Caitlin Cleveland

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, this time last year when I asked the Minister to create an immigration advisory council, the Minister informed me that, quote, "ECE and ITI are proactively reaching out to businesses and people who are familiar with the nominee program to find out what we can do to improve the program."

So I'm wondering, Madam Speaker, since there is no intent to create a strategy in the life of this Assembly, where I can find that information that the Minister has been collecting with his department over the last year? Thank you.

Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, my questions today are for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.

Madam Speaker, today I spoke about sustaining and growing our population in the Northwest Territories, and a key tool to grow our population is using immigration. The GNWT currently does not fulfill its annual immigration quota allotted by the Government of Canada through the nominee program. This is a big concern especially within our business community.

So I'm wondering if the Minister can explain why we're not hitting our quotas and tell us what his department is...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I have no further questions on this section. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, one of the concerns that I have, and I understand that, you know, there's a process that Housing NWT follows, but the minor and major home repair program, as well as the home mobility and accessibility modifications program offered by Housing NWT, the first two are for health and safety related repairs for seniors aging in place, and then the second one is for people really to be able to access their home and use their home. And my concern is that the application period is isolated to April 1st through to November 31st. And, you know, we're all human...

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I'm wondering if there are any applicants who were denied, either because they do not fit the criteria outlined or because the fund is fully subscribed? Thank you.

Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, earlier this week I made a statement about Nunavut 3000, Nunavut's ambitious aim to build 3,000 new homes by 2030. Its ambition that we desperately need in the NWT but lacking sometimes, especially when it comes to creating new housing to meet our need. So I'm wondering because housing is such a huge barrier to sustaining our population, I'm wondering if this Minister will advocate for an ambitious house building and house repair strategy and action plan to support the sustaining and growing of our population, especially since he is the...

Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, I appreciate the success that has happened over the course of this term, but there's still room for us to grow and there's still room for us to welcome more people to the Northwest Territories. One of the things that I like to do in this job is pick up the phone and call people. And I've had the opportunity to speak to people working in the immigration sector from other jurisdictions who have literally said, why aren't you guys getting closer to your quota? So I think there's room for us to grow.

Madam Speaker, the department's response to the...

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, earlier last week, I had the opportunity to speak on the floor of the House with the Minister of housing in regards to strategic data collection and analysis by the department of housing. And both in terms of their clientele but also in terms of homelessness in conjunction with the homelessness prevention strategy and being able to use data collection as a means for further prevention. And so I'm wondering if that work would come out of the executive or where the funding for the hardware and software to be able to do this would come from? Thank...

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. So, Madam Chair, that is even for all of those places, and I understand that this is not the only funding pot because I believe Salvation Army also receives money from elsewhere. But if you take out Salvation Army, which we really shouldn't because it is still an emergency shelter, but if you take that out and you have the five remaining shelters in communities, or even if you take out YWCA, one of them, you have about $600,000 for each shelter to work with. It's not enough money to operate shelters notwithstanding the point either that that means we've got...

Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to deal with the motion I gave notice of earlier today.