Rocky Simpson

Thank you, Madam Chair. You know, in looking at the policy and the way it's it rolls out is that, you know, there's a flaw in there in the sense that if you have a couple and one's 65 years and over and the other one's younger, they're forced if they want to use that tax relief program, the only way they could do it is for one person, the younger one, to be removed from title, which is which is interesting because if for some reason one of them passed away, then, you know, they're they're put in a position where the where the house has to probably go through probate versus just going...

Thank you, Madam Chair. Yeah, I guess, you know, the seniors, the ones I talked to, they're concerned that, you know, there's a move to basically end this funding. So, you know, if such a decision was to be made, how would you know, what criteria would you be looking at to base something like that on? Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. You know, one of the big issues I guess when you look at the, say, highway Highway 1 and then where it connects with Highway 3 coming into Yellowknife is that there's a lot of traffic on that highway and, you know, there's accidents that occur. I know there's been, you know, fuel trucks that have went over here in the last that last little while and, you know you know, there's been other accidents as well.

One of the things that would really help, I guess, in you know, and provide for a quicker service is cell service along that route. Is there any indication when...

Thank you, Madam Chair. Yeah, you know, I see that, you know, the good building practices, you know, we have that. It looks like government follows that. Is that applicable as well to for private infrastructure? Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. The territories, we've been without a I don't think we have I'm not sure if we ever had a building code. But, you know, we've kind of been running off, I guess, the National Building Code, you know, and adopting parts of it. We've also been, you know, look run other or used other things as well as best building practices in the North and that type of thing.

So have we looked at any or has the department looked at any legislation? Like, I know Nunavut had adopted the NBC, which included, you know, parts of it, or in some yeah, parts of it, guess. Is there is this...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Will the Minister commit to a complete review of all current positions within the government with a focus to staff those that are vacant or about to become vacant with Indigenous persons through direct competition for Indigenous persons only or direct appointments or transfers? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The questions will be for the Minister responsible for human resources, and they'll be short and sweet.

Mr. Speaker, in recognition that the Affirmative Action Policy has evolved since inception, what does this government see as the barriers to reaching Indigenous employment targets under this policy? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I guess I just want to as well echo what my colleagues from Yellowknife had said, is that and, you know, these are mental health dollars as far as I'm concerned as well. You know, we're coming out of a pandemic and, you know, we know that there's there's issues out there. And, you know, when I look at this COVID relief funding and, you know, it's not there anymore and now is when we actually need it to, you know, promote sports and get people back back, you know, playing hockey, skiing, you know, jogging, whatever, biking, you name it. And, you know, it this money...

Thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to go to the infrastructure, community infrastructure gap as well.

You know, it when I look at it and, you know, and I think about how it's we're ever going to close it, it sounds like we're not going to be looking to the feds, really, to provide any support, and it sounds like the department doesn't really think that the feds can provide the support that's required. But I find it I guess it's unreasonable to place that burden on taxpayers when in the North here, it's bad enough that the cost of living is high and it's only going to get higher as we go...

Thank you, Madam Chair. You know, they're going through a review process and that's to figure out what's going to happen in the future. I'm not asking the Minister to tell me what's going to happen in the future but to just give me some idea of the criteria that's used to you know, moving forward in how they're doing the review. Thank you.