Mr. Speaker, today I spoke about the Aboriginal Sport Circle and all the good work that they’ve been doing. I’d like to follow up with some questions to the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs.
I spoke about the need to recognize and provide similar levels of support for the Aboriginal Sport Circle. Can the Minister tell me what kind of funding arrangement is currently in place for the sport circle?
Thank you, Mr. Jacobson. The honourable Minister responsible for Municipal and Community Affairs, Mr. Michael McLeod.
Mr. Speaker, this government spends approximately $5 million in the area of sport and recreation. That’s including the support we provide to our five non-governmental organizations that work with the NWT Council of Sport and Recreation partners, and they allocate the funding. It is part of their mandate to coordinate a system that recognizes their priorities and to provide direction. We also expect them to provide the resources fairly. On top of the support that’s provided by Sport and Rec, we as government also work with the Aboriginal Sport Circle to provide funding to go to the North American Indigenous Games, this time in B.C.
With all the great programs and events, the Aboriginal Sport Circle has demonstrated it can deliver much-needed programming to territorial youth. Will the Minister commit to recognizing the increase of core funding to the Aboriginal Sport Circle?
I thought I was pretty clear that the core funding does not come directly from us. It does come from the NWT Council of Sport and Recreation partners.
With the North American Indigenous Games held every two years and, more importantly, with programs and events happening every day in our communities, will the Minister commit to work with the sport circle staff to start increasing core funding as soon as possible?
Mr. Speaker, we’ve had a very good relationship with all the sport organizations, including the Aboriginal Sport Circle. We meet with them on a very regular basis. They have some new staff. They’ve taken a new approach and set some new directions that we’re quite excited and pleased to see. We meet with them. I met with them, in fact, yesterday. They’re doing a very good job on the North American Indigenous Games. They have relayed to us their concerns as to core funding, and we will continue to support them.
We have, in the last while, lobbied the federal government to provide increased funding to the Aboriginal Sport Circle on a national basis. We were also successful this year in lobbying the federal government to provide travel dollars to the North American Indigenous Games. The Northwest Territories is getting $144,000 of that money. I think it’s a challenge that we’re all continuing to work towards, but we’re finding small pots of money, and we’ll continue to work with this council.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Oral questions. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.
