Daniel McNeely

Thank you Mr. Speaker. Thank you, colleagues. The Department of Justice has a new department, or this whole government has a new department, with the Public Transparency, which we hope would ease some comfort in the outstanding land claims and the outstanding self-government initiatives. I think I tried to summarize the various departments and the challenges we have, and I look forward in moving ahead. I will look forward to rolling up our sleeves and getting down to business, so we can be mindful of the 60 to 70, 80 per cent unemployment, which I assure you we do have in these smaller...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I too, like my previous colleague, would like to recap what was done and accomplished over the last seven months here. In particular I think we, as newcomers, have participated in our first publication of this Assembly’s budget, and it has certainly been a learning process during the seven months. We look forward to moving ahead for the remaining term. In light of what we have achieved over the last several months, if we were to summarize and analyze each department, starting with the left-hand side. If we look at ECE… I might miss or not mention a few, but there have...

I seek unanimous consent to conclude my statement.

---Unanimous consent granted

Will the regional council orientation include development of regionalized policy because the geographical differences that many of our ridings have? If these policies would be a part of the orientation or part of the first quarter developments?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I mentioned in my Member’s statement here, during the summer we will see the new health structure take place for the Sahtu and other regions throughout the territories here on August 1st. I would like to ask the Minister of Health what preliminary action plans are in place for the startup date of the new structure. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My last question: is there a possibility for an extended invitation to the MLAs of the area? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I understand the move-forward step is to bring the regional chairs for an orientation to Yellowknife, which is good. I commend the department on that. As far as the regional council, is there a regionalized orientation for that group? If so, when Mr. Speaker?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As we draw closer to the conclusion of our Session, Mr. Speaker, some of us are going to be heading home and entertaining local groups in our communities as we enter the summer season of assemblies and gatherings and community council meetings, et cetera. At this point in time here, we would also experience the new transition of our new health system here taken into effect from the previous government on August 1st, and later I will have questions to the appropriate Minister on start-up operations and preparation for that date. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am glad to see the wording, “improve community capacity.” It is really common in these smaller communities that they lack financial bookkeeping skills. Within this budget, is there allowance for somebody from the regional office with financial management skills and preferably auditing skills to go in and support the communities and their bookkeeping systems? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chair. My last statement is more of a comment I would say. In many of the cases in the smaller communities it’s good to know that the finances are there and the support is there and I would encourage the department to randomly, I would say, go into some of the communities and do an audit on their fire truck, for example. In some cases we hear stories they can’t even get the fire truck going, or they go to the site and find out the water pump doesn’t work so they’ve got to call the private sector or the hamlet’s water truck, for example. Maybe that kind of audit support...