Alfred Moses

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, Mr. Speaker, in 2017 the NWT Housing Corporation did seek feedback from the residents and our stakeholders through our housing engagement survey. We did hear from our residents on what is needed in all of our communities. Further, specific actions to address core needs were detailed in the Towards Level Ground publication, which also includes costs by initiative. This government is committed to decreasing core need by 250 households per year, and each initiative developed under the Strategic Renewal of the NWT Housing Corporation is intended to address the core...

As the Member notes, we do have a very big mandate to address and work on and we have made that commitment as the government to get those mandate commitments done. I know that the Government of Canada has worked on a youth council, and that's something new that they have addressed this year. We are working on a mandate commitments as well as the general business of government, so it's when we are giving new direction on something like a youth council or policy. I mean, our priorities are making sure that we focus on our mandate commitments that we made at the beginning of this 18th Assembly.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I agree that the Youth Parliament is an exciting opportunity for young people to become engaged and involved in politics. I think we had a really good opportunity to see that during the most recent Youth Parliament.

Beyond the Youth Parliament, I don't think that there has been any action taken to establish a year-round youth council in this government or previous governments. As the Minister responsible for Youth, I will be happy to receive any recommendations from the Member, or committee, or any Member of the Legislative Assembly on how we can address...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I give notice that on Monday, May 28, 2018, I will move that Bill 18, An Act to Amend the Cities, Towns and Villages Act, be read for the first time. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

As I mentioned, we do have the Rent Supplement Program that we help with our families that are in need. We also have programs through ECE in terms of income support. We do know that there are a lot of NGOs that do a lot of great work, working with us to address some of the core housing needs across the Northwest Territories, and the Member mentions that we do have a family of six. In some of our small communities, where we don't even have housing, those numbers go up, and that's what we need to work on addressing right across the Northwest Territories. We do have high waiting lists for housing...

We do not really have the full details in line right now. As this progresses, as the work progresses with one of these northern airlines, we will see what kind of response we get back from the federal government. We will have a better idea of what everybody's role is in this and what our role will be as a government. Until then, we really do not know until we get more details.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I know, not too long ago in the Yukon government, they looked at creating some type of training school for pilots. The Member is correct. We do have a shortage of pilots throughout all of Canada, and, when our pilots here, in the Northwest Territories, are getting approached by big airlines, it does become a concern for residents. As well, as he mentioned, a lot of us are connected by the airlines. We have had initial discussions with one of our airlines here, in the North, but that is all it is right now, just initial discussions on how we can move forward in creating...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, our JK to 12 education system is based on the goal of ensuring that all students are grounded in the rich and diverse history, culture, language, and heritage of our peoples in the Northwest Territories. As you know, we do fund all of our Indigenous governments that play an integral part in working with our schools and in the classrooms. We do have the Elders in the Schools Program, where we are currently revising our Aboriginal languages curriculum, Indigenizing education, and we always promote to our schools to ensure that our elders are in fact...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, I believe our program has a lot of incentives for our students who do have a forgiveness loan. We also have zero per cent interest on loans, and the Northern Bonus, as the Member alluded to. Mr. Speaker, because the Northern Bonus is classified as a grant, therefore it is a taxable benefit and recipients are issued actually a T4A slip.

I want to let the Member know that our department is currently reviewing this program, the Northern Bonus program, to determine if there are any alternative ways to provide this benefit without the tax implication on the students. For...

As I mentioned in my earlier response, we just had initial discussions. That is where it is right now. I do believe my colleague the Minister of Infrastructure has sent a letter of concern to his federal counterpart about some of these concerns with pilots and concerns that the Member has brought up here today. We will keep Members apprised of how this progresses as we have these discussions.