Kevin O'Reilly

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I don't want to speak on this at length, but I personally had heard a number of complaints about our students in particular not getting absentee ballots while they were down south studying. Certainly, it happened for my son. The Chief Electoral Officer did identify this as a problem and an issue, and she brought this forward as a recommendation, so I am more than happy to increase opportunities for our students to participate in our elections. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. That is helpful information. I am just wondering if someone can explain, then, to me why this is not really in the O and M budget, and why this is not really part of the regular project planning for something like a new highway. Can someone explain why this is not part of the regular project funding and in the O and M budget? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. This is recommendation 13. I move that this Assembly recommends that the Elections and Plebiscites Act be amended to enable the Chief Electoral Officer to develop and make materials available to schools for distribution to students who have reached voting age or will soon do so, including information on the NWT's electoral process, the right to vote, how to have one's name added to the register of electors, and any other matter that the Chief Electoral Officer considers useful to electors and prospective electors. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. This is the fourth recommendation. Mr. Chair, I move that this Assembly recommends that the Elections and Plebiscites Act be amended to limit and regulate third-party election advertising related to candidates and/or policy. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. Earlier this week, actually, the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment made a statement about the Inuvik to Tuktoyaktuk Highway. In there, he said that ITI was working to position residents and business in the Beaufort Delta region to capitalize on economic opportunities from year-round road access. That led me to believe that ITI was sort of in charge of this part of this project and that they would be funding tourism-related activities and capacity building and so on. Why is this $100,000 amount appearing in the Executive and Indigenous Affairs Department? It seems...

I don't want to prolong this, but this is about clarifying the Chief Electoral Officer's ability to carry out investigations and enforcement and I think these largely stem from recommendations that she made, and I think they're very helpful in improving the transparency of the complaint process and providing some firm deadlines and certainty around complaints and. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think I might have to take a page out of my colleague's notebooks here and say, "No." Look, I know that the question was asked rather facetiously, and I do want to provide some assurance that this was an interesting debate at committee that we had more than one time. I think we tried to come up with a reasonable compromise. If I had any ability to influence Ottawa, I would probably be in Ottawa now rather than in Yellowknife. Thank you for that.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I appreciate that. My colleague's questions made me think of one additional one. I spoke earlier about the $1.7 million shortfall of funding to the district education authorities. If they were fully funded for all the JK students using the formula that the department now uses, is there a commitment on the part of this government to actually make up that shortfall at any point or to change the formulae themselves? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just very briefly. Right now the Chief Electoral Officer is required to file a report following the conduct of an election. The office does have the ability to file other reports as necessary, but this would require the filing of an annual report and I think this would just increase accountability and also give the officer the ability to tell us what they're doing in any given year. I think it's a helpful addition and something that the CEO herself has recommended and I think it's a good tool to increase accountability. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I just would like to respond briefly to my colleague, the honourable Member for Yellowknife North. I want to assure him that we did look at all of the options. On page 64 of the Chief Electoral Officer's report, there is a very interesting table of jurisdictions around the world and what their polling days are and also another figure showing the days that other Canadian jurisdictions use. We had all of that information available to us.

I think one of the reasons that we didn't really go with the recommendation from the Chief Electoral Officer was that having a poll on a...