Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment Minister of Education, Culture and Employment
The Honourable Caitlin Cleveland was first elected in the 19th Assembly as the MLA for Kam Lake in 2019, and has served as the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, and Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment since 2023 after being acclaimed to the 20th Assembly.
In addition to owning and operating a northern business for over 20 years, Minister Cleveland worked in a variety of communications and policy roles in both the public and private sectors before entering politics.
Between 2019 to 2023, she chaired the Standing Committee on Social Development, fulfilling a goal to be a part of the discussions and decisions affecting social programs in the Northwest Territories. Her noteworthy work on the Committee included guiding the considerable review and input into recommendations on housing in the NWT, suicide prevention, and improvements to caring for children in care and building supported families.
Within the scope of her portfolios, Minister Cleveland is focused on helping children grow into successful NWT residents that recognize opportunities and develop successful careers that contribute to a growing economy. She advocates for new approaches to sector diversification and innovation, and ensures the North is welcoming both skilled foreign workers and investment in the critical mineral resources across the territory. She persistently explores solutions for efficient and equitable access to programs and services, upholding a shared vision of an NWT where people are supported in the ways they wish to live, work, and grow.
Minister Cleveland is a lifelong resident of Yellowknife where she lives with her husband and their three children.
Minister of Education, Culture and Employment Minister of Industry, Tourism, and Investment
Statements in Debates
Debates of
, 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 88)
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I think what we're really talking around here is core need in the Northwest Territories, and so I'm wondering if as part of this work, if we can expect to see a plan to pull the territory out of core need within a timeframe with budgets associated with it so that we have an actual plan of how we're going to fix the housing crisis in the Northwest Territories. Thank you.
Debates of
, 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 88)
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. So, no, I wanted to better understand that $40 million figure, if that had to do with simply repairs or if it also had to do with building new infrastructure. And so, no, thank you very much for the Housing Corporation for that, and I always feel very rude with my back to them so I'm sorry for that. But, no, I want so thank you very much for that clarification. And we did get a good news story this week from the NWT Housing Corporation, and that was an influx of $93 million to housing in the Northwest Territories. So kudos to the Northwest Territories...
Debates of
, 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 88)
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, can the Minister give us an idea of this list that they have, the very detailed list, does it have a cost associated with what it would take to repair all of those units? Thank you.
Debates of
, 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 88)
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, does the Housing Corporation have a list of how many units require repairs, major repairs or minor repairs, but are still occupied? Thank you.
Debates of
, 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 88)
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I'm happy that the Minister brought up the total number of public housing units, and I'm wondering of the total number of public housing units, how many units are currently sitting empty because the Housing Corporation does not have the O and M to fix them up? Thank you.
Yes, thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. And I appreciate the Minister's recognition that a lot of this work does require a specialist to really go through this process with someone. And often medical travel's not always a possibility. Sometime there are a multitude of appointments that need to happen, and sometimes along the way people just need to be able to ask questions. And so I'm wondering if this position of a health planner and the plans of the NTHSSA speak to possibilities of creating a host of specialists that can speak to different conditions that Northerners have that Northerners...
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. And I appreciate that, and I think that it's important that we establish a baseline if it's expected to go up substantially over the next decade.
Mr. Speaker, the rate of Parkinson's among NWT residents is low, but watching very intimately residents try to go through the process of being diagnosed leads me to believe that maybe we do have more of a higher instance of Parkinson's in the Northwest Territories and Alzheimer's and just are not aware of it.
So I'm wondering, Mr. Speaker, what supports are available to Northerners with neurodegenerative diseases in...
Mr. Speaker, our seniors and Elders are the fastest growing population in the NWT. Over the next decade, our seniors population over 60 will increase by 56 percent, and the demand for home care by 80 percent. As the GNWT pens an Elders strategy, we speak often in this House about the need for housing to support seniors to age in place with dignity. But what we don't talk about, Mr. Speaker, is the predictable surge of chronic illness. 31 percent of NWT residents over the age of 65 have diabetes, a disease shown to lead to neurodegeneration that substantially increases a Northerner's risk of...
Debates of
, 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 88)
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, it strikes me quite interesting that or it strikes me quite hard that one of the biggest uncertainties in the Northwest Territories is housing, even for the Housing Corporation, how to operate, how to build new houses, how to maintain existing ones. And so I'm wondering if there is a plan within the Housing Corporation, either within the GNWT or within the federal government, to create more certainty for the budgets going forward, because there is a huge amount of fluctuation and a huge amount of uncertainty within the corporation as to how they...
Debates of
, 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 88)
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. So, Madam Chair, in the press release that we all got this week, it did identify that there was 213 units that will undergo major repairs, modernization over the next three years. One of the things that I'm noting is that in the document we're looking at right now, it does have 176 units of, I'm guessing, those 213 units, which would only leave 37 units left over. So is it the intent of the Housing Corporation to go over additional go after, sorry, additional federal dollars in future years in order to increase the number of units that they're providing...
