Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think my question is better presented to the Premier, so I will ask the Premier the question in regard to my Member’s statement.
Mr. Speaker, in regard to statistics that I received at the conference that we held on poverty, it clearly states that the communities I represent, such as Aklavik, where we have 45 percent of the income levels per household is under $30,000, and in Fort McPherson it’s 43 percent. Also, households under $10,000, it’s 16 percent for Aklavik and 11 percent for Fort McPherson. I’m just looking at the unemployment statistics for Fort McPherson that are 45 percent and for Aklavik it’s 35 percent.
With these large numbers which clearly show that we have a problem in regard to economic diversification or development, does the Government of the Northwest Territories look at these statistics when they make decisions such as capital investment or finding ways to stimulate those communities through community initiatives to increase those numbers so that communities are able to be sustainable and give them the opportunity to take part in the northern economy? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Krutko. The honourable Premier, Mr. Roland.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The sustainability of our communities is an important initiative. One of the parts of our vision and goals of the 16th Legislative Assembly is to try to create an environment of sustainability. So there are a number of factors that we have engaged with during the life of this government and one of them is going to be the Electricity Rate Review and the adjustments to our delivery of electricity. The other is in the area of the economic side, under the Minister of ITI, has been, for example, the SEED program, the agricultural program, investments being made in that area, as well as the more traditional areas in our smaller communities when it comes to the hunting and trapping basket as well.
We continue to try to improve on that and improve on those numbers as we look forward to how we try to do our business in government. In fact, one of the things we’ve done during the life of this government is establish the Rural and Remote Communities committee as well. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I think one of the biggest factors in the Northwest Territories is we haven’t really made the decision to deregulate government and put government positions in the communities and keep them there and fill those positions. Mr. Speaker, there are some 5,000 positions in the Government of the Northwest Territories which could be put to communities regardless of expanding our programs and services officer positions, wildlife officers, departments such as forestry or looking at areas in regard to the economic development positions in our regions, housing positions at regional centres. We have to reprofile that.
Mr. Speaker, I think it’s important that we, as government, have to look at those types of shifts in government expenditures and making it that is where the income is going to our communities for jobs, jobs, jobs, and good paying jobs, especially government jobs in our communities. Thank you.
The processes we’ve been involved with as the Government of the Northwest Territories during this government and even previous governments to try to create a level of sustainability in our communities looks at those kinds of jobs. There were community transfer initiatives examples that were used and unsuccessful for a large part partly because of the way things were looked at in those days.
We’ve looked at a number of other initiatives ourselves. One of the areas is our program review to see how we deliver those programs and services in our communities and what impact that can have. So there are a number of factors that play into there.
The issue we come to is affordability, and we can even use the Nunavut example. When they designed initially, their government to be more devolved -- and the past Government of the Northwest Territories, which included Nunavut, they undertook that exercise -- they established and planned to reach out and establish departments in other areas amongst their communities. As they initiated that, they found that the costs were extremely high and they were not able to fully deliver on that. We would have to look at... Quite simply, if we were to look at redistributing the employment situation in our existing framework, we would have to look at overall how do we use the revenues that we have available and establish these positions in communities that they are not in today’s environment and where would those additional dollars come from. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, again, I think it’s crucial that this government seriously look at this issue. I will just use a statistic here.
Looking at Yellowknife, for instance, there are some 6,000 households; 6,625. Fifty percent of the households in Yellowknife make over $100,000 in which out of that the average household income is $111,419. Compared to a community of Aklavik which is 220 households, basically it is 9 percent of the households which make over $100,000, which is $44,000.
Again, Mr. Speaker, we talk about the cost of living, trying to find ways to reduce the cost of living. The only way I see us being able to get out of this trap is we have to develop the economics of the Northwest Territories and, more importantly, the resources, which are the people of the Northwest Territories. I would like to ask the Minister, can we look at finding ways to develop economic opportunities in all of our communities, make them self-reliant and offer the people in our communities that opportunity to go to work. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I couldn’t agree more with what the Member just stated about creating a sustainable economic environment in our communities and trying to provide the necessary tools to allow that to happen.
Just the other day, Minister Bob McLeod had responded to some of the initiatives that we are undertaking in our smaller communities through his department to establish subsidiaries. For example, that would bring jobs to the community and maintain some of those jobs. The support we give through a number of other departments, for example, on the traditional harvesting side of the equation and the Education department to try and get as many of our youth trained so they can take those high paying jobs as well. Ultimately, it comes down to trying to have a healthy economy that is driven through that process and not have one that is overly subsidized, and the question then becomes where do we get those subsidies. If we can develop those economies through our resources, we would be able to take better advantage of that and have a more sustainable environment to afford. That is why, for example, we are promoting the changes in the Electricity Rate Review. We are promoting highways that connect our communities and drop the cost of living as well.
Thank you, Mr. Roland. Final supplementary, Mr. Krutko.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Hopefully within the remaining year left in this government, we are really able to make a difference in our communities. More importantly, we have to use the tools we have at hand. We have policies in place. We have negotiated contracting guidelines. We have initiatives to stimulate our communities. I believe we have to formulate these partnerships, because the communities are trying to do their part, whether it is the band councils, the hamlet councils, the local government authorities, because they realize the importance of jobs in our communities. Can we get some flexibility in regards to allowing communities to take advantage of negotiating contracting guidelines, sole-source contracting and those communities that have high unemployment, and be able to use those policies to boost those economies and get those people to work and take advantage of the capital investment this government has available to it? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, the number of policies the Member just highlighted are policies that will allow us to do just that. That is create, try to help build capacity in the communities so that they can take on more of the contracting that happens in our communities and not have businesses come in from other parts of the Territory or southern Canada. The Negotiated Contracts Policy of sole-sourcing and so on is there to do just that.
We will continue to use those tools where we have capital programs in those communities to try and assist in that building of capacity. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Roland. The honourable Member for Kam Lake, Mr. Ramsay.
