Sandy Lee

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Minister just repeated what I said, which is that the department rewarded the party who did not meet the timeline by giving them a 15-year leasehold contract. Now, I have a problem with that. The second thing is, I resent greatly anybody across the floor saying that when we’re asking questions about the way they’re spending legal aid money that we somehow do not support expansion of the Legal Aid program and I do not appreciate that, Mr. Speaker. I want to tell the Minister and the Cabinet, they know that other NGOs, for example, the Centre for...

…and this decision has to be revisited and reversed, and I demand that this government does a better job.

Mr. Speaker, what kind of operation is the Minister running at DPW? Is the Minister telling us that the rules and regulations allow that the officials from his department can call up anybody and negotiate a sole-source contract for a 15-year lease with whatever business they want? I would like to know how I'd get into that kind of business, Mr. Speaker. How does a person at DPW decide which business he's going to give this 15-year contract to? If the criteria was only that it had to be...

Yes, Mr. Chairman, we do have a comment to offer from the committee on Bill 7.

Mr. Chairman, Bill 7 amends the Legal Profession Act to enable law firms to enable trust monies that lie unclaimed in lawyers’ trust accounts. This bill was developed…Sorry, I am reading the Minister’s statement.

---Laughter

I was supposed to read the pink sheet; sorry.

Mr. Chairman, the Standing Committee on Social Programs conducted its public review of Bill 7, An Act to Amend the Legal Profession Act, on October 12, 2004. The committee would like to thank the NWT Law Society for its presentation, and the Minister and...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise on a Point of Order. I don’t know exactly what section there, but I believe that we have a rule in the House that says a Member cannot suggest that another Member is providing any information that is misleading, and, Mr. Speaker, I just want to state that we have the right to ask the questions that we all feel strongly about, on the basis of the information we have.

I do not appreciate any suggestion by any Member in this House that somehow we are failing in our duty to give good information. So I respect the Member's right to pose his own question, but I...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the information I have is in the last year there has been at least a 20 percent vacancy at the facility. There are 50 correctional officers who work at the facility and there have been up to 12 positions vacant. What is going on in there is much like I was hearing from the hospital. Correctional officers are refusing to answer calls on weekends because they don’t want to have to go in to go to work. That sort of thing causes a lot of problems and there might be a lot of things behind that that the Minister has to address. Would the Minister table in...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are also to the Minister of Justice with regard to my Member’s statement earlier today. Mr. Speaker, I have to tell you that the huge rate of vacancies at the Correctional Centre and the high amount of money that’s being paid for overtime is just one of the issues I am hearing that are contributing to a morale problem there that is affecting the operation of the centre.

I should also say that I am not speaking on the basis of one or two people who are talking about this; I have heard from many different people from different sectors in the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, further to the statement by the Member for Kam Lake, Mr. Ramsay, I’d like to also speak about the Department of Justice and its human resources management, the morale of the department, the corrections division, and the North Slave Correctional Centre, in particular.

Mr. Speaker, I understand very clearly that the internal management of a government department or division should not be a topic of discussion in the Assembly as a normal course of business. I know that this is something that the Minister feels very strongly about, too. At the same time, Mr...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Maybe a House motion to table that terms of reference could give him extra ammunition. He is correct in saying vacancies were between 10 to 12 and it’s going down to eight and seven, but I don’t think the Minister is really appreciating the extent of the problem and that’s what I was trying to say in my Member’s statement. The voice is growing stronger and stronger. One of the concerns I am hearing is the people who should be interviewed for this review are hesitant about speaking out. What is the Minister doing to ensure the staff involved, who should be...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I am trying to be very sensitive because this involves human resources, individuals and staff and such and I don’t want to name any names, but I must say the Minister is very good at skirting the issue either. He is speaking about finding out about strengths and weaknesses and doing a review. Could the Minister indicate what is the question he is trying to get an answer to? What is the problem he is aware of that gave rise to looking into this? Why did the staff of the department come to him and say there needed to be a review? What is the question?...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I saw earlier Mr. Dave Legros who is my constituent. I don’t know if he is still there, but if he is I would like to welcome him to the House. Thank you.

---Applause