WHEREAS nine Canadian provinces and the Yukon Territory have parliamentary ombudsman offices;
AND WHEREAS the Northwest Territories does not have an independent ombudsman office with a broad and comprehensive mandate to investigate complaints about the practices and services of public agencies and to promote fair, reasonable, appropriate, and equitable administrative practices and services for Northwest Territories residents;
AND WHEREAS an independent ombudsman office could provide an alternative to the courts to address both individual disputes and systemic issues;
AND WHEREAS an independent ombudsman office could make use of consultation, mediation and other alternative dispute resolution techniques which are generally less adversarial, less expensive, and less technically complex than court processes, and would be more accessible for most Northwest Territories residents;
AND WHEREAS in addition to investigating and assisting in the resolution of complaints, an independent ombudsman could make recommendations to public agencies to improve administrative processes and services to the benefit of all Northwest Territories residents;
NOW THEREFORE I MOVE, seconded by the honourable Member for Sahtu, that this Legislative Assembly recommends that the Government of the Northwest Territories bring forward legislation to establish an independent parliamentary ombudsman office with the mandate to investigate complaints about the practices and services of public agencies and to promote fair, reasonable, appropriate, and equitable administrative practices and services;
AND FURTHER, that the Government of the Northwest Territories provide a comprehensive response to this motion within 120 days.
There is a motion on the floor. The motion is in order. To the motion. Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to thank the seconder of the motion for allowing this motion to come forward. As mentioned in the motion, there are only three jurisdictions in Canada that do not currently have an ombudsman office and we are one of them. There are innumerable situations where NWT residents could use an ombudsman to assist in solving a dispute or a disagreement. I’m going to mention a number. They include but are definitely not limited to:
rental officer decisions that either the tenant or the landlord disagrees with;
landlord/tenant issues that are outside the jurisdiction of the rental officer;
decisions by housing authorities that the client may disagree with;
income support issues – a family may lose their home due to income support not issuing cheques in a timely manner;
investigations and decisions by a self-regulating body that the professional person feels was incorrectly handled or resulted in an unjust decision;
health and social service issues;
administrative decisions by officials in hospitals and other medical facilities;
issues with how health care is delivered to individuals; and
decisions made by the Workers’ Safety and Compensation Commission.
Government staff generally do a wonderful job for our residents but there are times when a resident – rightly or wrongly – feels that they have been treated unjustly or without fairness. In most cases they have no option for appeal. Some organizations do have a complaints process. We do have some appeals within our own government organization. If you lose on that front, there is absolutely no other option to appeal except to go to court. I’ve talked about that before. Court is not a viable option for many people. An ombudsman office provides an impartial third party, someone who can evaluate the disagreement or the presumed improper treatment, someone who is an alternative to going to court. Goodness knows, our courts are busy enough. This would help to alleviate some of the congestion that we currently have in our court system.
We probably, as Members, all know at least one, I’m sure many people, many residents who are intimidated by the court system and by the court process, and they may have the courage of their convictions, they may firmly believe that they have been unfairly treated, but they will not even contemplate taking their case to court. This motion asks for legislation to establish an ombudsman office with the powers necessary for an ombudsman to do the proper job. In order for that to happen, the office needs to be at arm’s length, independent from government, similar to our other statutory officers offices.
As well as acting as an arbitrator, an ombudsman can act as an evaluator of the government and its boards and agencies. Members have often said that as a government we don’t do enough evaluation, and I totally agree with that. Looking inwards for ways to improve our services, we don’t do enough of that either. The office of an ombudsman can be tasked with that, can make recommendations for improvement to government processes and to the programs and services that we provide for our residents.
In previous discussions, the government of the day has said that residents have ways available to them to appeal a government action or a decision. That’s true. They can talk to department staff. There are appeal boards, in some cases, as I’ve mentioned, and people can talk to their MLA for help. But none of these possibilities provides an impartial forum. Even as Members we’re not impartial. We are also very political. When all options are exhausted and the individual has reached the end of their rope, they have nowhere to turn and they do not see where they can go, they still feel wronged, the only action left to them is to go to court. It’s expensive and it’s an intimidating solution for most of us. NWT residents fighting a government or a board decision need an alternative to the Supreme Court, and an ombudsman office will give them that.
