Wendy Bisaro

To the Minister, yes, things take time, but I don’t think it should take five years for an environmental assessment. Goodness knows when it took that long for the pipeline, people were screaming that it was far too long.

The Minister quoted from a letter from 2012, I believe he was referencing the Oversight Working Group at that point, and I feel strongly we need an independent oversight group, which apparently has been rejected, or which I know has been rejected. So the Oversight Working Group, from my understanding, has not met since September of 2012, shortly after the letter I think the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s unfortunate that the Minister feels we have to disagree on something which would go towards assuaging the concerns of residents, particularly here in Yellowknife.

I’d like to ask the Minister if he can tell me, one of the recommendations which was rejected referenced an oversight of the project, and there’s no recognition from the response from the team of environmental agreements that have been worked on. There is no recognition that oversight is a very large concern for residents.

Can the Minister tell me, again, to this particular one, why is oversight of the...

I understand he’s the responsible Minister; I accept that, but he’s also the Minister responsible for the environment in the NWT. He should be, in my mind, looking after the best interests of the residents of the NWT.

I’d like to know if the Minister can advise me, and advise the House and the general public, how he can be responsible for the cleanup at the mine on behalf of NWT residents, and at the same time, he is responsible for the regulation of the project, which in this case is rejecting the recommendations.

Mr. Speaker, it concerns me that the project team speaks as if the decision is done. The team itself responds to the public as if their decision is final. This quote appears on AANDC’s website Frequently Asked Questions: “The answers are in and it’s time to move forward with a solid long-term plan.” For me that solid long-term plan must include an independent oversight of the project. It would help build public confidence if people from this community have further input into this project, rather than just the project team itself.

In closing, I want to quote one of the questions from the AANDC...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I move that we report progress.

---Carried

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m very happy to rise and support this motion. As people probably know, I have a bit of a passion for education. The intent of this Education Renewal Initiative is to use the most current educational research finding and promising practices of the 21st Century. That’s the intent. I’m not sure we’re getting there, but we will.

Education systems are very complex and changing them requires multiple concurrent initiatives. It requires motivation and collaborations if we are to make the change successful. Given the additional layers of complexities in the NWT, it’s even more...

I have to ask the Minister how he can say that they are taking a look at them when we have a letter from the project team which rejects these recommendations.

Thank you, Madam Chair. We’d like to deal with Tabled Document 1-17(5). I would like to just mention that Tabled Document 4-17(5), NWT Electoral Boundaries Commission 2013 Final Report will be left on the Order Paper. We won’t deal with it today as we have a motion pending that was deferred yesterday. Thank you.

Thanks to the Minister. The Minister speaks to research that talks about junior kindergarten and kindergarten and the benefits of that, and has been pointed out by Mr. Bromley many times and myself a number of times, the science also, and the research particularly, supports the larger gains that are made when we provide the early childhood programs for zero to three.

If we do implement junior kindergarten, it’s going to be a very costly venture. I have no idea what the estimate of the amount of money that’s going to be required, but if we put junior kindergarten into every one of our 49 schools...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are also addressed to the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. I want to follow up on my statement and discuss a proposed action within that Education Renewal and Innovation document. I talked to it in my statement that it seems that the department and the Minister are suggesting and fairly firm on going forward with junior kindergarten. The document that we have that was tabled talks about poor learning readiness. I’d like to reiterate my feeling in my statement that we don’t get learning readiness if we start at age four; we get it if we...