Floyd Roland

Let’s be clear that again, with a Territory our size and the delivery of programs as complex as they are, we go out there at times for public tender, RFPs, RFQs, sole-sourced contracts as is the example being used today. We try to deliver the programs and services that we’re expected to deliver. It is a challenging environment. We go through a number of phases and processes of ensuring that we can get the work done and even though people who have worked for the Government of the Northwest Territories in the past, they still need to earn a living if they are to remain in the Northwest...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The part of the Executive that would be involved in that is primarily the office of devolution, where we have identified areas where we feel that areas of responsibility should be transferred to the North. That work has been done and there was much discussion about potential positions, either transferring from the federal government just to GNWT throughout the Northwest Territories and further discussion about what decision-makers or staffing is in other parts of Canada that may, as well, be moved here. That area of devolution discussions slowed down to a very slow...

Mr. Chairman, that direct question hasn’t been put to the organizations, but through just the negotiation process there are different avenues taken at times when it’s felt that negotiations have gone as far as they can and then it’s time for the political masters to sit in a room and iron out the rest of the process and details. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the National Aboriginal Summit was because under the Executive we have the native women’s and our women’s groups and support through the Department of Executive. An agreement was entered into to host a second conference. The contract, as highlighted, would have been for the whole series of meals provided through that conference. It wasn’t just one or two meals, but it wrapped up with a feast. So it was, I believe, in total would have been about three days for arrivals and then departures and supporting that conference. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have had no one from the public contact me or my office specifically; the issue has come from the Assembly here. We continue to use the policies that are in place. Any change in policy, we have a process where we go back to Members of the Assembly. If there’s a request by committee to look at that, we’ll take a look at that, as I responded earlier in an earlier question. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, Mr. Chairman.

I would agree with the Member. That is one of the areas that is of concern to us when there are so many different levels of government at the table. That is why, for example, at the regional leaders’ table we agreed to work on a land use framework process. That work is ongoing and, in fact, moving ahead, I would say, at a fairly good pace, considering the complexities across the Northwest Territories, and we continue to put that effort into it. Hopefully, before the life of this Assembly, we’ll have something we can agree on together with aboriginal governments and ourselves. But that is the...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Under the general operations and maintenance, under contracts, I’m trying to get further detail on that. We have contract services of $902,000 where he’s going back to 2008-09 actuals of $1.224 million. I’d have to get that information. I’d have to get the details on the difference there of what’s actuals versus what’s in the contracts registry department. The contracts registry area, the report is developed by ITI, I believe. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, the approval process is laid out. There are some dollar figures. So a contract could be let at a community or regional level and it could be let to a past employee of the Government of the Northwest Territories if they’re a year, two years, five years, ten years. As the record shows, and public accounts and our contracts document shows that there’s been those, an example of those, used by governments throughout different Assemblies on that initiative. Again, it depends on the dollar value. You could have directors issuing a contract all the way up to deputy ministers as well as up...

I would say there has been an improvement in the way we’re doing our business when it comes to our human resource plan. Number one, we’ve put a plan together. We’ve worked on the associate director position. We’ve also done a number of internal transfer assignments so we could have managers in training, and how we structured our negotiations teams, as well, has been positive. But for more detail, I’ll go to Mr. Robertson.