Caitlin Cleveland

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Yes, opening remarks for our committee report were read into the record yesterday, and the first motion, Mr. Chair, is I move that this committee recommends that the Government of the Northwest Territories declare the overrepresentation of Indigenous children and youth in child and family services a crisis and develop a wholeofgovernment response in partnership with Indigenous governments. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Chair, I move that this committee recommends that the Department of Health and Social Services audit all child and family services resources, ensuring they are all plain language, culturallysafe and easily accessible online, including a plain language summary of the Child and Family Services Act. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, do I think this is a revolutionary game changing budget? No.

I have shared my views on the budget as a whole in my reply to the budget address towards the beginning of this sitting. But true change takes time, Mr. Speaker. Evolution takes time. And I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the most patient person in this House. But I acknowledge that we are at a place where costs are being stretched in all directions. Inflation is having a real impact on the people we serve as well as the government who serves them. And our expectations of how the government...

Mr. Chair, I move that this committee recommends that the Department of Health and Social Services develop a Child and Family Services Evaluation and Monitoring Framework, including a data profile on children and youth in care. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

In favour.

Mr. Chair, I move that this committee recommends that the Department of Health and Social Services deliver, and make mandatory, culturallysafe and traumainformed training for foster families. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I guess what I am going to do is kind of shift here to just a GNWT focus and take the feds out of the equation.

So even within the GNWT, there are existing contracts. We have hundreds of millions of dollars of carryovers from Infrastructure every year and some of those are contracts that have already been set before COVID, before the inflation. Like even a contract that was set at this time last year would have been incurring additional substantial additional costs this year. And some of those might have people in certain business situations where...

Mr. Chair, I move that this committee recommends that the Department of Health and Social Services increase funding to Indigenous governments, communities and organizations to deliver addictions recovery ontheland healing options specifically tailored to youth. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, and I guess further to the conversations that I'm hearing today between colleagues on this side of the House, the Minister of Infrastructure, the Minister of Finance or ITI here today, one of the things that has struck me is this idea of getting projects done on time and on budget right now. And one of the things that we have just heard as well acknowledged by Minister Wawzonek on screen was, you know, the rising costs of living in the Northwest Territories and inflation as well.

So if, you know, costs of wood, steel, all have gone up over the last period of...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I move that this committee recommends that the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs lead an allofgovernment approach to ensuring access to recreational programming by providing additional funding for recreational facilities and programming so all families have increased access to these spaces outside regular business day hours and additional funding specifically for those children and youth in care to participate in extracurricular activities. Thank you, Mr. Chair.