We’ve been talking about the need for an ombudsman office for years now. There are references to it in Hansard from 1992.There was a proposal for an office as far back as 1993, and a report tabled in this House made recommendations to establish an ombudsman office. But we have had, unfortunately, no concrete action to establish an office to date. The office is needed. The need is evident. Our territory has grown and we have grown up. Part of being grown up and being a grown up is recognizing the need to help our friends and neighbours. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. To the motion. I’ll allow the seconder, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I do want to thank Ms. Bisaro for bringing this motion for discussion in the House here. I think the timing is right in terms of creating an ombudsman office here in the Northwest Territories. It is an office that would be independent from the government, at arm’s length. It will have the powers to look into matters and issues on behalf of our people, and it will have the powers of, hopefully, the full scope of the government services that we provide. It will be centred around people much like our jobs here in the Assembly.
I see this office here having a lot of visibility for our people, being accessible to the people in the Northwest Territories and that it will focus around resolving issues, differences and finding solutions and being very proactive.
Mr. Speaker, 45 years ago, Alberta was the first government to get an ombudsman office. This issue has been raised three times in the Legislative Assembly through Members’ statements, one in 2007, 2009, and 2010. Our sister neighbouring to the west of us, the Yukon government, has an ombudsman office. That office runs about $500,000, just a little over. It is a powerful office. Again, it can handle complaints from the administration of our government, and I see this as being very, very powerful because it will look at the accountability issue and how we can be accountable to our people, especially to our elders.
I looked at the pros of this office here and it gives us an access point. Right now, as MLAs we are the access point to our government, and we are sometimes swamped with work on a 24/7 basis, and that’s fair, that’s a given. That’s the job that we asked for and that’s the job we accept. Also, we need help. Sometimes a creation of an ombudsman to us would be a godsend support for us. I look at it as we know where to sometimes tell people where they can look for help, besides us, but if they have an ombudsman office, people know where to go. There is a place. For us, we can say, well, go to this department or this department, but sometimes it gets quite confusing. So we ask that this motion be supported so people then know where to go, and at the office they will tell them what can be done. They also can help us as MLAs and they can be a proactive approach.
Like I said, I looked at the pros and the cons, and one of them is the cost of this creation. This is a huge budget and the Minister has been preaching to us about the fiscal responsibility and we need to look at and take that into serious consideration. We need to weigh out the benefits and the cons of this office, and we have to look at the cost of this office here. I mean, certainly, we need to do this here. Like I said, the office outweighs the cons, so I’m fully supportive of this ombudsman office on this motion and I hope this motion does get implemented. I thank the mover, Ms. Bisaro, for bringing it to the floor. I fully support this motion.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Being part of the Standing Committee on Government Operations, the issue of an ombudsman did surface early on in our mandate, as we prepared for the people of the Northwest Territories, and it did receive unanimous support in coming forward, so I really welcome the Member for Government Ops Ms. Bisaro for bringing it forward, and Mr. Yakeleya for seconding it.
Really, in essence, this is an opportunity for this government, for government in general, to become more accountable to the people of the Northwest Territories. There is obviously a gap in our system. There is an obvious gap in terms of offering of services to the people when they need it most. Our legal system, if anyone was paying attention during the budget deliberations on the Department of Justice, we have backlogs. In fact, backlogs as far back as four months. This is very difficult in times when people are looking for that independent advice and may not need to go a legal system for that. An ombudsman would offer that segue and, I hope, unblock some of the unneeded, unnecessary legal actions that are required.
As Members indicated here, we as Regular Members are plagued and we welcome to help our people in the Northwest Territories, but we can’t do it alone. Many of us are quite busy with a lot of the affairs of just being legislators, and sometimes even ourselves, we have a backlog of constituents needing help and we can’t get to them in time. This is where an ombudsman office would offer that opportunity to be independent in nature, as mentioned by the Member for Frame Lake. We, ourselves, are not totally independent. We are in the government process ourselves and we can’t offer that full independence because our being part of the system. That is where an ombudsman office would have its definite praise and opportunity to be a better tool for the people of the Northwest Territories.
