Thank you, Mr. Chair. So identifying surplus land, does that mean there's no inventory prior to this business plan commitment of surplus land of ECE? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, there's certainly an inventory but as we know, there are different ideas or different dreams that we all have of how we'd like to see land in the territory used, and so ensuring that we're working collaboratively with our education body partners is paramount in this process. Thank you.
Okay, thank you. I'll go to the Member from Great Slave.
Thank you. I don't think I have anything further for this section. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Okay, thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from the Sahtu.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. My question is related to the Indigenous Services Canada. Can the Minister provide how many existing contribution agreements is in place, and if so, if that information could be provided? That'll help explain some of these numbers that we're seeing. Thank you.
Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I'm wondering if the Member can provide more information about specifically what section he's in within, and then we can speak directly to those sections. Thank you.
Okay, thank you. I'll go to the Member from the Sahtu.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. It's on page 34. There's a Partnership Initiative Agreement - North Slave Regional Training Partnership, and it makes reference to a three-year project with ISC, and I'm just wondering if there's any more of these agreements with that particular Indigenous Services Canada department. If so, if that information could be provided. Thank you.
Thank you. On this -- on that line of questioning, we're not quite there at this time, but if the Minister wants to go ahead and answer that question, thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. So within the section the Member is speaking of, the only agreement with Canada is the one for the North Slave. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Okay, thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from the Sahtu.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. My next question is I recall in the last Assembly there was quite a number of contributions made by Skills Canada for specific projects accessed by a number of Indigenous governments, and I'm just wondering if Skills Canada still exists, and if so, if there's any access to capital there from this government through different education initiatives, training initiatives? But I'm really not too sure if Skills Canada still exists; I'm just curious if the Minister has any knowledge on the existence of Skills Canada. Thank you.
Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, Skills Canada does still exist as does Skills NWT, and we make a contribution agreement to Skills NWT every year, and that's a cost shared agreement, and it is $155,000 between the GNWT and the federal government that is provided through contribution agreement to Skills NWT.
Thank you. I'll go to the Member from the Sahtu.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have got nothing further.
Okay, thank you. Is there any further questions? Okay, no further questions. Please turn to page 37.
Education, Culture and Employment, corporate management, operations expenditure summary, 2025-2026 Main Estimates, $13,295,000. Does the committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you. Moving on to early learning beginning on page 39 with information items on page 43. Are there any questions? I'm going to go to the Member from Frame Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I mean, this is certainly something we've been talking about in the House quite a bit, today, yesterday, but I thought I might be able to get into it a little bit more during budget.
So although there was an increase in the 2024-2025 Mains, clearly we're still hearing a lot of concerns from operators about the ELCC funding, the certification processes involved, the proposed wage grid. Does the Minister have confidence that they can sufficiently support this sector and, indeed, achieve their goal of growing the sector with the current funding models given these challenges? Thank you.
Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.
Thank you very much. Mr. Chair, I'm going to be very honest with you, I know the Member knows that, you know, there was asks today on the floor of the House for talks and conversations, and so without having committed to those conversations and without having had them to date, because I've been here in this House, you know, it's -- I don't think it's fair of me to fully answer that question. What I can say is that with the funding that we've been allocated by this House, and the funding that we've been allocated by the federal government and under the regulations of the agreement that we have with the federal government, we are absolutely doing our darnedest to see the growth of a sustainable sector. Our childcare sector's incredibly important in the Northwest Territories. We cannot grow a strong economic foundation, which is our priority, without it. So I am absolutely committed to making sure that we have just that. Thank you.
Thank you. I'll go to the Member from Frame Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I appreciate those comments from the Minister and obviously, you know, she's been busy with us so she can only do so much with one -- I don't know what I'm trying to say here. But there's only one Caitlin. And she's in this building right now so she can't meet so maybe we should wrap so she can go off to her meetings.
