Mahsi cho, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement I talked about the youth, and programs and infrastructure that are needed for the youth in the communities. I have questions for the Minister of youth. Mr. Speaker, I’d like to ask the Minister what this government is going to do to ensure that some of the much needed infrastructure that was built for the youth is going to continue on to the other communities that don’t have that infrastructure yet. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The honourable Minister responsible for youth, Mr. Robert McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The communities have done a really good job at identifying projects for the youth and they’ve been identifying dollars. They’ve actually been putting money towards it, and that’s been encouraging. I think one of the legacies of the 16th Legislative Assembly could be the amount of money that this Assembly has put into youth. Never has any Assembly before us put as much money into youth as we have, and it’s through the work of all Members of this Assembly identifying that youth are a priority, not only identifying that they’re a priority but actually putting money towards it to the tune of almost $4 million. So I think that’s been a significant investment in youth by the 16th Legislative Assembly. Thank you.
That’s a good response; I appreciate that. The infrastructure that I referred to, again, is there has been a good response from the government. But again, not all the communities have the much needed infrastructure. So I guess recognizing the fact that the communities have the capital dollars in their possession to do with as they please, spending it in their community. However, I’m wondering if the department, MACA, in response with the youth, has provided some sort of support to the communities to ensure that this start of the infrastructure, this $4 million in infrastructure that has come will continue to the communities even if the money has to be found from outside the GNWT. Thank you.
The communities themselves are getting their capital dollars and they’ve put a lot of money into youth infrastructure. I’ve been fortunate that I’ve been able to attend the opening of the youth centre in Paulatuk, and community centres, and in Fort Resolution they’re doing a youth centre there and a lot of it is a decision that’s made by the community. What our role is, is we continue to support them through the Youth Centre Initiative, which the money in the Youth Centre Initiative has almost doubled and the uptake in it has gone from 17 to about 34 community youth centres taken. So that’s where we see our role.
We continue to work with the communities. They identify their five-year capital plans and, again, I’ve been quite encouraged by the amount of money that they’ve identified and put towards youth infrastructure in their community. Thank you.
Does this government plan on moving forward with any transitional document to try to provide support for the communities to hire qualified youth workers? I think that if we have some program dollars, or we have some infrastructure, the one piece of the puzzle that seems to be missing is qualified youth workers who work with the youth so that they have programs that are viable at the community level.
Each community will usually have a recreation coordinator and they’ll hire their own youth workers as their budget allows.
What we’ve been able to do through the work of this Assembly is put more money into regional youth officers to work with the communities. We’ve also made the multi-sport games and the Youth Ambassador Program permanent line items in the budget. That assures us that those items are going to stay as part of the Legislative Assembly’s way of doing business.
The youth centre, the youth sports event through the work of the Rural and Remote Communities Committee have put almost $400,000 into multi-sport or regional sport games so the youth have an opportunity. We’ll continue to work with the communities.
The Member also makes a good point that we need to ensure this is all part of a transition document so that the 17th Legislative Assembly can carry on some of the work that was started in the 16th.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final supplementary, Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I see that the government has supported community-built infrastructure and supported communities for some programming money. The one piece of the puzzle that is actually missing is our actual youth workers at the community level. I think they have recreation workers. The money is flowing to the communities. In trying to make the government understand, I think that’s probably the most essential. Providing qualified youth workers working at the community level I think will gain the greatest results for the success of the youth. I’d like to ask the Minister again if that is something that his department could look at to see the benefits of having actual qualified youth workers at the community level.
I can assure the Member that is something that we can have a look at. Whether we’re able to do it financially is another question, and decisions such as that would have to be something that the 17th Legislative Assembly would have to take into consideration. We could also make our thoughts and recommendations to them in the form of transition documents. I can assure the Member that we will have a look at it.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.
