Jackie Jacobson

Let's just get this straight, too. I support my staff in the communities, in my riding, and across the territory. I sat on the education committee in my home community of Tuktoyaktuk for the last three-and-a-half years, and I support them. I support my youth, my youth who ECE is failing. It is not this Minister's fault. It is prior. At the end of the day, the department has to be committed to adopting a more accurate method in getting graduation rates in the NWT, to get more information broken down by the riding. That is all I am asking for. We have our haves and have-nots in our ridings. In...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today, it is high school graduation rates in our territory. I wouldn't want to be in the Education Minister's shoes because of yesterday's tabled Auditor General's most recent report on performance audit on Early Childhood to Grade 12 Education across out territory.

Regular Members had the opportunity to meet with the Auditor General staff to hear about the findings, things that shocked me, Mr. Speaker. ECE is using an outdated method to calculate graduation rates. The audit found that ECE reported a graduation rates that are 72 percent in 2017. Using a more accurate...

Madam Premier, you brought up a 48-bed facility going up in Inuvik, which takes our elders out of our community. I need help in regard to keeping our elders home, because we want to take care of our own elders. We don't need them just shipped off to Inuvik, where my people, the people who I represent, can't go see their loved ones. The only time they are going to go see them is if they are on medical or somewhere, because cost of travel is too high, and then when they bring them home for a funeral. That is the problem. I need help in regard to getting a long-term facility in Ulukhaktok, so...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today, I have questions for the Premier. Mr. Speaker, the last five months, basically, we had nothing going on in regard to short-term planning for any kind of jobs that we could create or what's happening with any projects going on because, once you leave Yellowknife and you head into the Delta, we have nothing going on in the Sahtu, nothing going on in my riding. What are her plans on the go-forward to stimulate the economy and jobs in the short term? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Education is key to our success in our territory and to our people and to our youth, because our youth are our future. Will the Minister make a commitment to the Assembly to provide a draft copy of the department's implementation plan in advance so the standing committee can have a public hearing?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have questions for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. What is the Minister's reaction to the findings of the audit, and in these findings, what concerns him the most? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. All I am asking is for the government, I guess, to relook at the 48 beds in Inuvik. They have 25 beds. We have a need in our smaller communities, such as Paulatuk, Tuktoyaktuk, and Ulukhaktok. Ulukhaktok is a priority. I have elders sitting in a long-term care facility who are not seeing family, and it is hard on them. Too much hardship going on, all the time. Everything is fly in, fly out, on the coastal communities.

The people of Ulukhaktok, Paulatuk, and Sachs Harbour need to have something to grasp on instead of taking them and pulling our elders out. I'm just urging...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So many families are affected by cancer. I am asking the Minister today to commit, just say yes with me, on a pilot project for the Beaufort-Delta to establish a team of professionals who will travel into the communities to do pre-screening for our elders and for the people who can't leave the community, who only go to the nursing station when they are really sick. They feel like they are not going to waste people's time, because, you know, they're not feeling well. They have to be really sick to go to the health centre. You know that, Mr. Speaker. All I am asking is if...

Putting out pamphlets and stuff like that don't mean nothing. It is good to have them in the community, but we need to know: what are the improvements of the healthcare system that the department is currently working on today?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today, my Member's statement is on cancer. It continues to touch the lives of so many people across our territory, and it is taking our loved ones far too often.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the front-line staff in Health and Social Services, who work every day with those affected by cancer, from the doctors and nurses to the people who book medical travel. These are caring professionals. They help cancer patients navigate the medical system in such stressful times in their lives.

Unfortunately, we face challenges, such as in the remote communities that I represent in...