Deputy Premier Minister of Finance Minister of Infrastructure Minister Responsible for the Northwest Territories Power Corporation
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, Minster 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. Yes, Mr. Speaker, it probably is a bit of both departments here. Mr. Speaker, I'd like to take that number back. That's a very specific number, and I'm -- while I'm familiar with the audit, I am not necessarily up to speed with what that number would be.
So in terms of the projected costs, we do have a fairly detailed analysis that's obviously been done when we got the audit in. We are looking at where costs are going over the course of time. There's some concern that we have seen with respect to the audit in terms of understanding the difference between the portion that...
Debates of
, 20th Assembly, 1st Session (day 35)
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'm very happy to say that I have a resident of Yellowknife South here in the room with us today serving as a page, Mr. Ben Mager. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the following six documents: Plain Language Summary for Bill 11: An Act to Amend the Motor Vehicles Act; Statement of Consistency for Bill 11: An Act to Amend the Motor Vehicles Act; Inter-Activity Transfers Exceeding $250,000 (April 1 to June 30th, 2024); Public Service Annual Report 2023-2024; 2024-2025 Consolidated Budget; and, Northwest Territories Carbon Tax Report 2023-2024. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I do want to give another shout out, as I have on more than one occasion, that when we first put out the Restoring Balance initiative, we went to the public service and the public service responded. We had over 900 public servants respond directly with over 1800 suggestions, many of which were directly involved in the planning of how to develop and build up the main estimates within that context, a number of decisions -- or suggestions around efficiencies, department amalgamations, even fleet management came up in the course of there. So those processes and...
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, a lot of the -- in fact, I would venture to say most -- the vast majority of our roads are maintained by contractors, third-party contractors, and not by -- directly by operators in the GNWT's employ. And, Mr. Speaker, yes, we can certainly always look to optimize that we are doing the best we can, so perhaps what I'll do is take that away and just have a direct conversation with the MLA to see whether or not there may be particular stretches, particular contracts, particular areas, that need another look and I'm certainly happy to have that conversation to...
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we do have the relevant contracts now awarded and that will provide more consistency in terms of the maintenance that is occurring in that region. Mr. Speaker, there's also some particular contracts related to larger scale repair work, for example dip repair right at the crossing, so -- and along with a number of other projects. And, again, a couple of them certainly did get delayed over this summer season but I can say, again, that those are now awarded. And what I'd suggest with respect to contingency is ensuring that there's a wider degree of overlap in...
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the paving project for the airport is right now expected to be over 2027-2028 and somewhere in the course of that, we will be able to include the paving of the bypass road. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this too, I do just want to just provide quickly before -- you know, we pay the costs that we pay for services, and certainly within health care, these are essential services for residents of the Northwest Territories. But, Mr. Speaker, the auditor general was bringing together what for us is the P3 project which is the Stanton Hospital as well as the Liwego'ati Building which is where the long-term care facility and now primary care are housed. So this has been a conversation that I've had with the Auditor General's Office of Canada that does our audits...
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the opportunity that arose to sublease the building was later in the procurement process. This has been some of the challenge with the audit is that there were multiple stages to what occurred from back in 2013 when the project first originated up to the last stage of that project which is when that decision was made to sublease. At that point in time, there was this opportunity because the investment that was being made by one of the partners to decommission, renovate, you know, clean up that old building, that involved a significant amount of investment...
Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Kam Lake, that Bill 11, An Act to Amend the Motor Vehicles Act, be read for the second time.
The proposed, An Act to Amend the Motor Vehicles Act, will allow police to move more quickly with their investigations. The bill amends the Motor Vehicles Act to update and clarify the ways in which the registrar of motor vehicles can share information about drivers, vehicles, and holders of general identification cards. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