Really, what an ombudsman means, is part of the beginning of what I have been talking about in the government standing committee, is about the government accountability office. This is something we’re going to hear more of in the future of the 17th Assembly. This is a brain child of many other governments and jurisdictions across Canada and North America, where the government itself is evaluated for what it does, independently, and where people can access this information via website with a simple click of a mouse, where they can see where their dollars are being spent, how it’s being spent, if it’s being spent wisely, and is there comfort knowing that this government is doing well.
That’s a future opportunity that I see here for this government, but it starts with an ombudsman office, and for that, I will be speaking in favour of this motion. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Mr. Menicoche.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I stand here and regret that I cannot support a motion of this type. I know that I am not really convinced that this is a right time to have an ombudsman office. As well, I think my biggest concern is I was in the Yukon and the ombudsman office got initiated I think some seven years ago at a cost of around $9 million annually to the government. I don’t think that we can do that right now. The other consideration, as well, is I believe that such a territorial office will be located in Yellowknife again. It is nothing that I can certainly support when it comes to that planning. In the end, I’m not convinced that this is the right time for our government to be spending those type of funds. Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I also rise to support this motion. I want to start by thanking my colleagues Ms. Bisaro and Mr. Yakeleya for bringing this forward. There has been, indeed, perpetual interest and discussion on this, and that discussion needs to be resolved. There is an obligation of government, clearly, to provide the full opportunity for their citizens’ voices to be heard. This is a proven mechanism, and clearly across Canada there is good recognition of the need to fill this responsibility. We would certainly be consistent with them in doing that.
I know my colleagues and, certainly, I work hard for our constituents. I am always amazed at the amazing dedication of commitments of our constituents that are coming forward with their concerns. They are fully committed at working hard. They are willing to go to great lengths, but the court is not typically one of them. Unfortunately, not all cases that are brought to us as MLAs get rectified through this process. I found that constituents can be left hanging with their issues unresolved. We may need to dedicate some money to this, but I do note that we are able to throw tens of millions of dollars on projects unexpectedly at the last minute. I would say meeting the responsibilities that we have to the people of the Northwest Territories certainly should take precedence.
An independent parliamentary ombudsman office is the way to go. I look forward to working with the Cabinet and all of my colleagues on this side of the House to make it happen.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Mr. Bouchard.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I will be voting in favour of this motion. As a new Member, it’s something that I’m learning about, the ombudsman and the potential that it has. Several different jurisdictions have different responsibilities, whether it’s the rental office, whether it’s housing issues, hospital issues, police abuse, police issues, so I believe that there’s a group of people in the Northwest Territories that are falling through the cracks in the system that don’t have an appeal system. Ultimately we have one option to go through the courts, and those court costs and court delays are often very expensive and very monotonous. I think the ombudsman would give them a place to put their grievance, get a quick answer at least in the direction of whether it is acceptable to move forward.
Some of the information that I have received is not anywhere near the $9 million cost. It is more like a $600,000 to $650,000 cost. It all depends on what jurisdiction you are looking at, I do believe, and how it’s incorporated and what is incorporated with it.
I think there is also a lot of merit in using this type of ombudsman or that type of office to do also minor reviews of the government and government programs, what is going on and what can be looked from a third party, from a distance, that says this is an area where we think there’s a flaw in this program. There is a flaw in this part of the government. There is a great deal of that type of concern in the general public right now. I will be supporting this motion. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Bouchard. Mr. Moses.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise in this House to support this motion as well. First I want to thank Ms. Bisaro and Mr. Yakeleya for bringing this into the House for discussion and looking to making it a reality within our government here.
Too many times a lot of people just accept the decisions that are based from this government. In reality, our decisions that we make in the House are not always the best decisions. This gives an opportunity we are getting an independent review to make sure that there’s equality as well as transparency and fairness to the people that we represent in this House.
