Caroline Wawzonek

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I, you know, would be remiss not to acknowledge that, of course, the Department of ECE has a shared responsibility over the arts. With respect to ecommerce, I can say that the challenge here  one of the challenges here, far apart from the technology alone, is, of course, then are we at risk of displacing those who may not wish to be part of the GNWT process? Would we be at risk where we are creating a situation where we're influencing or, you know, creating a market place that isn't fully fair and accessible to all? So there are some challenges in an online...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, of course we sort of shed our past lives a little bit as Ministers. So, you know  but I can speak to the issue from the perspective as a Minister responsible for the Status of Women. And certainly I know the Member appreciates, this is an area that it involves obviously the Minister of Justice. It would involve potentially Health and Social Services as they do work with women's shelters as well as other ministries across the government.

The challenge with a proposal such as a Clare's Law, which certainly could well fall within my responsibility to promote...

Mr. Speaker, you've seen nothing yet in my capacity to speak. Now I get to talk about arts.

Mr. Speaker, with respect to art sales and art sales tracking, so at the moment I can say art sales aren't tracked by the NWT Arts Program in terms of the dollar value per sales or number of sales had. Again, you know, again, this is one where there's a number of individual artists across the Northwest Territories, some in collectives, some selling on their own, some selling, I know, under various social media channel.

And this is not an opportunity, this is not an area where the government is able to...

Mr. Speaker, today's mineral resource industry in the NWT is innovative, collaborative, environmentally conscious, and has the highest standards of safety. It collaborates with the GNWT and with Indigenous communities to enhance resources for capacity building and supports Indigenous participation in, and benefits received from, the mining industry.

The resource sector directly employs over 3,000 people in the Northwest Territories and contributes over $800 million in spending each year. It accounts for nearly a third of the Northwest Territories' gross domestic product. A healthy and vibrant...

Mr. Speaker, I'd like to try to be helpful and not repeat my answers but the simple fact is I'm back to the same response I gave at the beginning, that there are wonderful public servants and good people in human resources doing their very best to make sure that their processes are fair and that they are modern and that they are in keeping with the best practices of human resources processes anywhere else in Canada or the world.

Now, when I say about accessibility, I certainly have heard from individual employees direct to me. I have certainly heard from my own constituents direct to me. And...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, no, this is not  there is not a blanket practice as what is described by the Member. Mr. Speaker, I  this is a human system of 5,000 people strong. It is populated by wonderful people who work across the public service, great people in human resources. Does that mean that every single process and every single time at every single hiring is  produces the end result that every person wants it to? Well, the end result is that some people don't get jobs. What we want is to have a process that is clear, transparent, accessible, and that is the purpose of human...

Thank you, Madam Chair. And I do appreciate the commitments that were made, I want to echo that, you know, that really was a consensus government approach was a very positive one for the people of the Northwest Territories. So I think the appreciation really does flow in both directions on all of those commitments.

Madam Chair, with respect to the travel reductions, this was not a simple process and it was not a simple calculation. It was done in a way where the departments came forward, did an analysis of all of their travel spending in order to understand what of the various travel budgets is...

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'd be happy to make that commitment.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I know it's easy to lose sight of the fact that the vast bulk of the airline funding is coming from the federal government and I'm not sure they are prepared to fund us to take an equity stake in our local airline. And, again, the conversation hasn't been had, Madam Chair, to be quite clear.

As far as adding route, the funding that is being made available is to support the existing and really the essential services routes in terms of moving supplies and moving people within the territory and south. Right now, this is our only route to the south so all...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, no one department has a position or an opinion about land withdrawals. There is a position of the Government of the Northwest Territories on land withdrawals, and that alone is the position, not one offs or, you know, statements made out of context, perhaps in these notes. Although on that note, Mr. Speaker, I received this only yesterday. I have also gone through it. I've gone through the unredacted version.

Mr. Speaker, it is clear to me and it shouldn't be any surprise industry, indeed municipalities, have long said that the lack of certainty around land...