Debates of October 27, 2004 (day 29)

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I give notice that on Friday, October 29, 2004, I will move the following motion:

Now therefore I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, that the Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation identify and recommend to this House viable options to sustain our long-term public housing investment;

And further that the Government of the Northwest Territories sets as a target the reduction of core housing need in the Northwest Territories by 10 percent by the year 2007;

And furthermore that the Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation work with other NWT stakeholders to develop a convincing proposal to take to the federal government for additional investments in the NWT public housing.

Mr. Speaker, at the appropriate time, I will seek unanimous consent to deal with this motion today.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

WHEREAS the 15th Legislative Assembly vision statement identifies as a goal housing that is adequate, affordable and accessible;

AND WHEREAS the 2004 housing needs survey has identified 2,260 households in the Northwest Territories that are considered to be in core need;

AND WHEREAS there are many houses in communities throughout the NWT that are boarded up, and that could potentially be brought up to standard and made habitable at a lower cost than new construction;

AND WHEREAS the policies and standards of the NWT Housing Corporation and the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation fail to recognize northern traditional building practices as being acceptable according to national standards;

AND WHEREAS 14 percent of all households in the Northwest Territories have identified major problems with the physical condition of their dwellings;

AND WHEREAS there are individuals and families who can no longer access the programs and services of the NWT Housing Corporation because of previous rental and mortgage obligations to the Housing Corporation and there is a need to provide adequate shelter for these people;

AND WHEREAS the current policies on housing programs for disabled persons are uncoordinated and there is a clear need to improve the level of services available to persons with disabilities living independently;

AND WHEREAS the $33.2 million annual contribution for social housing from the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation will be reduced over the next 34 years and will disappear completely by the year 2038;

AND WHEREAS the NWT Housing Corporation Act has remained substantially unchanged since 1981;

NOW THEREFORE I MOVE, seconded by the Member for Yellowknife Centre, that the Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation identify and recommend to this House viable options to sustain our long-term public housing investment;

AND FURTHER that the Government of the Northwest Territories set as a target of reduction of core housing need in the Northwest Territories by 10 percent by the year 2007;

AND FURTHERMORE that the Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation work with other NWT stakeholders to develop a convincing proposal to take to the federal government for additional investments in NWT public housing.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. A motion is on the floor. The motion is in order. To the motion. Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I totally support this motion. I just want to make a couple of quick comments. First of all, I find it really heartening that we have a clause in there that points out about disabilities and independent living. Mr. Speaker, I would like to see that this government takes a strong, firm grip on the type of policy that helps enable our people in healthy living conditions.

Mr. Speaker, I truly believe housing is a critical issue out there. It’s a basic need. Tom Jackson, the famous singer, once said, you know, if there’s no house, life doesn’t really matter. He coined it in such a silly way, but it was simple. A house is the basic need of healthy communities. Health is a basic need to have healthy families. I think he was absolutely right. I don’t think he was speaking from a scientific report or anything, but I think from his heart he was totally and absolutely right.

I think it’s time that our housing department creates policies. If we have agencies out there in the private industry that come forward and ask for money and want our housing department to participate in private programs and whatnot, we should be able to enforce those relationships with following our types of policies that we put forward.

Mr. Speaker, I’m in support of this. Like I said, I wouldn’t be long and I’ll leave it at that for now. I think it’s a great motion. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. To the motion. The honourable Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I fully support this motion. Mr. Speaker, looking at the housing needs survey in the communities, visiting the people in the communities and looking at the conditions of housing and seeing where the federal government’s obligations to our people are, in terms of giving us affordable housing in our communities and giving us places where we can stay that don’t run into many problems such as our honourable Member for Nahendeh mentioned about mould. Some of our houses in our communities are in bad shape. Hopefully, this motion will give the Minister some good support to go to the federal government and have a really good discussion with them in terms of having our funding increased. Even if this government had enough funding to increase housing, I look at this report, Mr. Speaker, and there are some people who don’t have running water in our communities. In this day and age, that’s a crying shame, as I’ve always said. In this day and age there are 240 people that don’t have running water. That’s what we have to do to make a difference in their lives in the community. That’s what we have to do.

