Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today I would like to talk about the Hay River Seniors’ Society. This is a very vibrant and fun-loving group of seniors in Hay River, an association of which I am proud to say I’m a member.
I have a recent newsletter and I’m just going to use it to highlight the very busy schedule seniors keep in Hay River. They do get together often and have a very good time. They have coffee at their facility five times a week. They’re having a crib tournament in February. They’re having a fun bingo with a Valentines theme. They’ve produced calendars and cookbooks which are almost sold out. They have decided this year to again undertake the management of the Hay River Tourist Booth. That’s something that they did last summer. They set up a schedule so that when people came to Hay River and came to our Tourist Information Booth, they were greeted by seniors. They’re going to be involved in helping out with the fishing derby. They have dinners. They have their annual general meeting coming up. They’re involved in territory-wide work of abuse of older adults. They also have in their newsletter a little plug for our Seniors Parliament that they will be looking at sending a representative up for Hay River North and Hay River South.
Some stated priorities of this government are strong individuals, families and communities; sustainable, vibrant, safe communities. I want to suggest that the seniors of our communities are a very big part of that vibrant community and I am sorry to say that there is no direct funding for seniors’ societies that is provided by this government. Yellowknife is fortunate enough to have a large enough group that they can actually fundraise to hire a full-time staff person, but in a community the size of Hay River, even though there is a fairly good membership, everything is done on a voluntary basis. It would enhance their efforts and some of the activities they would like to participate in greatly if even there were a small amount of money designated through a budget of this government for support for some of those activities. I think we could count on them to put the money to very, very good use.
I know that there is project-specific money for the NWT Seniors Helpline, for example, and there is project-specific money related to other activities and workshops that the seniors have, but I think there should be money for communities that don’t have a seniors’ society and those who do, because I think it’s extremely important for seniors to get together.
Later today I’ll have questions for the Minister of Health and Social Services on why we don’t have that.
Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The honourable Member for Nahendeh, Mr. Menicoche.
