Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. I'm wondering: what areas of income assistance the Minister will focus on as part of the income assistance review? Thank you.
Thank you, Member for Kam Lake. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Identifying the areas that we're going to focus on is actually part of the review. I think that, as an MLA, I've dealt with income assistance issues over the years, as have all MLAs, I assume. I know there are some certain areas that I would like to deal with. We're also undertaking a client survey so we can go talk to the actual clients who receive income assistance and see what they think the issues are. We're talking to the front-line staff, and we're using feedback from the integrated case management report. There are a number of areas that are yet to be identified, but I think that, if I was pressed, I'm sure I could name off a handful. I'm sure we all could. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
The Minister lightly touched on it, and I touched on some of the common barriers that were brought up in the ICM report in my Member's statement. I'd like the Minister to hopefully confirm that, yes, all of the common barriers identified in the ICM report will be part of the review of the Income Assistance Program. Some of those, for example, are cumbersome program requirements, late payments, and lack of person-centered approach.
Confirmed.
Thank you to the Minister for that. Given that 70 percent of ICM clients have housing-related challenges, one out of four is already homeless, and 80 percent showed up at ICM already unemployed, how could income security and housing front-line staff work together to provide a more coordinated wrap-around service at this time?
The Member is referencing the clientele of integrated case management, and there has been a limited number, I would say, over the past few years, of clients to that program. That's because those are clients who are facing a number of barriers. Those barriers interact with a number of different departments, and that's how they get access to that program. That program has shown us that sometimes these people, the clients in these programs, just need a little bit of assistance in certain areas. Sometimes, they need someone to go to the bank with them and help them talk to the teller and just give them at that confidence to say, "Okay. This is how this interaction should go." There are those types of things that need to happen.
In terms of the collaboration between departments, sometimes, we need some GNWT employees to look at these programs that the clients are accessing and look at it from the client's perspective and say, "Okay. How can we ensure that these programs are more streamlined, given what I'm seeing my clients struggling with?" What the Member is talking about, integrated case management, is specific to Yellowknife right now. Perhaps that model only works for Yellowknife, but the fact is that that type of integrated service delivery really needs to be rolled out across the territory. Maybe integrated case management isn't what's needed in communities but front-line staff working together, working across departments, under common policies that were developed by collaboration of departments is what's needed.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. That's exactly what I'm talking about is a collaboration between departments so that we can provide better service to Northerners so that they're not having to go to different departments and really search out what programs what might be available to them because a lot of people have enough struggles. Struggling through GNWT departments should not be one of them. I guess another way of looking at this is: what is senior management doing today in order to change the corporate culture from a gatekeeping one within the GNWT to one where service to the public is a top priority? Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.
The senior management of the GNWT really take their lead from the Executive Council of the GNWT, and I know that myself and my colleagues are all committed to ensuring that we have the best client service possible. We just heard the Minister of housing say the same thing. In that vein, the deputy ministers of the social envelope departments, Finance, ECE, housing, have all signed an MOU that states that they are going to work together to promote the principles of person-centred, community-driven delivery; that they are going to be responsible for this; and that they are going to have to answer for this. That is being coordinated by Justice as the lead on the integrated service delivery model.
When I say "integrated service delivery," I am looking at -- perhaps we could even change that name because that name even has a government focus on it. The government is integrating its services, but as far as the clients are concerned, they are getting services from the government. They don't know if they are integrated. They don't know which silo these services come from. The senior management is actively working to come up with ways to work together right from the point of developing legislation, right down to the service delivery, and working together with a focus on the best way to serve the client. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.
