Mr. Speaker, it’s been known for some time that the Department of Justice is proposing to close down the Arctic Tern Facility in Inuvik.
I’d like to ask the Minister of Justice what the rationale was for proposing to close Arctic Tern down. If they do close it, who made the ultimate decision to close the facility down?
Minister of Justice, Mr. Lafferty.
Mr. Speaker, there’s been considerable discussion on this particular subject: the closing down of the Arctic Tern that’s been proposed.
Part of their reasoning behind it is the operation cost: having two or no inmates in the facility, having 20 staff plus seven relief staff to look after a facility, and $2.5 million to operate the facility. Also, Mr. Speaker, just to maintain the building…. It’s roughly $500,000 a year to have an upgrade of the facility annually.
It’s just not feasible to operate the facility that way. That was part of the reason we decided to go with that Arctic Tern Facility in Inuvik as part of the cuts we are faced with. Mahsi.
The time for question period has expired; however, I’m going to allow the Member supplementary questions. I’d also like to remind Members we’ve only had seven Members ask questions. Obviously, we are going to have to shorten our questions, and answers as well, if we are going to give all Members the ability to ask questions.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask the Minister if he knows of any other facilities that are proposed to be closed down.
I can only speak to my department. Basically, what we have proposed is for Arctic Tern for now. We are working on the options for the community as well. Mahsi.
The Arctic Tern brings a lot to the economy of Inuvik, and they have a concern with it being closed down. It also affects a lot of the staff. I met with the staff at Arctic Tern. One thing I found was that they were very passionate about what they do. They are very protective of the girls who are in there. They were asked to take training to work in that position. They believed in that, and they went and took training. I’d like to ask the Minister: what’s going to happen to the clients of Arctic Tern?
Mr. Speaker, I believe, yesterday, there were ten or two inmates. We’re certainly working with the Yellowknife Correction Centre as well, and young offenders. We’ve been working on that for quite some time now — to look at options — and that’s one of the options we are seriously looking at. The inmates will be looked after. Also having those correctional workers at that correction facility will certainly look after them. Mahsi.
Final supplementary, Mr. McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I can tell you one thing about Inuvik: we’re a very resilient community. You can hit us high; you can hit us low. We always seem to bounce back, but we’ve had to bounce back too many times. Enough is enough. I know this facility was built by the government when there was the Youth Criminal Justice Act of Canada. They were full, and now they’re proposing to close it. They’ve been looking for a reason, for the last few years, to justify closing this facility. That’s not going to be accepted, especially with the girls we put through training. I will say right now, for the record, that I’m going to fight this tooth and nail for the next four and half weeks.
I’d like to ask the Minister: is he aware of any other correctional facilities proposed to be built within the Northwest Territories?
I appreciate the Member’s statement on this particular issue. It is a concern for our community. It wasn’t an easy decision going through the process.
With regard to other new buildings that the Member is alluding to, we are in the process of retrofitting. We’re not focusing on new buildings. Mr. Speaker, I’d just like to highlight that there are nine individuals we’re working with in the facility of Arctic Tern. We are making progress, and we’ll do what we can to assess the remainder of the workers at the facility.
