Glen Abernethy

In order to get a bonus, an employee would have to be seen as exceeding their expectations. If they don’t exceed their expectations, then they shouldn’t be getting a bonus. It doesn’t matter, it’s not specific to one category or another category. They have to be seen as overall exceeding.

I’m happy to meet with committee to discuss bonuses, how they are awarded, how they are earned, and if any changes are required, we’re happy to consider those with committee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That information is on-line. We’re happy to re-provide it to Members.

I’m happy the Member brought up my past experience, my past comments. I did exactly what I’ve done already as a Minister, which is post all ranges for all GNWT positions in the Government of the Northwest Territories. I’ve said in committee, I’ve said in the House that that should be done and I’m happy to say today that is exactly what has been done.

With respect to posting individual salaries and individual position salaries, I’ve never been supportive of that, but if it’s something that committee wishes to do, I’m happy, with my colleagues, to look at that and discuss it with committee. If...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Following up on the recommendations of the Access to Privacy Commissioner in the last Assembly, the government also made a recommendation that the government post all salary ranges for different categories of employment in the Government of the Northwest Territories. The Member and I were both on that committee, and since becoming a Minister I have directed the department to post all salary ranges for all categories of employment in the Government of the Northwest Territories on-line. They are all there.

As far as posting individuals’ salaries and individual position...

Mr. Speaker, many of the individual diversions are very specific to the individual involved in the diversion, whatever can be arranged in the community. It would be difficult to provide a comprehensive list of every specific diversion that has taken place, but I will commit to getting to the Member a bit of a summary of the types of things that are being done in the different communities as well as a little bit of a summary on what some of the communities are doing as far as prevention and individual diversion.

I do know that some of the communities have submitted applications for money to run...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There are a couple things. Some of it’s promotion and advertising. We do have the Not Us campaign, which is actually a community-driven promotion and awareness campaign. It does exist in Inuvik. The RCMP are working with the community group who is delivering that, and I think we’re getting some pretty positive results in Inuvik.

We also have community justice committees in most of our communities in the Northwest Territories. They are working through diversion to work with youth to find alternatives and healing methods, and ways to divert them out of the criminal justice...

It is a hypothetical question. I have committed to going to committee. I have committed to sharing our information with them and working with them. If committee has some direction they would like us to follow, we’re absolutely open to discussing that and working with committee on any issue that’s important to them and the people of the Northwest Territories.

I just want to correct my last answer just slightly. Employees’ information, excluded senior management are on-line. I’m not 100 percent sure about deputies’ information, how that is determined. It is by policy, and I can share that with the Member if it’s not on-line.

With respect to individual bonuses and why they may be awarded, financial management would be one category. At the end of the day, we have collective agreements in place, we have agreements with our employees, we have the Public Service Act which outlines bonuses as a possibility. Every deputy is responsible for doing an...

Thank you. I don’t think we have anything to hide about or hide behind. Bottom line is, our legislation is specific and it talks of this particular area. We are not in a position to release that information without changing the Access to Information and Privacy Act.

Like I said, I’m happy to go to committee, have a discussion on this and if committee wishes us to change the Access to Information and Privacy Act, that is certainly something that we are willing to work with committee on. Thank you.

I’ve seen that information and I understand that some jurisdictions, under their particular access to information and privacy legislation, have the freedom to do that. We have our own stand-alone legislation here in the Northwest Territories which we have to comply with, and our legislation does not allow that. I am happy to sit down with committee and have some discussions around this, and if they wish for us to pursue this and look at our legislation, we’re happy to do that, but right now our legislation actually limits our ability to do exactly what some of these other jurisdictions are...