Thank you. I'll go to the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, one of the things that has happened that has come into play right now is that the Student Financial Assistance program was also improved in the last Assembly at the same time that the income assistance review happened and the income support review. So through -- and the way that the changes happened were increases to basic grants, monthly living allowances, and that also expanded the remissible loan for all residents of the Northwest Territories, and that is a key difference here. Before it was only for students schooled in the Northwest Territories. So unless a change was going to somehow be retroactive, any future change wouldn't cover people who have repayable loans and are expected to repay them to the GNWT because they took them out separately. Thank you.
Thank you. Next, I will have the Member for Mackenzie Delta.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I'd just like to get some further clarification. We're putting our young students, young adults in a very bad situation. First of all, the education system is failing them. They have no place to go then to finish high school. It looks like they wouldn't be able to go to any upgrading for -- that's in their communities, so they'll have to move, and I think these young adults don't have -- haven't been out of their communities, and if they do find work, then they'll be clawed back by housing, so it's just a no-win situation. Is there any update on how the GNWT is ensuring that youth are not accessing income security as a first option following graduation?
Thank you. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. So, Madam Chair, if I understand correctly, the Member is asking for updates on how students access post-secondary from high school within their communities. And so one of the things that the Department of Education, Culture and Employment has is career education advisors, and those career education advisors fill a very important role within our community schools right across the territory. And so they actually work with youth on a one-on-one basis to understand what their career goals are and what it is that they would like to do and ensure that students understand what courses they should be taking for graduation, what pathways there are, so these relationships are also some of the relationships that students are taking in order to access programs like SNAP. And it's also our career education advisors that are forming relationships within the communities in the Northwest Territories to make sure that students interested in SNAP program, so that's the school's north apprenticeship program, have employers that they can form relationships with to really get some of their apprenticeship or student apprenticeship hours with. And it's incredibly important for students to know what courses they need to take, what grades they're expected to have based on what their career goals are, and so I can't stress enough how important our career education advisors are to students across the territory. Thank you.
Thank you. Member for Mackenzie Delta.
Thank you, Madam Chair. When you witness a recent graduate in the adult education system as I witnessed, I was getting refreshing in my math and a recent graduate was in the same classroom, but this individual was having problems with simple, simple math, like multiplications and dividing, and you expect that person to go into a trades with those kind of credentials? I don't think so. He wouldn't even make it out the door. And that's where he's going, to income support. So there has to be some kind of mechanism where the government, the community, the teachers, have to find some kind of mechanism to make this thing work, make this education system work so that they're not going to follow this income security and make a living out of it because the majority of these students are making a living out of it. They're staying home. They're still staying with their parents. They're 20, 30 years old. That's not a lifestyle. And probably 90 percent of these people are Indigenous. And that's what bothers me. This government is imposing -- not imposing but giving them this option of living this kind of lifestyle. And it starts with education from kindergarten to grade 12. Is that going to be looked at seriously and make promotional -- socially promoting our students a thing of the past so we can have a viable workforce in our smaller communities? It's the smaller communities that's hurting. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. I'll go to the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I cannot stress enough how important ensuring access to education is in our territory. You know, every aspect of our lives is directly related to access to education. And access to education, I can say, is incredibly important to me. We're working certainly very hard within the Department of Education, Culture and Employment to address the need to improve the education outcomes of students right across the territory. And I would be happy as well to sit down with the Member and show some of the actions that have taken place over the last, I believe, three years, and not all three years ago, but over time, over the last three years. And, really, what jump started a lot of it was the report from the Auditor General of Canada that really came up to the Northwest Territories and said you guys need to, you know -- you got some work to do. And so certainly, we embraced that report and got to work right away. And so some of that had to do with training classroom assistants. Some of it was access to training for teachers who are doing multigrade classrooms. Some of it was assessments across classrooms. There is also in the same breath changes being made to the early learning and child care sector within the Northwest Territories and also within the training expectation of people working within that sector because we know that that is what ensures that students are ready when they get to school and they're being -- they're having access to supports before they get there if they are, for example, nonverbal and needing supports in that.
The other thing that's incredibly important as part of this work that is taking place over the course of this term is changes to the Education Act. And I cannot stress enough how important that is because that is a piece of legislation that is going to be done in collaboration with Indigenous governments. And when we talk about the importance of understanding the Northwest Territories, having social legislation that is drafted in partnership, drafted in collaboration, is incredibly important, especially when we want to ensure that everyone in the territory sees themselves in the legislation that's guiding something as important as education. So that is incredibly important work that's being done.
