Kevin O'Reilly

For.

Merci, Monsieur le President. Although some Members of this Assembly supported a priority to increase resource exploration and development, I believe that subsidies are not the best tool to achieve this. Increasing our overreliance on resource extraction is not my priority but if we are going to provide subsidies, these should be properly configured and evaluated. So I recently reviewed the guidelines and applications forms for the Mining Incentive Program. I'm going to offer a number of observations and suggestions for improvement.

In the last mandate progress report tabled earlier in this...

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I move that the chair rise and report progress.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. Well, that's good to hear about the work at the Council of Leaders with the working group on housing, and they're going to look at policies. But I guess I'm hoping that they're going to look at more than just policies, that they're actually going to be sharing information, as our government can and should as well, about what the housing needs are in terms of our stock and the programs and so on that we have in place.

Look, I don't really care who improves the housing. The question is getting the work done. And if partnerships are part of the answer, just go and do it, but. So...

Thanks, Mr. Chair. Although it's not one of the specific action items in here, we did get the Minister and the deputy minister to agree to prepare a plan to get our housing out of core need, and I had understood that that plan was going to be available before March 31st so I guess they got three days to go. But I'm just wondering if I can get an update as to the status of that work. Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. Committee wishes to consider Tabled Document 56719(2) and Minister's Statement 20219(2) concurrently at the same time. Mahsi, Mr. Chair.

In favour.

Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to put it on the record that I support this extension. I believe that, as I understand it, the department requested this extension and it will also give the department more time to go back and work with the professional associations representing some of the medical professions that have expressed a number of concerns as there's work to be done with the committee, but the department also has a lot of work to do, I believe, with medical professionals, and I look forward to the results of those consultations. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

For.

Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that. I think that was a yes, and I'm more than happy to take that as a commitment from the Minister, and I think it's a positive contribution I've made to help mining in the NWT.

So there is no requirement, though, in the for applicants to disclose whether they are in debt to GNWT or other governments or have unpaid taxes. While GNWT may be able to check some of this internally, the onus should be on the applicants for full disclosure, and those in debt to government should not be funded. Again, can the Minister commit to make...