Jackson Lafferty

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Certainly, that area has been brought to our attention as a department, and we are looking at options on how to deal with those seniors in their own home or in a public unit.

Just for the fuel subsidy, it will be in their own home. We are looking at where individuals working at the mine sites are living with their grandmas or their parents. It is based on household income.

At the same time, some individuals, community members, unfortunately do take advantage of that, where they are living with their grandmas or moms or grandparents. They’re not paying anything. This way...

Mr. Speaker, within the education system, with the Education Act and also the guidelines and policies that we follow, those do come into play even before the trips go out. Identification of the maintenance of the vehicles…. If there are any problems with the vehicles, then they need to work on those vehicles, as well, before they hit the road.

Certainly, most of the school boards and also school authorities have a common practice of regular maintenance on the buses, and they have school vans as well that they maintain on a daily basis. There is a common understanding that there are guidelines...

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Certainly, we do take safety as a first priority in any trips that are going on, these sports trips for students or community trips. Most of the time they go on a school bus, and as you know, the school buses are regularly maintained. Those are the factors that come into play.

It’s the students’ lives we have to deal with, and they are the first priority. I can provide that information to the Member. Whether he wants the schedules of maintenance or information pertaining to that, I can provide that to the Member.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. I would like to speak today about an Income Security program that is unique to the North and that has recently been improved. The Senior Home Heating Subsidy provides support for fuel, including wood, wood pellets, fuel oil, propane, natural gas or electricity for heating to seniors who own and live in their own homes. It was designed to help elderly Northerners deal with the higher cost of living. The Senior Home Heating Subsidy provides a direct and clear improvement to the quality of life for seniors.

The benefit is fairly simple. Taking into account household income...

I will commit to the Member that I’ll bring something back to the Member, also dealing with the household income. Whatever changes we make does come with the funding, so we need to take that into consideration as well. We need to find out how much it will cost us to change our policy overall for the Northwest Territories. So we need to do that math; factor that in. Mahsi.

Like I said, we are working on this, especially this month, with the following few more months to go. Then, whatever we come up with, we need to talk to the Regular Members as well, because whenever there are changes, we need to notify the Members on the policy changes. As long as it meets the needs of the communities, the seniors especially…. We need to work with the seniors — how we can help them, especially with a recent increase of $10,000 for the Seniors Fuel Subsidy. We want them to qualify for that subsidy program, but at the same time, there is a threshold with their household income...

We can certainly gather the guidelines we currently have in place to see if we need to improve in certain areas, whether it be the satellite phone for a long journey from here to Hay River, that type of deal, or Smith or isolated communities, for that matter. Those need to also be taken into consideration.

At the same time, these are important issues we’re dealing with. On these trips and journeys it’s not only one coach who goes. There are always chaperones. There’s always an assistant coach and the students and the peers of the students. We have to keep that in mind as well. It’s not only...

Mr. Speaker, for the transporting of students, whether it be by bus or van, we take the safety precautions of inspecting those vehicles, maintaining those vehicles. We are fully aware of the incident that happened in another jurisdiction. We are taking safety as a priority. Certainly, I can come back to the Member with the information he’s requesting. There are certain guidelines on the safety aspect. Each school board could provide that, and I can have that available for the Member.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Last month I attended a meeting with my counterparts from across Canada. We discussed many issues related to justice and public safety, but the one that will likely be of particular interest to this Assembly was the issue of aboriginal justice and policing.

I called for improvements to policing in our small and remote communities and highlighted the challenges of northern policing. There was considerable support from the provinces and territories as well as the federal Minister, Mr. Day. Many said that they have similar issues, especially in their remote and northern...

I can certainly share that with the Member. I don’t have it in front of me today. But it does break down on whether it will be the foundation, the actual structure of the building itself. There are many aspects of the project itself, so we need to have the breakdown of the actual cost of the capital project.