Michael Miltenberger

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I apologize to the Member opposite. Not recently.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With regard to the issue that the Member started his statement on regarding fiscal management and responsibility, we have, over the last eight years, managed our way through some extremely traumatic financial times, including the major downturn in 2007. As we have pointed out, we have still not rebounded from that, but we manage to navigate our way through those difficult times without any program cuts or layoffs and we continue to invest in capital.

We give, in every case possible, as much advance notice as we can. For example, when the fire season was going, we sent...

What we have laid out is a good, solid plan on a go-forward basis that we believe is going to show results. We are making a lot of the structural, organizational and procedural changes to do that. We have initiated a much closer working relationship with the private sector to make this a combined and joint effort so it’s not just strictly government.

But I can tell you, from a simple math point of view, if we filled the vacancies that we have, then we would address the issue that the Member is talking about many times over, and if we would recruit all the students that we’re giving SFA to, to...

Thank you. The Member is a fine example of the success of our education system. We’re not excluding the fact that it’s a loss. What we have done is started a program, an initiative that we’ve given ourselves a five-year time horizon, because we recognize that these things take time to sort things out, to turn things around, to do the work that’s necessary, to make the changes that are necessary, to do the things with HR, for example, where we want to be able to go south and enable the folks that go south to take interviews and do job offers on the spot so that we can be way more timely in how...

Thank you. We are at work in terms of a review, cleaning up after fire season, doing the final accounting and then doing the critical debrief is underway. Then early in the new year, we’ll have that work done and we expect to be able to go forward with those findings to committee to have a thorough discussion in anticipation of the upcoming fire season. Thank you.

Thank you. The extra funds are covered through borrowing the money. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to recognize one of the members of the union contingent, as well, Ms. Lauraine Armstrong, a family friend and a berry picking and swimming companion of my wife. Thank you.

---Laughter

Thank you. All the communities could take a page from the work that Kakisa did to take matters into their own hands as the fire smarted their community, and as they were encroached on all sides by fire they recognized the value of that exercise. So I think communities can look at doing public spaces and then the encouragement for all individuals to get out there with their own saws and chainsaws, as I did my property, where you thin out the trees, you clear out the underbrush, you limb your trees as high as you can, move your woodpile away from your house and those type of things. All will...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I can’t quantify how widely it happens, but I do agree with the Member and I’ve seen it myself where there’s smoke coming through the snowbanks even on a drive from Fort Smith to Hay River where there’s been fires. So we know it happens and we’ve mapped the burned areas, but I can’t quantify it to the extent the Member is asking.

There are a couple of initiatives that are intertwined here. We are looking at increasing the population of the Northwest Territories. That is one thing we’re trying to do. We are working, as a government, on decentralization to move positions outside of the centre, out to the communities. That work is underway. Phase three is now underway. We are also working to fill the very many vacancies we have, and we have approximately a split between Yellowknife and communities of vacancies anywhere between five to 800 positions that we’re trying to fill in both inside Yellowknife and outside of...