Jane Groenewegen

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I give notice that on Monday, March 10, 2014, I will move the following motion: now therefore I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Thebacha, that this Legislative Assembly request the Government of Canada to propose to Parliament an amendment to the Northwest Territories Act that would authorize this current 17th Legislative Assembly to extend its term to a period not exceeding five years; and further, that the Premier communicate this request to the Prime Minister; and furthermore, should federal legislation be enacted as requested, the Board of Management of...

Thank you, Mr. Nadli. The motion is in order. To the motion. Mr. Nadli.

I do realize that they need to hear from the French school board, but the MOU proposed to the DEA, we’ve been officially notified by the chair that this has been rejected.

I’d like to ask the Minister, just for the benefit of people in Hay River to know, by what date would this Cabinet be making a decision on what avenue they are going to take to proceed? I know that the court deadline is March 24th. By what date does this Cabinet need to make a decision to expend the $13 million to build the gymnasium for Hay River?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are also for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. I have a lot of questions, but let me start in my little preamble, my short preamble to say that we talk, as a government, about regional capacity and building capacity. Part of that capacity building in Hay River is our schools, and right now I realize that the occupancy levels in our schools are not as high as they could be, and I think that’s what left the door open for this idea of this swap, but I do want to say that with this government’s commitment to decentralization and some of the...

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Is committee agreed?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I believe in deleting this, we have not failed to speak of the wages because further down in the motion it says that early childhood education workers be recognized as education professionals and paid wages accordingly. I think that covers the issue of the pay. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I did not speak to the motion, now that we’re back to the motion.

Mr. Speaker, in the whereas, and it says “and whereas early childhood education workers are professionals that should be paid the same wages as our teachers,” I have an issue with that because I don’t know what the early childhood education requirements are for credentials to teach early childhood education compared to teachers. I am pretty sure that teachers need some kind of a degree. I don’t know how long it takes to get a diploma or certificate in early childhood education.

So, we are now telling all...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to ask the Minister, very succinctly, what option does this government have, other than to comply with the court order, to spend the money and build the gymnasium for Ecole Boreale in Hay River? Thank you.

I, like my colleague, would also like to know what money we’ve already spent on looking at the school swap and what kind of money we have spent trying to fight building a gymnasium for Ecole Boreale. I mean, that would be an interesting number and I hope that the Minister could possibly be forthcoming with that. I think we should stop spending that money and we should start spending money on planning to build a new facility.

The deadline, again, that my colleague spoke of, Minister Lafferty refers to March 24th. I would like to ask the Minister, is there a date before that, even within the next...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Last night there was a public meeting held in Hay River. It was sponsored by the local district education authority, our DEA, which is elected members of our community who are mandated with overseeing education issues.

A number of months back, my colleague Mr. Bouchard and I were brought into a briefing with the Department of Education to talk about how the Government of the Northwest Territories was going to solve the issue of there not being a gymnasium at the Ecole Boreale French school.

Ecole Boreale is a French first language school that was built in Hay River, and...