Bob Bromley

I appreciate those comments from the Minister. I think that’s going a good ways in the direction that we’d like to see this. The Minister mentioned in his remarks yesterday that 90 or 95 percent of these dollars would be going directly into those programs and I think as long as he agrees that that’s the sort of figure we’re looking at, I think that would satisfy the committee for now and I’d welcome his response to that. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Mr. Krutko.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I would like to stress the comments, many of the comments of my colleague Ms. Bisaro. She’s laid it out quite thoroughly there.

Basically we are at the point where we need to define in order to measure and then go out and measure poverty. I think somebody said at one of our get-togethers that if we don’t measure something, we don’t care about it. I am afraid that encapsulates some of the aspects of the issue we are dealing with through this to get an Anti-Poverty Strategy in the books.

The historical patterns and the development of poverty, of course, are...

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Next on my list is Mr. Jacobson.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments of the Minister there. I am sure that will be good involvement. Will the Minister also keep Members and committees informed of the progress of their work with the city’s affordable housing committee so that opportunities to align upcoming departmental business plans can be pursued? Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Next on my list is Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to recognize Weledeh constituent Dana Britton. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Krutko. Minister McLeod.

I understand there are some tough realities here. I think ultimately it comes down to the communities themselves. That’s the ultimate endpoint provider. I tip my hat to the City of Yellowknife for their Affordable Housing Initiative. I think it’s not a precise model for our smaller communities, but I think it’s a pretty good indication of some direction we could and should be going and focusing yet again on community capacity for dealing with some of these issues, because ultimately that’s where they end up residing. We can play a big, supportive role there, at least. That’s it. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’m just wondering, under the Canada Economic Action Plan funds that have been and are being spent in the Northwest Territories and recognizing that we are losing our federal funding steadily with the levelling out at zero in 2038, are any of the Economic Action Plan dollars stimulus funds being directed to really build our capacity for building and maintaining our houses with local people and resources so that we can start to shoulder some of those things ourselves and circulate what dollars we do have in the communities instead of exporting them out of the NWT.