Glen Abernethy

That’s my point, Mr. Speaker. The Minister was talking about implementing something for the working poor on Monday and, yes, it’s not going to happen, which is unfortunate, but that’s where we ended up as a result of the rescinding of this policy.

My point is still there, Mr. Speaker. We, on this side of the House, never saw anything about any program that was going to be implemented on Monday. How was the Minister planning to… When the working group report is tabled this afternoon, it doesn’t say anything about implementing any program on Monday for the working poor. So what program was this...

The next area I just have a few questions on is, I’m looking through your list and I’m seeing a lot more duplexes in here. I’ve been to a lot of communities over time and I guess I’m seeing more and more duplexes and more and more row housing type units over time. I think that’s a good direction for us to be going. I really feel that getting away from sort of single, stand-alone units over time will be better as far as maintenance costs, heating costs, if we can share some of the costs on a unit basis, construction costs, all of those types of things.

Does the Housing Corporation have a program...

Thank you Mr. Chair. I’ve gone through the list of items identified within the capital estimates, they’re information items. It looks like there are one, two, three, four, five new units under the HELP program for construction in ‘11-12, and I know there’s been a lot of talk about the number of vacancies and the Minister has made some commitments in the House about getting rid of the vacancies that exist in the Northwest Territories, but over my three years in the Legislative Assembly, I have been to a number of the communities and a lot of the communities that I go to, there are vacant HELP...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Your committee has been considering Tabled Document 66-16(5), Northwest Territories Capital Estimates 2011-2012, and would like to report progress with one motion being adopted, and that consideration of Tabled Document 66-16(5) is concluded and that the House concur with those estimates and that an appropriation bill to be based thereon be introduced without delay. And, Mr. Speaker, I move that the report of Committee of the Whole be concurred with.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I will keep it short. When might we, as Members, and when might the public start to see this research start and when might we see some sort of recommendations coming out of this review? Thank you.

Question has been called.

---Carried

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation as well.

I talked in my Member’s statement about flexibility of programs. The lack of flexibility is, I think, a problem across the government as a whole, not just the Housing Corporation. But there are certainly certain areas within the Housing Corporation where the programming lacks flexibility.

I highlighted in my Member’s statement one example where the programs are set up in such a way that it doesn’t encourage tenants to go back to work or take advantage of short-term employment...

Mr. Ramsay.

Does committee agree that that concludes our consideration of the NWT Housing Corporation?

Thank you, Minister McLeod. I have no more Members on my list. Are there any questions? We’re on page 3-12, which is an information item. Programs and district operations, infrastructure investment summary, total infrastructure investment summary, $16.420 million.