Floyd Roland

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, I am unaware of the changes that impact the seasonal firefighters as the Member has stated. The payroll changes that we have implemented across the Territories sees a delay or an advance being paid to all employees and then a portion of those being drawn back. I am not aware of the details of how that would specifically affect the firefighters, so I will have to get that information. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, once again, the Member initially started saying, “in his opinion,” but again he has clearly stated not just now about the Finance Minister but Cabinet has circumvented the rules. I believe that’s inaccurate. We have laid down the specific situation in this House to the public about the situation. There may be feelings of certain Members that they don’t like the result of what happened, that we’ve circumvented the rules, we have broken the rules that are in place, I don’t believe we have done that and I look forward to your decision on this. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I am pleased to announce that the GNWT and the Northwest Territories Teachers' Association have negotiated and ratified a new three-year collective agreement.

This new agreement will improve the competitiveness of the GNWT in recruiting and retaining teachers and administrators, while also focusing attention on key issues such as aboriginal languages.

The new agreement will result in a restructuring of the teachers' pay grid over three years to provide more consistency. The minimum pay increase will be three percent. Additionally, employees with more experience and...

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I wish to table the following document entitled Public Accounts of the Government of the Northwest Territories Interim Report for the Year Ended March 31, 2005.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, I think over a number of years the department has made changes in its process of how it does things as a result of concerns being raised in the House. We have made a number of changes and as I’d committed to this process I’m hearing the concerns here and looking at the document and seeing already where we can strengthen that. Again, I’ll provide that to the Members and see what input they want on it. Some Members would probably like to sit beside me at the FMB table and say yes or no to certain projects. Unfortunately, we won’t get to that level...

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, the information that we use or the changes we use, we do inform Members of the changes that have occurred. In this particular case, the item came back to this House requesting the permission to make the change. So when you look at the process, we followed the letter of the law. We’ve followed the process in place and, in fact, I believe Members were aware that this was occurring prior to the day before, because a Member had been quoted in the paper as being supportive of this initiative. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, as the exercise we went through, one of the ways we report capital carryover is through the supplementary process that’s reported in this House for lapses of projects that just have not got off the ground and have been dropped. We will work on getting that information together. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, the Member is talking about the actual pay cheque and the delays. For example, our casual hires would have to wait the two weeks before they get their first cheque. The normal process for GNWT employees, until we made this change, would have been that they have gotten cheques sooner, but it made it very difficult for us to calculate sick time or time away and make those adjustments for overtime and so on, and it further delayed when the season ended. That is the reason why we made those changes. Now I see where the Member is coming from on the...

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, seeing that this is the last day of session, I must say I look forward to traveling back home to Inuvik. It has been some time since I’ve been back home and I especially look forward to taking part in the Samuel Hearne Secondary School graduation ceremonies that are taking place on June 11th, and look forward to taking part with the graduates there and wish them the best, as well.

Of course, I look forward to just the everyday visits I get from the good people of Inuvik. So I’m looking forward to going home and wish everybody here safe journeys back...

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Earlier in a Member’s statement just a few moments ago, Mr. Ramsay had, as I see it, made allegations against me saying I circumvented the rules. Under 23(h) of our rules, I believe that is an infraction. I have listened to some of the Members and their comments and felt that they have pushed the envelope. I feel at this point I have to rise on this point of order. We followed the rules and I tried to explain what had happened. I believe in this House now making that allegation against me is not appropriate. Thank you.