R.J. Simpson

Thank you. I know that we still offer scholarships for Indigenous languages, and we have Indigenous language broadcasting money in the contributions section, instead of the grants section. There's been a bit of a reallocation. I believe these were program-specific, the ones from 2018-2019. I can get more details on that, though, for the Member, if that's okay, Madam Chair.

Thank you. I will say the department has done some preliminary work on this already, on the funding formula. We are going to have to work together, talk about collaborative fashions, the education leaders, the chairs of the authorities in all of the different communities. There has been a lot of interest from Indigenous governments on this, as well, not just the funding formula but the act and how the renewal or the modernization of the act will relate to Indigenous governments and their involvement. If they are going to have a greater involvement, direct involvement, then they are going to be...

There are 320. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Sorry, my deputy minister, Ms. Mueller.

Thank you. That's a good question, and those are the kinds of questions that we have to answer every time we spend money, what was actually achieved by this. This is a difficult file, in many ways, because there are so many barriers to improving access and affordability. Some of those are the fact that it's difficult to find people to do this work, and so, you know, wage subsidies that are offered through this program help to retain employees for daycares who may have otherwise not continued to be employed. Is that concrete evidence? Perhaps we need to do a better job of evaluating this. I can...

No, I haven't looked into that. It would be difficult to sort of extrapolate that from other jurisdictions, to say, "This has worked in other jurisdictions, so it will also work in the territory." We are vastly different from most places that would do this type of research. I have been very open with the Members that I want to have an Income Assistance program that helps people get back into the job market. A lot of people on Income Assistance, they are in and out. Some, there are additional barriers that keep them out of that job market. What are those and how can we assist them to get into...

To my deputy minister, Ms. Mueller.

Thank you. In the early years of the agreement, money could be carried over, and so it shows up in here as more money at certain times. Then we have the decrease in the early childhood development and learning agreement due to the fact that it's sunsetting. Those are the issues with that. I agree; investments in early childhood are the best bang for your buck you can get, probably across any department. Thank you.

Thank you. That flexibility is available. We can do that, from my understanding, without a change to the regulations or any acts, and so again that is the type of initiative we might be looking at. We need to be flexible. We have journeymen retiring at an accelerating rate, it seems like, and we have not been doing what we need to do to replace them over the past number of years. All across Canada, we are facing a shortage in skilled labour, and, just like anything else, the North is an extreme example of that. This is at the front of my mind. We are not going to build local economies, we are...

Thank you. Yes, that can be shared with standing committee. I think it likely has to be shared with the Cabinet, but not for decision, prior to going to standing committee, but I have no problem doing that. Thank you.