There are some people that don’t even have indoor sinks and basements at home, let alone indoor toilets that we take for granted. This is why, Mr. Speaker, I fully support this motion that gives some ammunition for the Minister and gets what we have to do to make sure that we make a difference in our people’s lives. Tell our people tomorrow who don’t have running water what we have done for them. We talk about other issues. People across the Northwest Territories who don’t have baths or showers; that’s 172 people. There are no kitchen sinks for 156 people. There are a lot of numbers here. There are 1,728 people who need major repairs on their houses. Winter’s coming.

It’s here.

Winter’s coming. This is fall right now. Winter’s coming. Wait until it gets really cold, minus 50 and 60; that’s winter. These people need major repairs in their homes and yet we can’t do it. That’s why I support this motion. I support the Minister going down and getting a good deal from our federal government. We’ve done it with health, we’ve done it with equalization. We need to do it on…I’ll maybe have to retract that. I’ll have to wait until I hear from the Minister of Finance. However, Mr. Speaker, this is why I’m in full support of this motion and I’m passionate about this motion. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. To the motion. The honourable Member for Nahendeh, Mr. Menicoche.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today, too, as well, to support the motion that’s before us, with regard to housing. Just with that alone, that’s one of our basic core needs: food, shelter and clothing. That’s fundamental to any existence anywhere in this world. I just want to speak to the fact that, upon being elected…It has almost been a year now and people warned me, they told me, they said, Kevin, the single most common concern that’s going to come before you, especially for Nahendeh, is housing. And it’s true. Over the course of the year, I can say that at least 50 percent of the concerns I’ve been dealing with have been housing; not only for the constituents, but for the housing staff in Fort Simpson, as well. They are doing the best they can, but they are lacking the resources with which to handle this huge problem that’s overwhelming in my riding of Nahendeh.

Basically, the constituents at the basic people level are telling me, there’s one word that they use in Slavey called “nahetsandile” and that always strikes a cord to me, Mr. Speaker, because what it means is that nobody’s caring or taking care of us. I want to tell them today that I care and I want our government to care.

A motion like this kind of does that, I believe. I certainly believe. What it does is bring to the highlight that yes, it’s very important to our government and I just don’t want it to be a spoken kind of caring, Mr. Speaker, because the last three or four years, our government has steadily been decreasing the budget. The budget for the Housing Corporation has been steadily declining and those kinds of actions don’t show the people or give confidence to the people of our North that it is high on our agenda.

I’d like us to review that and say look, it’s very important to us that we support our people and their needs and one of the ways of doing that is to review the way we’re making housing a priority. I know it means spending more money, especially in my riding alone, just to address the current needs to update, to bring current the homes that are there, especially to national standards. I know it’s not there yet because of the mould problems that exist there. That alone is an indication that the houses have been poorly constructed and need attention today.

One other thing I want to speak to is the Housing Corporation Act was created in 1981 and that’s very old. I believe that it needs addressing. We have to look at some other comparable systems in other jurisdictions like in the Yukon. They have an appeal system that’s independent and that people enjoy because the way it is set up now, Mr. Speaker, is that when somebody has an issue and they want to appeal a certain decision by the Housing Corporation, they are asked to go back and see people that said no. So what hope is there of having their decision overturned at all? So I believe that, yes, we have an old system here and it has to be revitalized and it has to be more user-friendly to the people and constituents that are out there, Mr. Speaker. Just with that, I would like to thank my honourable colleagues for taking the time to listen to me and I’ll be supporting this motion. Thank you very much.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. The honourable Member for Great Slave, Mr. Braden. To the motion.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I will be speaking in support of the motion and I would look at the three tasks or the demands that we are putting forward in this motion, Mr. Speaker, as the areas that I would like to address. I think my statement reflected my deep concern for the first requirement, Mr. Speaker, and that is that we take on a much more urgent basis the sunset of the funding program that we have had in place with the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation from $33 million, Mr. Speaker, this year in long-term mortgage assistance and O and M, and we’re going to see that drop, I think in the neighbourhood of about $25 million by 2010. By 2030 it will be in the neighbourhood of, I think, about $15 million. Then, of course, I think it will go to nothing. This is one of these sorts of quiet things that will happen in the background, Mr. Speaker. It’s going to be hard for us to notice them on a year-by-year basis as we see the revenue statements coming through from the government, from the Housing Corporation. There will be a little bit every year sliding off the table from CMHC. That is why it is so critical now that we turn our attention to innovative ways to replace that.

