David Ramsay

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Honourable Brendan Bell, Minister of Justice. It gets back to my Member’s statement from earlier today. I know Father’s Day is about 10 days away and Mrs. Groenewegen made a very nice statement today in respect to fathers, and the observance of Father’s Day, and what a father means in a person’s life. I commend her for doing that today.

I wanted to ask the Minister if he’s aware that under the current conditions that are in place, father’s can actually be forced out of their children’s life, oftentimes because of false allegations? It...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I have heard the Minister of the Housing Corporation exhaustively try to explain what this program is, where it came from and everything else. I have to say it’s an admirable try, but I am going to ask my questions now to the Minister responsible for the social housing policy and that’s the Minister of ECE. It was just over a year ago that they took the $30 million from the Housing Corporation. They casually liberated $1.3 million from the Housing Corporation’s budget to hire new people to carry out this social housing policy. I would like to ask the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, if indeed, and I would suggest that the work on the review that needs to happen for a means test for folks to access seniors’ housing and public housing needs to happen yesterday and I don’t think we can afford to wait the four months over the summer period for that to happen. I’d like to ask the Minister, can we get a means test for the seniors looking for housing over the summer, and I know the Minister said he’s going to consult with the committee, but is he going to enter into any projects over the summer? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there’s been much discussion about seniors’ housing the last two weeks during our session. Much of that discussion has been centred around a lack of a means test for seniors getting into public housing and, in fact, in some cases a lack of clients that may take up residence in some of these projects the Minister has talked about here the past couple of weeks. I’d like to ask the Minister what assurances can he provide to us that he’s not going to rush into any projects over the summer with building any further seniors’ housing without first informing the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I guess the question I would have to ask the Minister is he says things are going to happen, things will be resolved. I would like to get a commitment from him that both YCS’s needs and YK No. 1’s needs will be resolved and I know the Minister just said it’s not going to happen by this fall, but when are the issues here surrounding space in Yellowknife schools going to be settled once and for all? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This approach is obviously causing division amongst seniors in our communities and while no one could really begrudge a couple for taking advantage of such a generous program, the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation can’t provide this level of support to all seniors. It’s impossible, Mr. Speaker, that they do that. I’d like to ask the Minister is this an approach to seniors’ housing that the Minister plans to expand on? He started on it, but I want to hear an answer from him today. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I find that completely outrageous. There’s been a number of concerns raised in the media and from constituents of mine about the fairness of this approach. Some seniors receive fully subsidized housing while others are struggling day in and day out to maintain independent homes with very little support, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask the Minister, what is the plan of the Housing Corporation to address a more fair and equitable distribution of housing support for seniors in the NWT? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Luckily the NWT has these. We have gold, silver, zinc, copper and rare earth metals that are all trading at record highs. In most of them our forecasts remain high in light of the increased demand from Asia’s growing economy. We also have a major storehouse of clean energy: uranium. In order to bring these commodities into production some day, prospectors need access to the land to carry out the grassroots exploration activities. Unfortunately, many of their planned programs are being held up for political reasons while land claims are under consideration.

Mr. Speaker...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I think the question begs to be asked, well, why didn’t we go to tender three years ago or four years ago when we knew this was the case? If you want the approval of this Assembly to do that, I’m looking down the row here and across the way and I’m sure the will would be there. If there’s a need in Fort Simpson for office space, the desire and the will amongst the Members here to get that done would be there, but it just wasn’t done, Mr. Chairman. I think that’s the problem. It should have went to tender years ago, not arrive here on the floor of the...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I wouldn’t be adverse to going straight into the motion because I am going to support the motion to delete this item for a variety of reasons. I think other Members here today and yesterday have discussed how it is that we’ve arrived here at the 11th hour having to spend $3.5 million on a building that might have a life expectancy of two to four more years. It’s a complete, in my mind, waste of money without a plan to address the office requirement needs in Fort Simpson. It doesn’t sound like the Minister has a plan to do that. There’s been a lot of talk about, well...