morale and changing morale and changing culture are more difficult than simply the action plan or the specific action item in any particular framework. It is really about creating cultures of change and showing the culture of change within the public service. So I do want to acknowledge that it is critical that the public service return to a place of good morale. It's been a difficult few years in the territory for a number of reasons, and that will no doubt affect people's state of well-being in the workplace as well as elsewhere.
Now that said, the implementation plan aspect of the action plan is underway. It's meant to be concrete measures whereby we can achieve some of those more aspirational goals as they might be described. And we're doing that in concert with -- with the employee advisory committee really to hopefully keep that connection flowing so that we're not just doing surveys but we're actually, even in between the different surveys, maintaining the connection to the employees who are filling out those surveys to check in as we develop the implementations which will hopefully get us to a better place with morale. Thank you.
Minister of Finance. Final supplementary. Member from Great Slave.
Yeah, I know -- thank you, Mr. Speaker -- it is a tricky one and an even trickier one is increasing Indigenous representation in the public service, Mr. Speaker. I know this side of the House is very keen on seeing how we can do a better job of that. The survey does not distinguish between Indigenous and non-Indigenous employees so I have to assume that Indigenous employees are struggling with low morale too.
So what specific actions will the Minister propose to take to ensure Indigenous employees feel valued, heard, and supported in this organization above and beyond what's contemplated in the Indigenous Recruitment and Retention Plan? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, this has the ring of a Minister's statement. There's so much that really needs to be said in this space. The territory has a population that is not reflected in the public service right now and arguably never has been, so we need to get to a place where that changes. I can only imagine that that impedes people's morale. That would make certainly sense to me if you don't feel -- see yourself reflected around you or in the services that you are receiving as a resident. So I want to reflect that first as just understanding the gravity and importance of this.
It also -- if we can get to a place of increasing meaningfully the diversity in the public service with the diversity that's present in this territory, that makes for better workplaces. It in and of itself improves culture.
So those are a lot of things without being a concrete answer, Mr. Speaker, and I'm mindful of the time given the complexity of what's being asked. We do now have online or published the reporting back in on the targeting in the Indigenous Recruitment and Retention Framework, which is really a very targeted document that's meant to change where we're at, to change who's employed, to really focus very specifically by department, by division, and by level who's employed. So I would ask folks to take a look at them. You know, it's going to take some time to turn those numbers around but we aren't going to do it if we aren't being held to account, so I want to be -- I want folks to go look at those numbers and to see where we're at and to raise those questions because that will hopefully show that we're trying to be responsive and trying to be honest with the problem that we have in front of us. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Finance. Oral questions. Member from Mackenzie Delta.