In addition, as the Minister has indicated, he’s going to be having another meeting with another housing Minister. I think we’ve been doing this for a long, long time, but that has got to be on the table, as well: restoring the federal government’s commitment to investing in public housing. But I think it would certainly be careless of us and naïve to expect that it’s simply going to flip over overnight and we will be on the same generous program that we have been before. We’re going to have to be looking for ways to be more independent, more self-sustaining in our housing financing, and I think it’s going to take more than just looking for pots of money that we can dig into.

I think we need to change a lot of our thinking about conventional housing designs. My colleagues have spoken about some of those things this afternoon, I won’t go into it, but our ability to think ahead, far ahead to a future that will be extremely expensive purely for energy consumption, Mr. Speaker, should be way up on our radar screen when it comes to how can we make housing not only accessible, but affordable too.

Mr. Speaker, the second demand in the motion looks at the reduction of core housing need. This is one that I think applies very much to the Housing Corporation. It also applies to a number of other agencies within our government, Mr. Speaker. Core housing is essentially a formula by which we determine a family’s situation, fiscal health, other considerations, and this then triggers, through various policies, our ability to offer assistance or provide assistance to a family. The standards that we have set right now, I think as the motion indicated earlier, suggest that there are 2,260 households who are in need of core housing. The Housing Corporation in the business plan of 2003-06 -- I would say again, Mr. Speaker, that this is about an 18-month-old plan, but it’s the most current one we have before the Assembly -- set a target of decreasing the percentage of families in core need from 20 percent to 19 percent. That’s only a one percent reduction in the number for housing in core need. I think, Mr. Speaker, it far undershoots the need here. It is simply a one percent reduction, and it doesn’t say over what period of time, by the way, only a one percent reduction that does not indicate that we have a Housing Corporation that sees the urgency and the need to really do something and make a difference out there. That is why this motion calls for a 10 percent reduction in the number of families in core housing need by 2007. We’ve put a time frame on there, we’ve put a more aggressive target. In fairness to the Housing Corporation, they are not the ones entirely responsible for this. So this is a signal to all of government to work together to help our families become healthier and better housed.

Hear! Hear!

Mr. Speaker, the third demand here is that our corporation work with other stakeholders to develop a convincing proposal to take to the federal government for additional investment. The Minister indicated he is going to be seeing the federal Minister, I think it was next month. We hope, Mr. Speaker, that he will take this message to heart and involve other people in the Housing Corporation's plans and visions. There’s a 10-year plan that we understand is in the makings. I wish we could learn more about that today or very soon, but I’m anticipating that in the near future we will, and I hope it is going to be one that will take into account the kind of thing that we’re bringing forward today.

Mr. Yakeleya quoted briefly from the housing needs survey. There is valuable information in there, but we need to broaden our horizon as a bureaucracy, as a government, as a Legislature that I think has a big social mandate and an acceptance of that mandate. We’ve got to be more aggressive, more forward thinking, more inclusive of other organizations and companies and communities that can help make a difference.

