Deputy Premier Minister of Finance Minister Responsible for the Northwest Territories Power Corporation Minister Responsible for Strategic Infrastructure, Energy and Supply Chains
Caroline Wawzonek was first elected to the 19th Legislative Assembly in 2019 as the Member for Yellowknife South. Ms. Wawzonek served as Minister of Justice, Minister of Finance, Minister responsible for the Status of Women and the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment. In 2023, Ms. Wawzonek was acclaimed to the 20th Legislative Assembly and returned to Executive Council as Deputy Premier, Minister of Finance, Minister of Infrastructure and the Minister Responsible for the NWT Power Corporation.
Ms. Wawzonek holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Calgary (2000) and a law degree from the University of Toronto, Faculty of Law (2005). Her academic journey included language studies in China and Taiwan, as well as legal internships in the Philippines and England. Born in Calgary, AB, she has called Yellowknife home since 2007.
After establishing her criminal law practice post-admission to the Law Society of the NWT, Ms. Wawzonek appeared in all levels of NWT courts and engaged in circuit court travel. She later joined Dragon Toner, expanding her practice to general litigation and administrative law until becoming a member of the 19th Assembly.
Since 2007, she has taken on leadership roles in the legal community, including the presidency of the Law Society of the Northwest Territories (LSNT), section chair for the Canadian Bar Association Northwest Territories Branch (CBA-NT), and committee membership in various working groups. Her community involvement extends to appointments in multiple Yellowknife organizations, and she received a national award in 2017 for her contributions to Canadian Women in Law.
Ms. Wawzonek, a mother of two, enjoys running, paddleboarding, and time outdoors.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Member must be reading my social media. I had the opportunity to attend an FPT recently where I think my lead word was "interoperability." It is something that, quite frankly, doesn't sound very exciting, not the sort of thing that gets somebody's political blood boiling, but is quite critical to the functioning of the services from the IT perspective and one that we need to do a better job of, Mr. Speaker. There's really no way around that. So I'm pleased to have some attention here. It's been brought to my attention by my officials that lack of...
Debates of
, 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 135)
Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, Madam Chair, I'm happy to try to get that data. And, again, just having briefly a conversation here with the director of fiscal policies, that that may be difficult to determine just what the amount of lost revenues are, are sort of anecdotal. The expectation is that it's not likely a significant value nonetheless and again, I mean, if it's across every type of tax credit, yes, we would need to just go back and look at exactly what kinds of credits we're talking about and what kind of lost revenue we're talking about. But, again, we'll go and have a look and we'll...
Debates of
, 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 135)
Thank you, Madam Chair. No, there's no lost revenues on that. Thank you.
Debates of
, 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 135)
Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, on my right I have Kelly Bluck, who is director of fiscal policy within the Department of Finance, and on my left I have Christina Duffy, who is legislative director.
Debates of
, 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 135)
Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I am here to present Bill 62, An Act to Amend the Income Tax Act, No. 2.
The main purpose of Bill 62 is to make various legislative retroactive housekeeping measures to the territorial income tax legislation to comply with the CanadaNorthwest Territories Tax Collection Agreement. These amendments keep territorial legislation current and harmonized with the federal income tax legislation. Specifically, the proposed changes include:
Remove a reference to a repealed federal provision about an option for trusts to pay tax;
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in many ways this is the culmination of why ISSS was created in the first place under the last administration and now is coming more and more to its fruition. Again, I know we've said this more times than I would like to count, COVID was not a help in this particular regard. It was certainly a big draw on this particular division to pause some of the transitions required during COVID. But now turning back to what should be regular business, the chief information office does create a business partner approach with departments. This is meant to have that...
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the Member's observation. There certainly are budget lines that go department by department, which can make it difficult perhaps to look at it from a corporate perspective. I am, however, happy to say the Department of Finance is now putting in practice a way to better review and report on those specific items, computer hardware and software. That should make it easier to look at this from a governmentwide perspective and ensure that we are obviously controlling those costs but also better servicing the public through having better control over...
Debates of
, 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 135)
Thank you, Madam Chair. So, Madam Chair, I can say that refundable tax credits do show up in the public accounts but something that is a non-refundable credit may not be the same. Obviously, we'll certainly do our best to try to make better use of the information sharing provisions. But, I mean, if there are specific elements of tax credits or specific tax provisions that the Member's interested in getting information on, you know, if we can get that, again, I'm happy to try to distill that data as much as possible. This, theoretically, is supposed to help with that data collection from the...
Debates of
, 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 135)
Thank you, Madam Chair. I do remember that exchange, Madam Chair, and I apologize if we didn't include that on any correspondence to committee. I did just confirm again now with the Department of Finance, as I had at the time, that, indeed, these were changes that were slow in coming from the federal government and so we are simply aligning with the calendar that they had or the timelines that they had put forward on their side. So, again, I ought to have conveyed that to committee earlier; I apologize for not doing so. Thank you.