My colleagues here today made some really good statements on why this position should be forthcoming and made a reality. I support this motion and look forward to seeing it become reality in the future. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. Mr. Nadli.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I speak and will be voting in favour of the motion simply because, as MLAs, we are the front and centre of dealing with our constituents’ concerns and also, at the same time, concerns that sometimes we don’t clearly have a recourse in trying to help people at least have their validation of concerns acknowledged.
It’s part of the due process. In some respects, this government is a new government. It is an evolved government. One principle that we uphold very clearly is the principle of consensus that we are inclusive in the decision-making process. We try to involve everyone in terms of trying to work out issues, at the same time come up with solutions and try to work in unity. In some respects, perhaps the individual rights of people in communities need to be clearly listened to and this mechanism will ensure that people’s concerns and issues that they bring forth will be addressed. Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Nadli. Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise with concern to this particular motion. Back in 2003 I did a fair bit of research. In my first term as MLA, I thought there was a lot of need for a particular ombudsman. I certainly was an advocate at the time, but continuing to look at the issue even into my second term, I started to realize that there were cases where we were going to minimize the role of MLAs. If we had an ombudsman, and a particular person didn’t like a WCB decision and they called their MLA, their MLA would probably say, hey, go to the ombudsman. Case closed, file taken care of. If they didn’t like an income support appeal or housing appeal, as further examples, they will just redirect their complaints to the ombudsman office because they felt it wasn’t fair. They have made decisions.
When we consider other aspects that I have looked in since I have been an advocate for this particular issue, is don’t forget about the extra costs. How many ombudsmen, commission’s offices, parliamentary offices do we need for 42,000 people? We are going to have more people on the public dole than we will not on the public dole through the process of these types of initiatives. There won’t be any public to serve because they will all work for the government in some form or fashion.
The other thing that people have to realize is if we create an ombudsman office and not be clear about how we do something like this, we could actually be denying MLAs the ability to do their job. What would happen is a client would not be satisfied by a decision by a department, maybe feel that there was some bias or confidence issue happening, who knows how messy it could get. What if they do? They go to the ombudsman. We wouldn’t have access to that particular information, so then the MLA would be denied their role because it would be in the hands of an independent ombudsman person.
I will not deny that there have been cases of problems. Back when I started looking at the problem, I remembered a young lady coming to me and she was applying for a particular program. There were discrepancies on how she was denied. In some cases, her stories led to a narrative where I thought there were some real mix-ups that needed seriously to be looked at. At the time, who looked at it and reviewed the case and the problem? It was the department. That made me a strong advocate to say, how do we look at these things fairly and independently. That got me down the path in thinking, is the ombudsman the right mechanism or the right vehicle. To that example, I probably say I do agree with the ombudsman office, but the fact is those examples are more fewer and far between than the real need today.
We need a process that people can go to and ask, I want this fairly looked at if there is some grievous error in the decision or the reasoning. But the framework provided today is just too broad. I know that the Member will say there’s no cost to this. Well, there is a cost to it starting day one. Once this motion passes, if it passes, there will be a cost to it. There will be a cost to drafting, a cost to thinking about how we’re going to implement this. How much will we source this budget? How much power will we give them?
On the point of power, let us not forget about the power. Take for example our information officer. That particular person doesn’t have the power to compel government to proceed if someone is searching out an information request. I’d be visiting her office for the Deh Cho Bridge agreement for 2010 and asking her to make government comply. What would we do if we empowered an ombudsman office to direct government because this particular ombudsperson said, well, I’m not happy with this particular decision? You now do it this way because I’m telling you. What we’re going to do is create an office with another level of bureaucracy. At this time we should be very cautious as to what we’re asking for. I always say this. Know what the question is and know what it means before we agree to it.
The issue here is not that I’m against the concept of ombudsman offices. I think there are a lot of questions that need to be sourced out long before we get behind this momentum and say that this is a good idea. I’m not against the principle of the concept that we shouldn’t make sure that we have someone that the public can go to if they feel, as I said earlier, that a grievous error has been made. I think that’s important.
