Robert C. McLeod

That is a concern that’s raised across the Northwest Territories. Housing has taken some steps and they do have training workshops for folks that apply for particular programs. There was some concern that some of the seniors didn’t understand how the programs worked and would somebody else be able to take it in their place. The answer was yes. We made those arrangements. But we’re always willing to see how we can improve our services, especially to elders that don’t understand the English language very well. It’s not their first language. So we’re always willing to look at ways that we can...

Mr. Speaker, I’ll commit to the Member that I’ll have that discussion with the department as to whether we can cc the band or not. If it’s confidential information, then I’m assuming that we’re not going to be able to. The elder could take the letter to the band, I suppose, and have a discussion with them, the interpretation. But I’ll follow up on the Member’s request and see if we’re able to cc the community government on the letters that are sent out to the elders. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, it is true that there is more operation and maintenance required. The operation and maintenance budget is reviewed every two years and if adjustments have to be made, they’re made at that time. The last couple of years, recognizing the fact that there is new infrastructure, the O and M budgets have gone up for the communities and they’re well appreciative of that. But it is reviewed every two years and if adjustments need to be made, then they’ll be made then.

We continue to work with the federal government and bring our case for the need for more operation and maintenance along...

Mr. Speaker, at this point there is no plan. This is something that we can have that discussion with NWTAC. I do know that the communities that do put forward a lot of projects, there are a few of them that have hired their own expertise. There’s a community that’s hired a consultant and their own project manager to bring the project forward. But we’re willing to have that discussion with NWTAC and we’ll go from there. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I would like to highlight the significant progress being made by NWT community governments in planning and building the infrastructure they need to deliver quality programs and services within their communities.

Since 2007 when most NWT communities took on responsibility for the planning, design and construction of their community public infrastructure through the New Deal, we have seen impressive results. Community governments are provided with capital formula funding from the GNWT that they can use to bank, invest and leverage other sources of funding so...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wish to table the following two documents titled 2009 Volunteer Summit Report and the Northwest Territories High Performance Athlete Grant Program. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, there is no grey area. The formula funding is flowed to the communities to deal with a lot of infrastructure that is required in communities and the community makes the decision as to how they want to spend the money that’s flowed through them. You can’t budget for unforeseen. It’s impossible to budget for unforeseen. We deal with those as they happen.

There was a situation that the Member was referring to where something happened in his community. The community saw that a need was there and they took care of it right away and, working with MACA, we were able to...

Mr. Speaker, I will have discussions with the department and follow up on the Member’s comment on the report. I haven’t seen the report personally and I would be quite interested in having a look at it. I will follow up and see what recommendations or actions may have come out of the report because of the flood of a few years ago.

I’ll say again that we continue to assist communities in identifying a lot of their priorities and if shoreline erosion is one of the priorities from Aklavik, then we’d be willing to work with the community to try and identify sources of funding for the project and...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. The Member wanted to make something quite clear and so do I. I never made the comment that Members didn’t care about the communities. I don’t think I’m that stupid, to be quite honest with you. What I said, and the Member talks about the 14 years that he’s been here, and he’s been able to see the devolution of authority to the communities and he’s able to see the past history where a lot of the small community projects got into the corporate plan and they were basically just bumped and bumped and bumped each year when other emergencies come up. So I just wanted to make...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m well aware of the flooding issue in Aklavik. I’ve been through a couple of them and I know that there was some shoreline erosion done a few years ago and that seems to have worked very well. There are some issues that still need to be taken care of. We do supply -- and I go back to this because I do all the time -- the communities with capital infrastructure money and they decide that if it’s a priority to have this work done, then they have the capital means to do so. If there are other programs out there, federal pots of money that we can access to assist the...