Charles Dent

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yes, this doesn’t replace the registration with their professional organization if that is required to practice a profession. What it does is the credentials are checked and then assessed against a Canadian standard, and what you get is a certificate that says yes, you meet the standards, then you could submit that to the professional organization and they would then review it and determine whether or not to agree that you should be able to practice. For instance, Alberta Opticians recognize the standards and are willing to accept them. It is a fairly extensive...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I can certainly talk with my colleagues and make sure that they're reminded of this requirement.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the evaluation should be completed in April. Then what we would hope to be able to do is if we are able to find any new money, use the evaluation of what programs that have been particularly successful, use that as a guide for where we should then start to emphasize the new money going towards, if we are able to find some new money. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Very shortly after I became Minister I raised this issue with the department and asked that they do some work to take a look at what trends were across Canada. I, too, had heard from people that our system appeared to be falling behind in some areas. So it is something that we're watching. We're looking for opportunities that we may have to restructure the program somewhat to try and make it more relevant, more useful. That is, of course, a challenge when we have the fiscal climate that we have. But, yes, it is something that hasn't fallen off the radar, it is...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. These numbers are not completely finalized and that is why I said we would likely be coming back for a supplementary request. In the 2003-04 school year, the contributions to schools was $110.375 million. What we are expecting that will be in the next year is $113.233 million. That’s made up of UNW increases, cost for implementing curriculum, updating of average salaries for the enrolment change and to maintain the 15 percent inclusive schooling directive, basically.

Certainly, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a return to an oral question asked by Mr. Allen on March 17, 2004 regarding the constitutional questions related to attaining provincehood.

Mr. Speaker, the Aboriginal Summit is a society established by aboriginal organizations to represent their interests in the Intergovernmental Forum process, including the negotiation of the transfer of lands and resources to the Northwest Territories. While the Aboriginal Summit does not have constitutional status, many of its member organizations have lands, resources and self-government agreements that do recognize and...

Thank you, Madam Chair. The college does have a program for professional development for the staff and as part of the collective agreement, we are required to invest in professional development for staff at the college. So there are ongoing opportunities for the staff to improve their skills and the college will, of course, be regularly encouraging people to do that because they, too, would like to see people encourage their skills. Having said that, we don’t have any territorial standards for certification. The college does oversee people to make sure the people who are teaching are...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I believe I indicated to standing committee that we expect to have it completed by May.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Cabinet was certainly aware of the recommendation that the committee made, and there was some discussion about it. As I have said, I think we would all agree that investments in early childhood programming are significantly important investments, but we haven’t yet found a way to say that we have the money to put this back into the budget yet. As I have already said though, this is something that we are continuing to discuss. I am convinced that this is the area where we should try and look for an opportunity to reinvest, and we will continue to do that.

In terms of...