Jackson Lafferty

This is an area that we have made a commitment to, that on average, none of the school boards will be over 16 to 1, on the average territorial. At the same time, those individual education authorities, as the Member indicated, year one, year two, year three, some will be just slightly over and those will be mitigated through the subsidy that I have highlighted.

The Member is also asking if it’s going to be on a continuous basis. When we roll out the junior kindergarten and start implementing that, then the funding will be based on their enrolment as well. The larger the student population, then...

Those are discussions that we will be having through the education renewal innovation. As you know, one of the pillars is to focus on small communities. The discussions we’re going to be having today until we develop the action plan with the work of the DEAs and the Aboriginal leadership, this is an area that will be targeted, the small community schools. By this summer we should have a clear idea of which communities we’ll be working closely with pertaining to these schools, what kind of programs should be delivered, upgrading and enhancing our programming. It will be part of the education...

This particular school was built and constructed in 1969. Again, there was a major, major retrofit in 1999 and since 2008, 2012 we’ve spent well over $2 million upgrading this facility. So we are on top of the renovation.

But at the same time, first on a typical capital planning cycle, Moose Kerr School will be scheduled for replacement or renovation in 2019. That is the overall plan and this is 20 years from the date of the last major renovation. Mahsi.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. [Translation] I would like to recognize our guests. It is the language group. They’ve been working on language development for many years. Today they are having a meeting and they’re here for a brief visit. I’ll tell you their names. From the NWT Metis Nation, Vance Sanderson, Leah Desjarlais; and also for Akaitcho Territory, Chief Ernest Betsina is here to represent the Akaitcho, interpreter Mary Rose Sundberg is also with that group; and Betty Grandjambe from Sahtu; Deline First Nation’s Pauline Roach; and for the Deh Cho region we have Violet Jumbo; IRC is represented by...

When issues like this arise, my department, more specifically through client service officers, work with those clientele. We’ve been working with our clientele since the beginning of the month on a constant basis, trying to assist them in various ways either through a medical note and so forth. We provide funding to their needs according to the policies that have been highlighted, so it’s based on that, these individuals who qualify for eligibility for the standard rate for their community. Those are just some of the subsidies that we provide to those individuals that are in need of our...

Through the education renewal innovation we are going to look at the overall formula funding for our educational partners as well. We’ve been discussing this at the early stages back in 2007 until today, how we fund the school boards, how we fund the school programming, and based on the needs of the communities. This is an area that we’ve been told that we need to seriously look at formula funding to our school system. Currently it’s based on enrolment, and now we’ve been told why couldn’t it be based on base plus and go from there. Those are some of the areas we are contemplating with our...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. This ratio 16 to 1 has always been there. It’s part of our legislation. We’ve been working with that with the school boards throughout the years. At the same time, we’ve been providing an additional $11 million so it can be based at 13 to 1 on the average throughout the Northwest Territories. It is through the legislation that was passed through this House, so that’s what we continuously work with throughout the years.

Part of the process of why it was established as different and diverse programming that we have, the threshold in various regions in communities is to attract those individuals into small, isolated communities. Most students that are graduating are university, post-secondary, college. So we can attract those individuals to the remote communities where they are very challenged because of a lack of job opportunities.

There are a variety of ways of dealing with the remissible loan in other venues that we have, but that’s the very reason why we want to attract those individuals into the small...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. We recognize that there are challenges within our Northwest Territories, along with other jurisdictions, as well, but as the Member indicated in his Member’s statement, we have one of the best SFA programs throughout the country. We improve our programming every now and then, changing our existing policies and enhancing through the review. We just conducted a review of SFA and part of the recommendations brought to our attention was some of the challenges that we’re faced with. So those are the discussions that we need to have as we move forward.

As indicated earlier, I...

Mr. Speaker, earlier today the Honourable Jason Kenney, Minister of Employment and Social Development, and I signed a Labour Market Agreement for Persons with Disabilities. Under this agreement, the Government of Canada will provide up to $1.25 million in federal funding each year for four years to the Government of the Northwest Territories to improve employment prospects for Canadians with disabilities and better meet the needs of Canadian businesses. The Government of the Northwest Territories presently contributes over $2.7 million, part of which will be used to cost match the federal...