Thank you, Madam Speaker. My questions were for the Minister of Housing but I've noticed she's stepped out. So I'm going to have an impromptu question for our Premier.
There's been some previous discussion about corporate restructuring, and I'll note that some of that discussion is centered around the departments of ENR, MACA, and Lands, who all tend to have one Minister right now. I'm just wondering if this is still on the table in the life of this Assembly, whether the Premier is going to look at corporate restructuring and how different departments are structured?
Thank you, Member. Madam Premier.
Thank you, Madam Speaker. Sometimes I wonder if people are flies on the wall because we just had that conversation yesterday. So absolutely, yes, it's still on the table. We're talking those talks now. Thank you, Madam Speaker.
Thank you, Madam Premier. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Madam Speaker. This week, I asked the Minister responsible for MACA when the seniors facility in Fort Good Hope would open, and he told me to ask the Minister of Housing. So my question for the Minister of Housing, I know she is intimately familiar with that facility, having been the one who opened it in her community, when will that facility open Madam Speaker?
Thank you. Minister responsible for Northwest Territories Housing Corporation.
Thank you, Madam Speaker. I just I received an update from my department. So the electrical assessment is to be complete and finalized and the engineering and structural assessment are underway by professional engineer and architectural firm. The Housing Corporation is highly engaged with architectural and engineering consultants to finalize the remaining remediation requirements to ensure safety occupation as soon as possible. Based on the assessment to date, the Housing Corporation is targeting to have the building ready for occupancy March 2022. Thank you, Madam Speaker.
Thank you, Madam Speaker. I'll note that March 2022 is a full year after the Minister opened the building officially. Can someone just explain to me what is going on here? Thank you.
Thank you, Madam Speaker. The Member is correct; we did officially open the building last year in February 2021. The inspection was completed by a professional engineer of the Office of the Fire Marshal in 2021, found that further work was needed to ensure safety occupancy of the building. One example, the requirements for the fire separation between the units. When we have a multi a multiplex unit, the fire separation is the current is in the current building does not meet the code requirements, and this is a safety consideration. We want these buildings to be designed in a way to protect and give adequate time for a neighbor to get out of their unit should a fire occur in one of the other units. Thank you, Madam Speaker yeah, thank you, Madam Speaker.
Thank you, Madam Speaker. You know, I know there's a lot of experts here, and I struggle to understand how something doesn't get built to code, and then I know sometimes the experts get in fights about what actually the National Building Code says. So my question for the Minister of the housing, do her experts in the Housing Corporation agree with the fire marshal's assessment of the National Building Code, or are we in one of these situations we're having a battle of the experts in the GNWT? Thank you, Madam Speaker.
Thank you, Madam Speaker. The Housing Corporation concurs with the findings of the Office of the Fire Marshal and is working to the remaining code concerns addressed as soon as possible. Thank you, Madam Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary, Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Madam Speaker. I really hope there's not some engineer in the GNWT who just cringed when he was told that he concurs with the assessment. But my question here is this has happened to the GNWT multiple times, where we've opened buildings and then there's been well, in this case, a oneyear delay before the building is actually opened. Are there some sort of lessons learned? Is there a path forward to prevent us from continuing to not open our buildings or not build them to code. Thank you, Madam Speaker.
Thank you, Madam Speaker. The Housing Corporation works closely with the regulatory authorities, including the Office of the Fire Marshal, to ensure our full construction process takes into account a bestbuilding practices, including the plan reviews and regular inspections. The Housing Corporation will work with its staff and contractors to ensure better awareness of these building practices and regular requirements as well. And also to encourage the Office of the Fire Marshal as a recommendation to work with the Housing Corporation to review the plans prior to the final design inspection. Thank you, Madam Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.
Oral Question 859-19(2):
Merci, Madam la Presidente. A hot pursuit question for the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs. What I didn't hear in her response, though, to my honourable colleague from Yellowknife North was the Building Standards Act. Is that something like, I think this is what's at the root of the problem, Madam Speaker, is the lack of a Building Standards Act here. Is that something this Minister and her Cabinet colleagues are prepared to look at, is a Building Standards Act for the Northwest Territories? We're the only jurisdiction in Canada that doesn't have one. Merci, Madam Speaker.
Thank you, Member. Are you addressing it to Minister of MACA or okay, so Minister of MACA.
Thank you, and I thank the Member for the question.
He's right; we don't have it. We're the only jurisdiction in Canada. It's something that we're working on but right now, we have other legislation that we need to get done. And I know the Member wants us to do all this great work but we need to get things done as we've already planned to do it. If we have time later on, as we complete other legislation, then that will be one of the things that we have on our books presently. Thank you, Madam Speaker.