So those are the explanations that I would like to offer, Mr. Speaker, in support of this motion, and I look forward to a 10-year plan that the Minister has talked about. I look forward to being able to make a difference across every one of our communities. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. To the motion. The honourable Member for Range Lake, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I’d like to just make a short statement in support of this motion. I would like to first of all reiterate the points that I made about the need for senior housing in Yellowknife, Mr. Speaker, which is very, very dire. Right now really the only independent units for seniors that are available in the city is the Aven independent courts, and that only has 24 units and it runs at full capacity all year round and it has been for the last 10 years that it’s been in existence. There are some seniors' units available in Mary Murphy and Northern United Place, and some private markets funded and subsidized by the housing authorities in the city. However, Mr. Speaker, I can tell you that all of them have really long line-ups and that there has to be something done for those seniors in need.

Mr. Speaker, I do appreciate that the Minister and this government have to deal with the needs and pressure from everywhere. When I’m asking for attention in Yellowknife, I don’t mean to do that at the exclusion of all others, but I don’t appreciate it when the Minister sometimes uses that as an excuse of inaction. I will tell you that the Minister of Health and Social Services has been planning for this for at least three years and if he plans some more, there won’t be any seniors left by the time he’s done for him to take care of. You know you can only study something for so long. He’s been planning and planning for two years that he was a Minister in the last Assembly and he has done it for the last year, and I say that’s enough planning and it’s time to do something and to act on it. So let me tell you, Mr. Speaker, I look forward to the Minister’s plans after November’s study and he could be assured that I will be pushing for him to act on the basis of the mountains of studies that he’s said that he’s done so far.

Mr. Speaker, I just want to speak briefly about the role of the Housing Corporation and its mandate to provide housing for the Northwest Territories. Mr. Speaker, I think that this motion should serve as a guide and direction and mandate for the Minister to work diligently to meet the needs of housing in the Northwest Territories. I understand that he is new to this portfolio and I am sure he’s working to get briefed and trying to determine his priorities. Mr. Speaker, I have to state that he can’t be, and the department and no Minister should be, trying to provide services economically and in an affordable manner by breaking their own policies. Yesterday, Mr. Speaker, we talked about the heated debate we went through when the government chose to waive the BIP back in March, and part of a major problem with that was the fact that the government didn't do any communication plan. It just landed on our laps at the last minute and we had to deal with that and they learned their lesson. Yesterday I learned that the Minister reinstated the BIP, except we didn’t know anything about it.

Ms. Lee, to the motion. Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m talking about the importance of a government department like the Housing Corporation in its effort to provide affordable housing in an efficient way, an economical way and that’s…(inaudible)…but I’m saying, Mr. Speaker, and I am saying to the Minister and the entire government that they can’t be trying to achieve that by breaking their own policies willingly. I think I’ve made my point there, Mr. Speaker.

Another point I want to make, and that’s going back to the seniors’ housing, the goals and objectives that the YACCS has cannot be met with only the help of the Minister of Health and Social Services. It does require the assistance and cooperation from the Housing Corporation. It requires their assistance in getting financing for their condominiums that they have planned, as well as some of the money required for the dementia facility. So I would ask the Minister to pay attention to the plan that the YACCS has. They have a very good plan and it really would be meeting the mandate and the responsibilities of the corporation to work with the YACCS to see that their plans are put in place. I think that would be my statement on this motion and I will be voting in favour of this motion. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. To the motion. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I’m in support of this motion as well, and I will speak briefly to one of the points, a whereas in the motion.

And whereas there are individuals and families who can no longer access programs and services of the NWT Housing Corporation because of previous rental and mortgage obligations to the Housing Corporation and there is a need to provide adequate shelter for these people...Mr. Speaker, just because people run into difficulties with the units that they are buying or renting does not negate the fact that they are still NWT residents in need of housing support, and this is where I think the policies of the NWT Housing Corporation need to be looked at. One of the Members today asked when was the rent scale revisited; well, the rent scale was changed not that long ago and as a result of that really substantive change to the way the rent scale was set up, rather than having standard rates for rent it was all based on household income and there are few realities in the North related to the way people live that make household income a really challenging way by which to charge rent.

