Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, earlier I made a statement about NTCL pensions, and I have a correction to make. I stated that the court hearing regarding the pensions was scheduled for October 26th. Today CBC reported that that date has been pushed back to early 2017. It's unclear whether the pensioners will continue to receive their full pension until that date or if the next cheque will be reduced. The pensioners I've talked to have had one communication from the company saying your pension will be reduced at some date in the future. That's all they’ve heard about it. I've also heard of some recent developments. Yesterday, a number of NTCL employees who received temporary layoff notices received permanent layoff notices. There are issues surrounding severance that I'll probably be discussing in the future as those developments develop.
My questions are related to what, if any, role the GNWT is taking or willing to take to protect the pensions of the former NTCL employees and to ensure they receive a fair severance? My question for the Finance Minister is: what level of engagement with NTCL, IDC, any of the unions involved, or the Monitor, Price Waterhouse Cooper, has the government being engaged in so they at least know what's going on with the situation? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as the Member said in his Member's statement that this is a privately-owned company and they were paying into a pension plan. To this point, we haven't had much contact with any of the parties involved. I think we play a very limited exposure that we have to NTCL and we don’t really have a standing in the bankruptcy proceedings. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I think I know how my second question will be answered. In 1999, the GNWT supported an application to the courts in the Royal Oak bankruptcy proceedings taking place in Ontario, relating to the termination of federally-regulated Giant Mine employees. Our government argued on behalf of the employees that the NWT Labour Standards Act had to be complied with to the benefit of the employees despite the fact that it is federal jurisdiction. Despite the fact this took place in a different jurisdiction, they did this to support our residents. So is the GNWT willing to put in the same effort to support the affected NTCL pensioners and terminate employees in terms of engaging any sort of legal proceedings?
Mr. Speaker, my understanding is that the GNWT had a standing in the Royal Oak proceeding so it was easier to intervene and make representation. I said before, we have limited exposure with NTCL. We don’t have a standing in the bankruptcy proceedings, so it would be difficult for us to do so, and it's also assumed that the pensioners and affected employees are suitably represented in the proceedings.
This is federally regulated. It always comes back to that. So on the federal level what is the GNWT doing to engage the federal Minister? Are they writing the federal Minister in support of the pensioners? Are they talking to the MP at least? Is there anything going on a federal level to support these residents of our territory?
Mr. Speaker, at this point, no, I haven't had the opportunity to speak with our MP; however, I will commit to having a conversation with Mr. McLeod, and as far as writing to the appropriate federal Minister, no, that hasn't been done yet.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Hay River North.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. These answers are, I guess, what I expected. We see that there's not much happening on the part of the government to support, you know, the affected employees of NTCL. In general, these type of things can be avoided in the future. I know that in Ontario they have a system where they have regulations to protect pensions, and there was an article a couple days ago in the Financial Post talking about how even public sector pensions, the investments are becoming riskier. They're not as stringently regulated as things like banks, and so there's a risk that, you know, a lot of people, a lot of organizations can face these pension shortfalls. So is the government aware of this and doing anything to prevent these types of issues in the territory in the future? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, I'm not personally aware of it; maybe the department is, but what I will ask them to do is to do some research into the issue that the Member speaks of. I mean it's unfortunate that we have to be having this discussion on the pension of those employees in Hay River for -- or all the employees of NTCL. But I will commit to the Member that I'll do further research. I'll ask the department to maybe have a conversation with Ontario, see exactly what it is that they do there.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Sahtu.