The fact is, we have to be cautious how much we continue to source our bureaucracy. Often we hear about no toilets in schools, we hear about the needs for addictions, we hear about more money initiatives, we hear about access roads near the Peel, we hear about wanting more help in Hay River with the fishing industry, we hear more about Highway No. 7. We go on and on. We’ve got community employment issues in Fort Providence that we need to help people. We have so many wants. This is taking money from getting things done.
If it’s not clear by now, I’ll make sure to spell it out: I’ll be voting against this motion until a better proposal comes out that we can really talk about the framework of something that could work. As it’s written now, I’m sorry, I cannot support it.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. To the motion. The honourable Premier, Mr. McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to make a few comments with regard to the motion. Specifically, it is my understanding that this should be a matter for the Board of Management of the Legislative Assembly.
An ombudsman must be independent. It must have the independence necessary to allow him or her to investigate complaints against the government impartially. Therefore, the ombudsman must be an officer of the Legislative Assembly and not part of government. This is the case in all Canadian jurisdictions where there is an ombudsman. As the Member stated, all jurisdictions in Canada, except the Northwest Territories, Nunavut and Prince Edward Island, have a general ombudsman office.
With regard to the cost of operating these offices, my understanding is the costs range anywhere from about $500,000 a year in Yukon to about $13 million a year in Quebec. As I understand it, the last time that we investigated the costs, it was in the cost estimate of about a million-plus dollars to have an ombudsman office.
As this is a recommendation to the government, Cabinet will be abstaining from this vote.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Closing remarks to the motion. Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. First of all I would like to thank those Members for their words of support for this motion. I would like to talk a bit about a couple of things.
Cost has been mentioned in a number of different contexts. Yukon spends $600,000 or $700,000 a year for their ombudsman office. I would suggest that we are hardly anywhere near the size of Quebec, so I can’t see us spending $13 million on an ombudsman office. I expect we would spend approximately the same amount of money as the Yukon. I also expect we would see some savings in our court system and justice system as a result, because there would be fewer people having to go to court. At least those of our residents who have that conviction and will to take it as far as that goes.
There are many options possible for an ombudsman office. The fact that my colleague suggests that it needs to be a more specific proposal at this time, to me, is putting the cart before the horse. I believe that we need to approve the idea and then need to do investigation. The Minister of Justice has said a number of times, as we deliberate the budget, that we need to look into things, we need to get the facts, we need to determine what’s possible. That’s what this motion recommends. It recommends looking into and developing legislation for an ombudsman office. We could have a full-time ombudsman. We could have a half-time ombudsman. We could combine it with another statutory officer who already exists. There are gaps in the services to our residents which are not currently being addressed by the statutory officers that we have.
I believe that passing this motion shows that we recognize the need for certain services to our residents and I think it would show the will that the creation of an office should get started.
I would like to say that in terms of powers of an ombudsman, one of my colleagues suggested that we shouldn’t have somebody who is telling the government what to do. If the matter goes to court and the court decides against the government, the court tells the government what to do. In my mind, it’s far more efficient to have an ombudsman directing the government to do that than it is to have the court doing that.
To the suggestion that this legislation belongs with the Board of Management, the Board of Management does not develop legislation. Legislation is developed by the government, generally by the Department of Justice. This is asking for this House to determine that this service is required, and then asking the government to develop legislation, perhaps with consultation of all Members, perhaps with consultation just within the Executive. It’s suggesting an independent body but the legislation has to come from the Executive.
Lastly, there’s an issue that Members will not be able to advocate on behalf of their constituents because a situation might be before the ombudsman. That would be a specific situation. Somebody has made a ruling against me, my Member does not have to speak against that ruling. They can speak to the issue but they don’t have to speak to the particular situation. That happens all the time. We can bring up an issue and we talk to the issue or we talk to the policy or the process. We don’t have to mention specific things. I don’t think the advocacy of an MLA is going to be diminished in the least. I think it’s going to be a great assistance to MLAs’ offices and it will provide better justice for our constituents.
