Floyd Roland

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, the three positions will not all be located in Yellowknife. One of them will be in the north and one will be in the south part of the territory. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I have with me today the director of legislation, Mark Aitken; to my immediate right is Mr. Lew Voytilla, secretary to FMB; and, to my immediate left is Ms. Lynn Elkin, assistant deputy minister of corporate human resources. Thank you.

I am pleased to introduce Bill 21, An Act to Amend the Public Service Act. The staffing appeals process provides for public accountability of staffing within the GNWT public service. The proposed legislative amendments to the Public Service Act will enhance this accountability by enabling revisions to the staffing review and appeals regulations to strengthen the staffing appeals process by making it more independent and transparent.

The proposed changes to the Public Service Act include an appointment mechanism for staffing review officers as well as a more extensive regulation-making...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I’d have to take exception with the Member stating that we have employees out there who are not committed to the policies that we have in place. If there are examples of that, if there’s proof of that besides accusations of employees not following the rules, then definitely bring them forward to me and I will work to address them. We have a policy in place. We need to follow those policies. We know there are some problems with the one management program that we have in place. In fact, we’re trying to, as we go forward, incorporate it into the work around...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the affirmative action policy will not be eliminated. What we are doing is looking at its structure and incorporating it into the new organization and how we would carry on business as the Government of the Northwest Territories. Just to be clear and on the record, affirmative action is still an issue that we’re dealing with and looking at how we can carry it forward. If it has the same title or a different title, that’s something to be decided.

On the committee the Member spoke about, that has not been in operation for quite some time, so the work we’re...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The percentage in 2003 from our own stats of aboriginal employees would be in the area of 32 percent, an average between all communities. The affirmative action policy is still something that we use on every position out there and it’s a consideration on any options we have to do hiring throughout the government. The affirmative action policy is in place and is used for positions that are advertised. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, what we do in a number of cases or in the past, again, we haven’t got into privatization initiatives for a number of years now, but what was done in the past when a community or business would request that this be done and there was support for it, an agreement would be put in place. There would be a timeline established as well for the final transactions to happen and the company would take over full operations. I believe in the case of Tuktoyaktuk it was a five-year agreement that was in place, but after year four there was an agreement to proceed with...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I don’t have the information available to me. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Under the land claim agreements, there is a requirement that we, as a government, would undertake certain activities. They would be listed out in the agreements and in this case, with both the Sahtu and the Gwich’in, the money would flow from DIAND for us to perform work for the organization. So that’s how that one works. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we are hoping that we can bring something to Members by early fall, so that they could review the work that has been done. As I stated, in the past, there have been a number of reviews done on the affirmative action policy, so our intention is to work with what we have initially, put something together, bring it forward to Members for their input and then move forward on that basis. Thank you.