Debates of May 27, 2021 (day 74)

Date
May
27
2021
Session
19th Assembly, 2nd Session
Day
74
Members Present
Hon. Diane Archie, Hon. Frederick Blake Jr., Mr. Bonnetrouge, Hon. Paulie Chinna, Ms. Cleveland, Hon. Caroline Cochrane, Hon. Julie Green, Mr. Jacobson, Mr. Johnson, Mr. Lafferty, Ms. Martselos, Ms. Nokleby, Mr. O'Reilly, Ms. Semmler, Hon. R.J. Simpson, Hon. Shane Thompson, Hon. Caroline Wawzonek
Topics
Statements

Oral Question 713-19(2): Economic Recovery

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'm hoping this is the last time I have to ask this question. When will the Emerge Stronger Plan be complete.

Speaker: MR. SPEAKER

Thank you, Member for Yellowknife North. Honourable Premier.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So I'd like to say the Emerging Stronger package will be done now, and it could have been done two months ago and put out there if I was going to take 100 percent control. And that would not be appropriate. We've talked about partnerships.

So I do know that people are waiting for it. I want to say that on March 26th, quite awhile ago actually, we presented the draft of the Emerging Stronger to the Accountability and Oversight Committee. So I'm hoping that all Members had seen that draft at that time.

We got a response back, and a revised document was sent to Accountability and Oversight on May 11th. If you don't have a copy, let me know, and I'll get it back again to you.

After that process was done, that we worked with Regular MLAs on what they wanted to see in it, then we worked with the Indigenous governments, because those are critical partners.

So we provided all of the document to the Indigenous governments. And we just closed the feedback on that last Tuesday. This week, we've been providing it to the Association of Communities for the Municipal Governments' input and the Business Advisory Council, and their input is being incorporated.

We will be, as I said in my sessional statement, tabling a draft in this session within these seven days, and it will still be open for public; it will still be open for feedback. This is going to have to be a living document. We don't know when this is coming. So this will always be changed. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I guess my other concern is that we have a number of different documents that speak to different areas of the economy. We have film strategies, art strategies, agricultural strategies, mineral resource strategies. We have a number of different documents, and I know there are many areas that the government is working.

So to me, I view this Emerge Stronger Plan as really new items, things that we are doing that we have not already done. But in order to do that, it really comes down to money, Mr. Speaker. There's no point of creating another plan without some special funding towards it.

So my question for the Premier is when we release the Emerge Stronger Plan, will there be funding associated with it. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As the Member is aware in seeing the draft document, that some of the things, absolutely, have budget lines to them. There are some things that are and were not priorities. Universal Childcare, we never had that before. Those things are in our priorities already. Those things have action plans. They have things attached.

Some of them, Mr. Speaker, will not be, have budgets attached to them at that time; they will have to go through the process that we all go through, the mains and the infrastructure or the capital. So until those processes are done, you won't see.

But, Mr. Speaker, not everything takes money. And some money is not going to be ours. Just because we have to go through processes does not mean that I won't stop lobbying support from the federal government. Like I said, the Federal government, their budget aligns quite well with what our needs are. And we've worked hard over this last year and a half to build strong relationships with the federal government, and that work has paid off in seeing what is in the budget.

So we will continue to have strong relationships and strong talks with the Federal government to get as much support as we can. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Speaker: MR. SPEAKER

Thank you, Honourable Premier. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.