Kevin O'Reilly

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I will be supporting this amendment to the bill. If you look at the memorandum of understanding, this change in instructional hours was clearly characterized as a pilot project, which means that it is going to be evaluated at the end of it. This was not meant to be a permanent change necessarily, but the way the bill was drafted, this was going to be a permanent change in instructional hours. We had this drawn to our attention by some parents. I noticed it when I first read the bill. This is a permanent change. Where is the review of this?

I believe that this amendment to...

Thanks, Mr. Chair. Yes I guess I will go on record as having expressing some concern about this. As I understand, the RFP was for a one-year term, and now this is, I guess for four years. That is a significant departure from what the RFP had called for. Does anybody have any explanation of how we went from a one-year to a four-year arrangement? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Clearly the Minister is not going to answer this the way that I want him to. He is not going to do the work. I will have to find another avenue. Perhaps a written question will be the proper way to do this because he is just not cooperating, and it is quite disappointing. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I guess I would hope for something a little bit quicker, but I will take the Minister's word. Can the Minister tell us how long this contract runs for? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I think I heard "look at it" at the end there. Is the Minister committing to do the work and providing us with the information? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I am not sure if my colleague from Yellowknife Centre asked this question or not, but can we actually get a copy of the contract that has been signed, then, even if it has to be provided on a confidential basis to the Regular MLAs? I would like to be able to compare that against what was called for in the RFP, and what the original New Day program was doing. Can he provide a copy of that contract on a confidential basis to the Regular MLAs? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I recognize that the Minister is under no obligation to actually respond to the questions, but I don't know how to make it any clearer. The formulae that are in here that start with kindergarten: can the Minister change that to JK, plug in the projections that he has, and give us the cost estimates, what those calculations actually are? Can the Minister commit to do that? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair, and I want to thank my colleague who asked some of the questions that I had here, but I just want to understand how this agreement was reached. This was the Department of Justice approaching John Howard directly. Is that how? Again, thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. That was a very long answer to a simple question, but I have one simple question to ask the Minister: I am looking for a commitment from him to prepare cost estimates, using these formulae, to change the ones that start at kindergarten, change them to JK, and tell me, using their JK student projections, how much extra it is going to cost to fully fund JK? Will the Minister commit to providing Regular MLAs with that information? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Have you finished, Ms. Green?