Robert C. McLeod

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The initial discussions on devolution, the transfer of the federal houses over to the GNWT was not included in those initial discussions. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wish to table the following document, entitled “2014 NWT Community Survey – Summary of Housing Results.” Thank you.

I can’t speak for what the federal government does. That’s their decision to make. However, we are now responsible for decision-making in the Northwest Territories and, of course, we want to protect the environment. That goes without saying. I mean, anybody in here can realize that. But what we want to do is, we want to have some sustainable economic development so our people can actually go work, get a job. But I can assure the Member, and again, it goes without saying, that of course we want to protect the environment and we do what we have to, to do that.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. A security bond is an instrument that is typically issued by an insurance company to pay one party a specified amount if another party fails to meet their obligations. So under the Waters Act, that is a sufficient instrument to use.

We had developed this as a pilot project with the hope that, well, with the four pilot projects, that the communities would put in the applications right away to take advantage of this. We were a little disappointed that we only had three come forward right away, and we do have, I think, a fourth one that we’re working on right now. We want to see how this works, and if this works well, this is a great opportunity for community organizations, too, because we will provide them with some funding to look after these homeless shelters on our behalf.

So, we’ll evaluate the results of this and then...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The homelessness coordinator has been on board now for about a year and a half and has been visiting a lot of the agencies and gathering as much information as she can to assist her in her job. As far as the standards go, as the Housing Corporation, if we provide the infrastructure, we would ensure that infrastructure meets all the building standards. As far as the programming in there, I would have to have a discussion with my colleague, the Minister of Health and Social Services, because my understanding is that whoever the funding agency is to operate that shelter...

Thank you. As part of the plan they submit to the Sport and Rec Council in their funding, they identify some of the clinics that they want to put on in the communities. I know for a fact that through the Aboriginal Sport Circle, the Parks and Recreation Association and Sport North run a number of camps in the communities to get the youth there not only competing but just to be active, and it’s through some of the programs that we partner with our colleagues, departments, the Active After School Program, the whole idea is to get our children active and we’re seeing a result of some of this as...

As I said, we will explore our options and if there are opportunities for us to do something with these units, if they meet the criteria that we have and if the deal is pretty good, then we will look at taking the next step.

I will have discussions with my colleagues, and the Housing Corporation will continue having discussions with Public Works and just see what opportunities are out there. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, being one of the Members from the Beau-Del, we’re very fortunate that we get to rely on the advice and experience of a lot of good leaders up there, and one of those is Mr. Floyd Roland, who was very instrumental with his advice and experience when I first started this. It’s been almost 10 years already; it’s 10 years this month. So I thank him for that and welcome him to the gallery once more. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The sheer volume of home sales in some of the larger jurisdictions down south required it almost be mandatory for them to have this type of protection. However, here in the Northwest Territories we deal with this on a much smaller scale. However, we hear the concerns.

One thing we are planning on doing is our whole communications strategy, our consumer affairs website. We’re trying to enhance our content on that website to provide all different types of advice on different types of consumer protection, so any input we receive on how we can enhance that even further would be much appreciated.