Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you, my colleagues, for speaking a bit about basic income today.
Mr. Speaker, can the Minister of ECE explain if her department has ever considered tailoring the income assistance system in the context of a regionallybased or a communitybased way rather than with a onesizefitsall approach. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member from Great Slave. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the benefit rates are based on the region in that it uses the northern market basket measure to determine the basic funding that an income assistance client receives. So it is based regionally considering that. While ECE understands that one size fits all might not work for everyone, it works very hard to ensure that programs like income assistance are delivered as fairly and as consistently as possible across the Northwest Territories while still taking into account that there are differences in cost of living for residents from one end of the territory to the other. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So as I said in my statement, structuring our social programs so they're designed to meet people where they're at rather than the other way around is the way to improve quality of life across all of our communities. So would the Minister consider piloting a project within income assistance that would reconfigure and tailor our existing system to the needs of the people in one particular region that maybe isn't dollarbased but is more based around their opportunities for employment. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in the month of July the Department of Education, Culture and Employment will be starting its new income assistance program. And so that program will allow persons living with disabilities and seniors to be able to do an annual application instead of a month to month application. And this reduction in the administrative burdens that are on some of income assistance clients will be able to free up a lot of time for the client navigators. And that time that is freed up with client navigators will be able to be used in more of a wraparound service provision where people can start finding out from income assistance clients what it is that they want to do, what it is that they need supports with, and be able to really meet residents where they're at in that way. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That's really great to hear. I am hoping the Minister may be able to commit to bring the findings of the client navigators back to us come budget time next year possibly? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, part of the new program is to do a performance management plan that would report on some of the findings and some of the review that takes place of the program changes and not only of the program itself but also to the communities as well where clients live so that we are looking at it very holistically.
In addition to that we do have an idea, for example, of how many people participate in programs when we take a look at the mains every year and so there is information available on an annual basis, and I would be more than happy to learn from the Member what else she would like to see. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. Oral questions. Member from Yellowknife North.
