Wendy Bisaro

For a start, the RCMP wants their members to learn local culture, meet with chief and council and attend a feast soon after they arrive in the community. For our part, the GNWT has to do something similar. We have to recognize the diversity of the clients we provide services for. We have to then educate and train our service providers so they understand the diversity and the different cultures that make up our great territory so our service providers can understand why a client acts as they do and provide service that is as culturally relevant as possible.

If we don’t, as my constituents...

Thanks to the Minister. Everything I have heard is in the future. I’m looking for something that is going to happen a little sooner than the fall of this year, although I’m glad to hear that there will be something even though it is a small thing and it’s a pilot.

The people who come to our service providers are very often in pain, they are struggling, they are at wits’ end. If they are not adequately understood, we see the horrendous ramifications that we have experienced in the last several months, particularly here in Yellowknife. I feel that the Department of Human Resources should be...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are addressed to the Minister of Human Resources. I would like to follow up on some of the thoughts in my Member’s statement. I spoke about the diversity within our territory and the need for our service providers to have an understanding of the diversity that exists, of the different languages and the different cultures that exist within our territory. I feel that we as a government have to change our mindset and we also have to change our mindset as workers. What programs exist now that go to training our service providers to be culturally aware so...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It has been a tough six months for our territory. We have lost many of our residents to illnesses, accidents, desperation and old age. We had one recently, as you mentioned earlier. Some we have lost years before their time; some a bit before their time; and some who left us after a life well lived. All had contributions yet to be made. We will miss each and every one. My heart goes out to the families and the friends of each of them.

The circumstances around each death were different, but one death here in Yellowknife was particularly troubling to many of us. A...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would encourage the Minister of Transportation to take the pledge to leave the phone alone and post a sticker on his window.

My questions today are addressed to the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, and I would like to say that we heard a great deal about bullying yesterday and I think we heard also about the impact that teachers can have on their students. It was an excellent discussion, as I mentioned. One of the things that we struggle with is to get and keep teachers in the Territories and in our communities, particularly in our small and isolated...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It was an exciting visit to the House yesterday by the N.J. Macpherson Grade 5’s and I think we had a very successful Anti-Bullying Day in the House.

I’d like to remind everyone that next week is NWT Education Week. During the last 15 years, a very positive initiative has been run by the Northwest Territories Teachers’ Association, the Department of Education, Culture and Employment, Northern News Services and First Air. They have all partnered to run a teacher recognition program called Thank You for Making a Difference.

Every January through to mid-February, students...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thanks to the Minister. I appreciate the work the Minister is doing. He recognizes the importance, as do Members, of the ASEP program. So, will the Minister continue to fight, basically, for what we need for our Mine Training Society here in the NWT? Will he continue to do that with the federal Minister? Thank you.

Thanks to the Minister for that update. I’m a little concerned in that what he’s saying is not quite the concrete support from the federal government that I was hoping for. I know I received a letter back from the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development Canada which indicated to me that the government would continue to support skills development through what she says is a new skills and partnership fund. I wonder if the Minister could comment on that fund. Does he have any details on that new program and is it, in fact, a definite program that’s going ahead?

Thanks to the Minister. I really appreciate that commitment. I know, from my understanding, there’s been no response received by either the NWTTA or anybody else. I guess I would like to know from the Minister… I appreciate he’s going to look into this. Any idea when I can expect his response?

Thanks to the Minister for that response. I know a number of years ago there was a defined program between the Housing Corporation and the Department of Education, Culture and Employment to try and encourage communities to take the responsibility and for the community to provide some housing for teachers and professionals in general, I guess. My understanding is that program didn’t work very well. I’d like to know from the Minister of Education if there’s a particular explanation as to why that program hasn’t been all that successful.