Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, statistics going back to 1985, when the native employment policy was first used, confirms that the affirmative action policy has done little to move the needle beyond the 30 percent Indigenous participation in the public sector.
Mr. Speaker, the current definition of Indigenous person in the current affirmative action policy, in part, includes Aboriginal persons resident at birth pursuant to section 23 of the Vital Statistics Act, and any Canadian Aboriginal persons who have lived more than half their life in the Northwest Territories. Now this group is being considered for removal from the definition.
Mr. Speaker, will the Minister of Finance confirm that this is being done intentionally or was it an oversight, as it impacts a high number of Indigenous people in Hay River and is the Minister willing to continue using the current definition of Indigenous Aboriginal persons in any future policy revision? Thank you.
Thank you Member for Hay River South. Minister for Finance.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the current language is still outdated. It is referencing Aboriginal persons, it is very old, and so that's where it is for that reason that we are looking for a new definition, not certainly to exclude people. The new proposed definition is around prioritizing descendents of the Dene, Inuit or Metis people who are indigenous to the present boundaries of the Northwest Territories.
Mr. Speaker, I have had some conversations with the Member from Hay River around this and was surprised as I started to hear from him, from his constituents, about their concerns. Because it certainly is not necessarily the interpretation, and therefore certainly not intentional, that the new proposal should be exclusive or exclusionary of members of Inuit or Dene or Indigenous peoples from the Northwest Territories. So I acknowledge that there needs to be some refinement around the definitions to be more clear and that is the process that we are in now, is to get exactly this kind of feedback so that the definition can be clear and appropriate to the Indigenous people of the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, Indigenous representation of public sector is at an all time low right now, at around the 29 percent. Can the Minister tell me what may be contributing to this as we have had a policy in place for some 30 plus years? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I firstly want to say that in no way do I want to simplify the issue and while I can give some responses from the perspective of the hiring department, it's an answer that does look back to everything starting from maternal health to education to mental wellness that the more people are ready, able, willing to work, trained to work and healthy to work, then there's more people available to be hired. So this is a responsibility for all of government to ensure that we are all doing those things to have to achieve those goals. As the hiring department for the public service, Mr. Speaker, that too, there's a number of things that we are looking at doing, looking at job descriptions, ensuring that they are not overinflated and ensuring that they consider equivalencies that may reflect the skills and the abilities of people in the Northwest Territories and what we actually need to accomplish with the jobs that we have, and to ensure that we are looking past internal biases, that we are looking past if there is a cultural awareness and cultural safety which training, again, is now mandatory. Everything we can do to change the mindset, often unconscious and often unaware, of who it is that we have in our roles and what we need. So, again, it's saying I didn't want to oversimplify and now I'm going to get a bit long. I will stop there, Mr. Speaker, just to say there is a number of fronts on which we are trying to tackle the issue. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, Indigenous representation of public sector in 13 communities in declining. Will the Minister tell me how will the department turn this around? Would decentralization of some positions be part of the solution? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there are a number of programs, and just in coming up to the last question before this, what are we doing this to solve and what are some of the challenges. To the extent that training and opportunity is a challenge, there is a number of programs now, the Indigenous Recruitment and Retention Program, there's the Gateway Program, the internship program, student programs, secondment programs. All of those are opportunities to increase our presence within smaller communities and to increase awareness of the opportunities to work with the GNWT.
Another thing that I'd mention though, Mr. Speaker, we do have this was again part of the remote work policy that was introduced. It would provide some opportunity to have people working not only in a headquarters or regional place but to be doing that work remotely. We saw in COVID that it's possible. It takes a bit of getting used to as a manager. It may be, we realize that. We want to work with our superiors and managers so that they can better supervise people to give them those opportunities for remote work, where appropriate, where operationally allowed.
So a number of things, again, happening all within the space of a last couple of years and I am hoping that they will start to grow fruit. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Hay River South.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, one bright spot, if we can see it as that, is that Indigenous representation in senior management has reached its highest level since 2013 and currently stands at a whopping 19.7 percent. Can the Minister tell me what may have contributed to this little increase and can we expect to see exponential increases going forward? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate calling it a bright spot. I think that's the fourth question so maybe I am getting a bit of an easy going there. I recognize that 19.7 is not really a bright spot, at least it's on the right direction though. Mr. Speaker, I can say that one thing that was launched 2018, and finally actually got significant up gait in 2019 and 2020, is the Indigenous Development Training Program, previously known as Indigenous Management Development Program. It's an important change in terminology to go from saying management to development because it doesn't mean only for managers and it doesn't mean only to become a manager. It means it's an opportunity for someone who wants to increase their career skills to move up in seniority, in whatever path that might be, that they can do so. And it is certainly our hope that that program will continue to the extent that we expect that it has been part of the reason for this, that people will continue to apply for it and not see it and see that it applies to them, that it applies to any public servant who wants to increase their skills. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.