But I guess I just wanted to highlight, you know, for the Minister and her staff, you know, this area's a high priority for me. Certainly growing spaces is the big one. You know, in my riding, it's something that I heard from a lot of parents about. There's a lot of people in Yellowknife, and I'm sure outside of Yellowknife, are facing even more difficult circumstances, who just want to be able to find a space for their children. And as the Member for Great Slave pointed out yesterday, or the other day, that the Hunger Games reference was a bit of an unfortunately apt analogy there in that, you know, families are really fighting. And you know, I've been hearing stories about people signing their unborn children up for daycare just knowing how long the waitlist is. So somebody gets pregnant, and they're on the list because they know that they're going to be waiting a minimum of a year to find out. So certainly we need to be working with our operators, finding out what they need, and I personally am willing and very interested to hear from the Minister what comes out of those talks and what is needed to help grow this sector, to put them in the position where they want to grow or they want to increase the number of spaces because what they've told me is that -- you know, speaking to one operator in particular -- they were very clear with me -- we would love to double our capacity but we can't do it if we're not being given the money that we need to operate effectively. And so I just wanted to make sure that those comments made it to the floor.
I think that we've had a lot of good discussions in the House over the past couple days about this, and I think we've made it clear to staff where our priority lies on this and so I don't need to belabour the point further but did want my comments on the record. I think that's it for this section for me for now. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. Is there any further questions from Members? I'm going to go to the Member from Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. My question is just about there are active positions, so there's an increase in one position in headquarters in early learning. Can you explain what -- why that position is needed in headquarters? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, that's manager of capital planning. It came with the ELC agreement with Canada, so it's fully funded and is to help us be able to distribute the funds through our infrastructure fund that we received from the Government of Canada. And it is a term position. Thank you.
Thank you. I'll go back to the Member from Yellowknife North.
Okay, thank you for that explanation. That is helpful. That's all I have for this item. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. I'll go to the Member from the Sahtu.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm looking at the active positions page there. When I look at the Sahtu and the Deh Cho, together these two regions make up one-third of the territorial communities and we've only allowed, for the last couple of years, one position. So I'm just wondering with the amount of schools in these two regions is there any future plans to expand on the personnel or staff in those two areas? Thank you.
Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, so this section here is the early learning section so it is the staff that help support early learning and childcare, and they are not -- they're just -- the education section is farther along, so that would speak to those positions. Thank you.
Thank you. I'll go to the Member from the Sahtu.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll ask that question again. Yes, I understand this is the early learning section of the schools. Is there any plans to increase the early learning sections of these schools in these two particular regions? Thank you.
Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. So, Mr. Chair, we were certainly looking for all opportunities to support new childcare spaces within the territory. At this time I know that, for example, Norman Wells is looking at a new space, and they've been very active in conversations with the Department of Education, Culture and Employment; and in addition, Industry, Tourism and Investment is kind of all hands on deck to see how we can support that understanding how critically important these new spaces are to parents across the territory. Thank you.
Thank you. I'll go back to the Member from the Sahtu.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. In this area of the estimates we're talking about, the children, can the Minister expand on the upcoming year and the school food program that is being planned, maybe explain a little bit more information on the new fiscal year food program for the schools? Thank you.
Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.
Thanks very much, Mr. Chair. So that funding would be found in the education section because it will be delivered to the education bodies through contribution agreement. So we have received that funding now from the Government of Canada, and we are in the process of putting together each of those contribution agreements with our education bodies to ensure that those dollars flow out the door as quickly as possible. I also think it's worth noting here that there is 100 percent carryover with those dollars between this year and next year knowing that we are so close to the end of the fiscal year, so we don't want schools to feel like they need to rush out and spend all of their money in the next month and a half here and know that they have time to do that. The action plan that is driving what those contribution agreements are was drafted with education bodies, so education bodies had really the autonomy of deciding how they wanted to spend those dollars and, luckily, Canada was very flexible in how those dollars got spent within communities as well. Thank you.
Thank you. I'll go to the Member from the Sahtu.
Nothing further, Mr. Chair. I'm really glad to hear that; that's good news. Mahsi.
Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from the Deh Cho.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm looking at as well as the active positions for the Deh Cho. It says it's one half-time, part-time position. Why is it part-time and not full-time? Thank you.
Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.
