Wendy Bisaro

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, and I want to follow up on my statement and talk a little bit about daycare and subsidies and funding for daycares.

Late last fall the Department of Education undertook a review of the Early Childhood Program, and they advised licenced daycares and day homes last August that they would be undertaking this review and that they would want to get these day homes and daycares involved.

I’d like to ask the Minister right now… Sorry, the review was to be completed in October. So, I’d like to ask the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s Education Week, so it’s very timely to have a theme day today on education.

The Department of Education, Culture and Employment is currently pursuing many initiatives. Education Renewal and Early Childhood Development, ECD, are just two of them. ECD generally encompasses the education and care provided for two- to four-year-olds. In the NWT it means licenced daycares, preschools, junior kindergarten and the Aboriginal Head Start program. Using that definition, about 70 percent of NWT two- to four-year-olds attend an Early Childhood Development Program.

That’s pretty...

Thanks to the Minister. My other question in this area has to do with the highway, the roadway from the intersection at the Explorer Hotel and the now extinct gas station and then heading out towards Niven Lake. It’s been discussed for quite some time. By quite some time I mean quite a few years. There’s a great concern for the people that live in Niven Lake and walk to work and downtown that it’s reasonably unsafe. There’s concern over tourists who are walking from downtown to the Visitors Centre. There’s no place for people to cross from one side of the road to the other.

My understanding is...

To the Minister: I guess I would say that if there is a willingness to make changes, this would seem to me to be a change that should be made sooner rather than later. The Minister seems to suggest that he has to wait for changes to be suggested from the public or from us as MLAs. Well, I’m making the suggestion. It seems to me that the policy says that it’s okay to save for certain things but it’s not okay to save for other things.

If the money is not available to be cashed in, I’d like to ask the Minister, will he not wait for more complaints but will he, in the next month, look at revising...

Thanks to the Minister. Three or four bundles… Does a bundle equate to a fiscal year, or is this three or four bundles in the ‘15-16 fiscal year? Thanks.

The NWT income support policy in regards to RRSPs puts people into poverty and ensures that they stay there right through retirement and into old age.

Mr. Speaker, I will have some questions for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment at the appropriate time. Thank you.

If I heard the Minister correctly, then, the funding for the Mackenzie Valley Highway is totally outside of this budget. I’m wondering about the Building Canada Plan. Is any of the Building Canada Plan money intended for the Mackenzie Valley Highway? Thank you.

That’s good. Thank you.

The Minister said supp review. Now I’m a little confused. I guess I’m wanting to know when the evaluation of the communications review will be done and when the government will know whether or not we’re going to increase our communications personnel which would then require an additional supp. Is this weeks or months or years that we’re talking?

Thanks, Madam Chair. I have a question here with regards to the Transportation Strategy 2015-2040. The Minister talked about it the other day in a Minister’s statement. This strategy seems to have been being developed for quite some time and I gather we’ve now done consultation, and that’s a good thing. According to the Minister’s statement, our next step is to prepare a draft of the Transportation Strategy and then go back out and visit each region of the NWT in the spring of 2015 to discuss the draft strategy with residents and stakeholders. So, that’s great, lots of consultation. I do like...