It has nothing to do with the unit or the size of the unit. It has to do with household income and, in fact, in the Northwest Territories it is, I think, a cultural thing and a traditional thing quite often for extended families to live in the same location. It serves some purposes. For example, sometimes there are seniors who are benefited by having grown children live with them because of the requirement for some assistance in their living. In some cases it benefits with parenting for young adults who have children to live with grandparents in the fact that they may need to go to work at the mines and they need to have support for childcare. Just the concept of extended family living is very common in the North, but our rent scale does nothing to recognize that. They just say household income, that’s it. If you’ve got your son or daughter who is working and temporarily living with you, then the rent goes up and then if you don’t pay, then the person whose lease the name is in will be penalized forever after as having arrears to the NWT Housing Corporation.

So there needs to be, in my opinion, more flexibility because there aren’t a lot of private market options in a lot of the small communities for these people. If they are making reasonable wages and could rent something privately or buy something, I’m sure they would do it rather than pay rents to the Housing Corporation. In a lot of cases there just aren’t many options. So I think we need to be very sensitive to the way that people live, traditional values and the realities of how people share accommodation in the Northwest Territories, and I don’t think in the rent scale there is one ounce towards doing that. I just wanted to mention that. Housing is a very interesting topic and we could spend a lot of time talking about it, but I think this motion is good in terms of things it addresses and I look forward to seeing what the Minister will do with this department. I think he’s got an open mind and some good ideas and I, so far, feel he is very receptive to working with us to improve the goals and the outcomes with the Housing Corporation. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. To the motion. The honourable Member for Kam Lake, Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I, too, am going to vote in favour of this motion. I just wanted to quickly go over a couple of points. The first one is we want the Minister responsible for the Housing Corporation to identify and recommend viable options to sustain our long-term public housing investment. Mr. Speaker, I just wanted to mention to the Minister I don’t want that to come with a huge price tag attached to it. I think there have been enough studies and reports and consultation done over the years that we should be able to come to grips with some of these options without having to spend a great deal of money. I can appreciate the need that is out there. I mean, it’s a tremendous need, over 2,600 units needed throughout the Northwest Territories and I can appreciate that and the Minister certainly has his hands full in trying to address this need and housing certainly is much, much needed in the regions. I would like to say I know the Minister is new in his capacity as the Minister of the Housing Corporation and I do know that he has shown the Members on this side that he does have a heart and he does have some compassion.

Yeah.

I think in his role as Minister of the Housing Corporation, that’s something that he’ll need and something that Regular Members do appreciate. As well, I know the president as well with the Housing Corporation is new in his role, and as Regular Members we look forward to working with the new Minister and the new president to try to address some of these serious concerns. Again, I am supporting the motion that is before us today. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. To the motion. I will allow Mr. Yakeleya some closing comments, if he would, as mover of the motion.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as I said in my earlier statement, I am very passionate about this issue about housing in small communities. I grew up in my grandfather’s house, and my grandfather's house was taken down by the Housing Corporation who said that they would build a new building there for us. I'm still waiting for it today. In saying that, this is one of many stories that people in small communities have in terms of housing and that’s why I’m quite passionate for the people in homes. Like my honourable friend mentioned to me and mentioned to the House here, that is one of the issues that the people have in the Sahtu, saying that housing was going to be a really big issue. I wasn’t really sure about this until I got into the position of MLA at some community meetings with some Ministers and did some of the tours in the communities. Housing in our region is a crisis. I think that the Northwest Territories would deserve better than that. I think it’s about time the federal government is taking some notice and help us out more than they are doing right now.

I want to thank the Members for who have spoken in favour of the motion and I look forward to the vote. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. All those in favour of the motion? All opposed? The motion is carried.

---Carried