Wendy Bisaro

Thanks, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to recognize Jeff Corradetti, Frame Lake constituent. Thanks, Jeff, for coming to listen to us today. I would like to recognize the groups that came here, the seniors group that came. I don’t think I need to go through the names. I’d like to particularly mention the members of the steering committee for the Anti-Poverty Strategy who are here and thank them for their work, and the Status of Women Council group who are here. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I move that this committee recommends that the Department of Education, Culture and Employment clarify the reporting relationships of staff involved in the delivery of its income security programs with a view to making their accountability evident, and provide this information to the standing committee at the earliest opportunity.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Elders make a difference in our communities every day. Elders are deeply involved in our communities and their contributions benefit NWT residents of all ages. I’m really pleased to see so many MLAs wearing purple here today to raise awareness of elder abuse.

June 15th is World Elder Abuse Awareness Day and I’m going to do my part today to raise the awareness of elder abuse. Elder abuse is a significant threat to the older residents of our NWT communities, as Members well know, and it is a problem in both small communities and larger centres.

For many years elder abuse...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a few remarks. I would like to thank Mr. Yakeleya for bringing this motion forward. I am happy to second it to get it to the floor for some debate.

In my time in the North, I think nothing is a bigger issue for us than alcohol and alcohol abuse, and the resulting effects of alcohol on our residents and on our society. I was thinking about this the other day. I think the word scourge applies best to alcohol. Alcohol is a scourge of the NWT and the North and our society. We have to do something to try and address it, something more concrete, something more...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I, too, am going to stand and vote in favour of this motion. As stated by my colleagues, it’s quite straightforward. This is asking for an updating of an act which is very much out of date. It’s asking for changes that will allow us to provide better services to our residents. It will allow us as residents to feel a bit more involved to allow us to do sort of the social service aspect of our lives, if we wish to do it, which we certainly can’t do now.

The whereases in the motion talk about specific areas in the current act which are out of date and which need to be...

Mr. Speaker, thanks to the Minister. I guess I would like to suggest that if we are following a system that we have set up that perhaps is not working very well, then maybe we ought to look at other jurisdictions in a little more detail and perhaps change our system.

In our system, in our process and in these guidelines that staff has, does it identify a standard turnaround time and what that time is from the time the application comes in to when the renewed or new card goes back out to the individual? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, thanks to the Minister for the answer. I would like to know then, if it is a manual process and I’m a worker in Inuvik and I’m processing these applications, do I have a template? Do I have standards, guidelines that I follow so that Mr. Moses sitting next to me is actually doing the same work in the same way that I am doing? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thanks to the Minister. Best use of money. I like that phrase. I hope that it proves out to be true. It’s not always true, I think, in government, unfortunately.

To the issue of the symposium, you mentioned in the fall. Is this going to be early in the fall or later in the fall? How long do people have? It’s over the summer, so how long do stakeholders have to get their action plans together?

Mr. Chair, I move that this committee recommends that the Department of Education, Culture and Employment report its Income Assistance client survey results annually as a performance measure in the departmental business plan. Thank you.

Thanks to the Minister for the response. I can appreciate that. I understand that the government is going to be working on an action plan. I think he referenced that he’s going to encourage other stakeholders to develop action plans as well. From my recollection – I’m testing my memory here – I think there’s up to 29 different groups who have had a hand in, at some point in time or another, in terms of the Anti-Poverty Strategy with input.

So these various organizations all deal with people who are involved in a situation of poverty, assisting them and so on. These groups, as well, are not...