Wendy Bisaro

To the Minister, if some of this staffing is being paid for by CanNor money, what happens in two or three years’ time when the CanNor money is gone? Will we still have adult literacy staffing in our learning centres in our communities? Thank you.

Mr. Chair, thanks to the Minister. No, I don’t need that. We have that information. I just wanted to know that it’s basically being used for the same programs this year as it was for last year.

I’d like to go back to… I started to talk about heritage and the requests from the various heritage organizations to the Minister. I didn’t really understand in the budget where cultural contributions show up. If I could get that clarified, that would be helpful. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I wanted to ask a question with regard to the numbers on this page. We see funded positions from ‘12-13 and ‘13-14 go down 23 positions. My first question would be do we have a corresponding reduction in student enrolments. Thank you.

Just to comment, I appreciate that the Minister understands where I’m coming from. But if he’s looking for sort of what the groups are looking for, I would reference him to the letter which came on the Mine Heritage Society letterhead, signed by seven or nine, I think, different heritage groups within the NWT. There were a couple of requests in there which, if he’s looking for inspiration, could provide some. I’m not looking for further information than what’s here. That’s all.

Thanks to the Minister, but that isn’t what I was intending. I think the Minister probably knows that particularly the Members of the Standing Committee on Social Programs but all Members have an opinion on how the college should work, whether it is working or isn’t working. My question to the Minister was whether or not the contractor would be consulting with Regular Members. Thank you.

Thanks to the Minister for the information. I note the Minister, in his remarks, said to improve student performance, the department has initiated a broad-based review of the NWT education system toward developing a territory-wide action plan. That was in his opening remarks. Just now the Minister mentioned talking to people on the front lines, and I absolutely agree that needs to be done. But if this is a broad-based review, if this is a review which is going to look at the total education system, I would caution that we don’t want to put too much weight on what the people on the front lines...

I appreciate that everything has to come through to the government capital plan process; however, within the department, what does the department use? Okay, the need to identify. So once the needs are identified, does the department have a list where they have a priority list of schools, which schools will be sent through the GNWT capital planning process first before another one, for instance? So there must be some way that the department determines that school X will be put ahead of school Y. So what exists at the department to determine the priority of schools that either need renovations...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m conflicted about this motion. I appreciate the intent of the motion and I thank Mr. Hawkins and Mr. Menicoche for bringing it forward, but I’m not so sure that regulating our gas prices is what is required. I accept that it’s asking for an investigation, but I am particularly disturbed by the fact that Yellowknife has a gas price that is, give or take, 20 cents more than what it is in Hay River, which is 300, 500 miles away, but that does not, in my mind, explain why we have such a large difference in gas prices. So it’s very perplexing to me and I think that it’s...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have some questions for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment. I’ll start with a simple one. I’d like to ask the Minister, what schools are on any plan at Education, Culture and Employment for renovations or replacement in the fiscal year 2014-15?

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Thanks to the deputy minister for the info. I’ll look forward to seeing those tenders. That’s all I have, Mr. Chair.

I move that we report progress.

---Carried