Robert Hawkins

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Finally we are hearing some solutions. By the way, for the record, I want to say that Jane is not plain, because I have worked with her for four years. I can say that is a fact. Mr. Speaker, the fact is there is the problem right there. It has been changed and modified. Mr. Speaker, what are we going to do to bring back the integrity of this system to both the employees who work in Human Resources, who are probably getting backlashes every day on this problem, and also the fact the employees who have to know that the integrity of the personal information is out...

Vivian Squires, as well, like Mr. Dent had recognized. There are a couple of other special people in the gallery that I’d like to make mention of: Katherine Silcock. She has her mother here from down south who’s visiting here today in our gallery. So thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I, too, like my colleague from Hay River, would like to highlight the concerns about the PeopleSoft program. Mr. Speaker, the word Oracle, the name of our program here for pay and benefits, its definition is authoritative person who defines the future, Mr. Speaker. Did they foresee the thousands and thousands of dollars that would continue to be spent and paid for this debunked or crazy program that does not work, Mr. Speaker? Maybe that is what they saw all along.

Mr. Speaker, GNWT employees have been unable to enter leave for days on end. Their reports aren’t...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Maybe it is not appropriate to ask the question because you say it is not involved, but to further pursue this, why isn’t it involved in the Public Health Act? One could see it as a toxic substance. Yes, it may help cavities, but it is also found in other areas to be quite toxic to people for their general health. Why wouldn’t it have been considered for this act? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just for clarification on this, more so on the intent, do we do any…What type of follow-up do we do with water testing and do we broadcast our testing results anywhere? So it sort of speaks to the section as a whole. I suspect community water testing gets sent into some facility like the Stanton Territorial Hospital, gets screened out and…Like, what do we do for public assurance, because the average person wouldn’t know where their water quality sits. They just assume, unless there’s a flag or a report on one of the media things, everything’s good. So where does...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, their responsibility is not the answer. Their problem is not the answer. Mr. Speaker, I want to hear the Minister say that it was his fault in the sense of…Boil it down to the fact that he knew about this months ago. Now we have chopped up a system and who knows what we have. Will the new system be tested to ensure that it works properly before we put it back on line and we put our employees’ personal information at risk once again? I can tell you for a fact, e-mails were floating around even earlier this week with personal information of various...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask questions today to the Minister of Human Resources. I want to make sure that we totally understand and find out, did we receive the program, the pay and benefits program, PeopleSoft, that we actually thought we were buying, Mr. Speaker? I am concerned that we may have bought a product that was faulty from the very beginning. Mr. Speaker, my first question to the Minister today is to find out what did we do when we bought this program. So, Mr. Speaker, does the Human Resources Minister today know, or can he tell us the fact that, did...

We promised to come here and not accept things just at any cost. Mr. Speaker, we can’t accept this just at any cost in blind faith without having the sense of what this is going to cost. I think it is totally irresponsible of us to just assume it will be okay. Mr. Speaker, I do not assume it will be okay and I am not going to assume the federal government is going to come behind us and sweep up and say don’t worry, we will cover the shortfall. We need to have a comfort letter from Ottawa. We need to have a comfort letter, heck, from Cabinet. That could be just in the fact of what it’s really...

Well, I can’t imagine anyone here is foolish enough to think that. Mr. Speaker, there is no blank cheque support from me on this project until we know what it’s going to cost. Mr. Speaker, if we can say we knew what it cost five years ago, that is completely unacceptable because Cabinet comes to us practically every month and says by the way, this project costs more than it did last year or last month and by the way, we need an extra 10 or 15 percent. You know what? It doesn’t erode the fact that it’s an important piece of infrastructure. It just further casts into concrete how important it...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That's actually good news, because when I brought the Minister the phrase "spectacular" to line up with the NWT Tourism initiative, I was quite in favour of it, but I was a little hesitant to suggest it had to be that one, only because I thought a lot of discussion would have to go into this. Could the Minister explain, or possibly highlight, when he expects a new campaign to launch this will take place? Thank you.