But I hear the Member, and the Member is looking for solutions today, and I think that working together and ensuring that some of the programs that I've spoke of earlier, so whether it's the SNAP program or it is the wage subsidy or working with -- within the community, for example, with modular learning, for example, like Fort Smith and the success they've seen through their Phoenix program. They had 18 graduates in that program in a community the size of Fort Smith last year. And I cannot speak highly enough of the program and being able to accept that we need to meet students where they're at and support them to grow from there and support them to successfully complete their education from there. So there are solutions that -- and frameworks and solutions that the department of education puts together, and it really does take all levels of government and organizations working together to see the success of students across the territory. And I'll stop there, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Member for Mackenzie Delta.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I try to listen but it's just being repetitive and, you know, going in circles. But the starts to education she stated that there has been some work done in regards to education the last three years, but I haven't seen any changes in the last ten years. And one of my concerns is socially promoting our children. I know there's some students -- I mean some parents who have concerns, and they -- they're more -- they're willingly -- they keep their children behind or worst comes to worst, they send them to another jurisdiction like the Yukon where they can get a better education or maybe one of the bigger regional centres. But our smaller communities are just not benefitting from this education system. I just -- hopefully this department can maybe take their staff on the road and, you know, get some feedback from the communities because this is really hurting the communities and the individuals. So thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. And, Madam Chair, as always I appreciate the words of the Member, and they're words that I definitely take to heart. There is certainly -- while there's work being done, there's certainly more work to do, and there are complex needs across the territory and certainly working with my colleague over at the Department of Health and Social Services to address some of those needs, especially when it comes to therapeutic care and ensuring accessibility of education in the North. Thank you.
Thank you. Next, I have Member for the Sahtu.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I thank the Minister there for mentioning bridging the programs to the people. And I think that's recognizing a gap and here's a bridge to challenge that gap. I see all these unique programs, and I look at what's your Beaufort Delta or Deh Cho or Sahtu regional trades strategy. We can no longer deny that we really need trades. But how we're going to get there, let's think about going above and beyond the budget. Looking at the budget, it's an operational one. Yes, we have these career individuals, but if we're really not doing enough on the promotional side recognizing our weaknesses in trades and the high demand in trades, we're not going to be any further ahead if we deny this budget a regional strategy. So we not only have an operational budget, but we do have a marketing strategy to address the trades gap. And successive planning is in there. You know, we may not have an industry in the Sahtu like we used to 10, 15 years ago, but the Skills 4 Success forecast recognizes the demand for retirement planning and the succession that goes along with the 375 workers we have there.
Now, in addition to that, we have other opportunities to encourage our young people that are probably going to end up saying, well, I don't really want to move; I'd rather stay home. Okay, well, let's see how we can fix that.
So this budget's going to be approved. Is the department developing a strategy for each region so that we can address the market demands with the programs that we have here? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I believe we have about 320-some apprentices in the Northwest Territories right now, 49 percent of which are Indigenous, and so I'm very happy but, of course, I'm like the Member and certainly want to see more success in that area. And I agree with the Member that marketing strategy and promotion is crucial to that. That is one of the top things that I heard from students when I was talking to them about the SNAP program, both ones that are in it and ones that are not in it, was they want to be able to see more advertising, more information, more ways of getting involved and making sure that their friends have access to that information. So I certainly see that as a critical part of this work forward and one that needs to be done so that I can achieve my business plan commitments which are to increase apprentices and increase SNAP students across the Northwest Territories. Thank you.
Members, the next section is income security, so we're not there yet. You can ask the question -- I'll go back to Member for the Sahtu.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll just stop there and reserve additional questions there. But I'm happy with the responses that I've received so far from the Minister on preparations after budget season. Mahsi.
Thank you. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Yeah, no, we are certainly in income security, and then next up is labour development standards. I'm happy to answer any questions.
Okay, now no further questions. We'll go to page -- turn to page 50. Education, Culture and Employment, income security, operations expenditure summary, 2025-2026 Main Estimates, $67,806,000. Does the committee agree -- sorry, it's $67,608,000. Does the committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you. Moving on to labour development and standards on page 53 with information items on page 57. Are there any questions? Member for Great Slave.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Can you please clarify if this is where I can ask questions about the NWT nomination program? Thank you.
Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Yes.
Thank you. Member for Great Slave.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm going to be pretty basic today. I have more things to say about this throughout the coming weeks. But can the Minister please explain how we plan to meet our targets in the business plan with the new limits placed upon us by the federal government? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. So, Madam Chair, certainly the business plans were developed specific to the nominee program with the previous allocations in mind, not expecting -- I don't think anybody across the country expected their allocations to be cut in half, and so we will certainly have to pivot to ensure that we remain in line with the guidelines afforded to us by the federal government.
Thank you. Member for Great Slave.
Thank you, Madam Chair. And, yeah, specifically, I'm interested in the action under access to health care, continue to promote this program as a tool to attract internationally trained health and social service professionals to the NWT.
Madam Chair, will the Minister have anything to pivot to that she is aware of to help us seek out those health professionals in any federal discussions she's had so far? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. I'll go to the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. So, Madam Chair, our conversations with the federal government have largely been at increasing numbers across the board. Certainly, as other jurisdictions, we have not seen success in that one. One of the things that we are going to do this year, once we do our allocations for 2025 in preparation for 2026, we are going to work with stakeholders to develop a plan of if our nominee program looks the same as it does this year with 150 allocations, then we want to ensure that we're being as strategic as possible, and so one of the pieces of work we need to do is to review our strategy with stakeholders to figure out, okay, what do we do if we are yet again in a position where we only have 150 allocations because we know that there's far more demand, and we want to ensure that benefit retention for the Northwest Territories is certainly paramount in this conversation along with ensuring that we are serving all Northerners that live here. Thank you.
Thank you. Member for Great Slave.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm good.
Thank you. Next, I have Member for Range Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker -- Madam Chair. Oh, that's not like me. Long night.
I also have questions about the NTNP program. So there's 60 applications that have been held over from the previous fiscal year, and -- or sorry, sorry, from the last intake. Not fiscal, but the last intake. And that leaves 90 new applications. Why -- given the kind of very serious situation we're in where the quota's been cut in half, there's lots of people with uncertainty, why are we not basing the intake on, you know, true equity where there's a level playing field for everyone and then when they evaluate the applications, they base urgency into it? Because we're already doing that, I guess. With the 90 applications, we are basing urgency of permits -- well permits -- of expiring work permits. That's what's getting the most attention after the random draw. But now we have these kind of 60 things that have -- 60 applications that have been grandfathered in because they weren't seen last year. This is not my bright idea. This is a concern that's coming forward from the community, both the worker community who missed out on the window and also businesses as well who would have been more diligent in applying if they'd known they got their applications in, it would have been held over for next year. So can the Minister explain why this decision was made? Thank you.
Thank you. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you so much, Madam Chair. So, Madam Chair, those 60 applications came in prior to the pause last year. So that was a commitment that was made last year before we paused the program in July. And so, really, the decision to honour that commitment was made to be fair to the people that the commitment was made to and then beyond that, we used the 90 -- the 90 allocations that we had left to ensure that we were focusing on urgency and retention. Thank you.
Thank you. Member for Range Lake.
Thank you for the clarification. Were those commitments made -- how were those commitments made? Was it, like, on an individual basis for each person who applied from the departmental level, or was it a political commitment? If the Minister can jog my memory. I'm not sure if it was made in the House, but just what level of commitment was this? Thank you.
Thank you. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you, Madam Chair. It was not a commitment made on the floor of the House. It was a commitment made to the people who put their applications in because they had applied before the deadline last year and so wanted to honour the fact that they had done that. And I think at the end of the day, it's important to reflect on the fact that no matter how this program rolls out, there are always going to be people that are disappointed and incredibly emotional about this. There are people who are in situations where they're looking for certainty as far as family reunification. There are people who have spent an incredible amount of personal finances to move to Canada and to set up their lives here. And so at the end of the day we're certainly not talking about numbers, we're talking about people. And this is very, very difficult knowing that we, at the end of the day, are not able to make everyone happy with this program.
Thank you. Member for Range Lake.
Thank you. And thank you to the Minister for that. This is absolutely about people, not about numbers, and I appreciate that recognition. That being said, are we -- is this hangover thing, is it a policy that people who apply, you know, during the intake but there's not enough spots are held over to the next year; is that how it's always been done? Thank you.
Thank you. I'll go to the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you, Madam Chair. We've never met our allocation before. So this is new. Thank you.
