Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, Northerners know that supporting the development of the next generation of Northerners is a top priority for any government, and this one is no different. As Minister responsible for Youth, I would like to ask: what resources are available to the Minister to support young people, and how does the Minister formally engage with young people and learn their viewpoints, what kind of services they need to support their development? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister responsible for Youth.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We have a lot of different intergovernmental, interdepartmental programs that we work with other departments within the government, that provides a lot of program services. I believe I have been asked this question before in previous sessions, and I would be willing to share that information with the Member.
Just recently, I and the Minister of Health went to Camp Connections and spoke to about 60 youth on health, wellness, education, culture, and language, and wanted their views and their input. At the end of this week, we should be getting it. We also engage in schools, many different venues, avenues, different groups that are coming out of the schools, but we work within our government with the departments and our stakeholders to find out what is important to youth and work on addressing those challenges, those concerns, supporting the successes, as well. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Does the Minister have any information on how those consultations or interactions with young people have shaped government policy? Does he have a "what we heard" document that is kind of an ongoing tally of youth issues and youth concerns as we do with other stakeholder groups?
As we engage with youth, we always get feedback on how the programs are, whether we want to continue working to support those programs. The one in particular that we just attended earlier this week is an excellent one. Both I and the Minister of Health encouraged and challenged youth to come up with policies, come up with ways we can move forward into what we need to do as a government and the decisions that we need to do, and that is where it starts.
This is a new generation of our young adults that is going to be taking over our seats and other leadership in the community, and we want to get their feedback so we can make the appropriate changes.
So that was a no I heard from the Minister, but, that being said, the Minister is clearly quite engaged in this topic and clearly enjoys working with youth and listening to what they hear, so will he commit to establishing a youth council that will be a standing body for young people to participate in, not just in a youth parliament setting but year on year, and provide ongoing feedback to government programs and policy and allow the Minister to canvass young people on their ideas about what our priorities should be as a government? Will he commit to establishing that youth council?
Such programs as the Youth Ambassador Program, the one that we just worked with the Department of Health on, we engage youth from all 33 communities in the Northwest Territories. This one in particular we had a really good engagement, from 12yearolds right up to 18, asking them what we need to do in terms of policy change, legislation change, programs and services that we need to provide. We will continue to work with the departments and our communities to address those.
It was not a no. We support our youth. The youth is our future, and anything that works in government, we need to hear from the youth because they are the ones who are living in a time that is a lot different from the way a lot of us have grown up in the past.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We all support youth. I think everyone here is very proud of the young people in our constituencies and our communities and the work they do, but I think it's key to actually establish bodies and policies that give youth a voice in government. Again, if not a youth council, why not establish a youth secretariat to better coordinate the government programs directed towards youth? Currently, they are scattered, as the Minister said, scattered throughout the public service. Why not have a youth secretariat to better coordinate those resources and so the Minister responsible has a clear sense of how those programs are working and can evaluate them against their success? Thank you.
Yes, we will take that information. We will have discussions, obviously, when we go before committee, and continue further to have these discussions and how we establish regional youth councils or even a territorial youth council. That is information we will look at, and we will bring it to committee to get feedback from committee moving forward. We will continue to evaluate the programs such as Back to the Trail, the program that I and the Minister of Health just attended, and see the successes and where we move from there. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Sahtu.
