Caroline Wawzonek

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, obviously, the department does certainly take a whole-of-government view. We do work with municipal and community affairs and to look at what programs and services they are offering through the emergency services that they are leading and coordinating and keeping ourselves, as much as we can, within the parameters of programs that are at least somewhat funded by the federal government and their programs, Mr. Speaker, and, of course, working too with ECE. They also provide emergency funding for income assistance clients and at the same time wanting to...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, with respect to this program, this grew after the initial -- well, the most recent evacuations that we had in 2022 and then in 2023 and 2024, and initially there was no additional supports beyond those which were provided by the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs, which do include transportation to an accommodation facility, food and meals at the accommodation facility, some basic toiletries, and often support for the United Way who will step in and provide additional supports through either NGOs locally or to municipalities. It was as...

Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the following four documents: GNWT Response to Committee Report 22-20(1), Standing Committee on Public Accounts Report on the Review on the 2023-2024 Public Accounts; GNWT Response to Committee Report 24-20(1), Standing Committee on Public Accounts Report on the Review of the Auditor General's 2024 Audit of the Stanton Territorial Hospital Renewal Project; Interim Financial Report 2024-2025; and Northwest Territories Power Corporation Amended Capital Budget. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This question certainly has come up over the last few years when individual communities have been evacuated, some, honestly, for very lengthy periods of time or on multiple occasions in the course of one year.

So again, the program we've landed on at this point is really meant to supplement. So it's supplementing the fact that there are accommodations provided, that folks who need accommodations outside of the group-type accommodations are triaged and meant to get access to hotel accommodations and as well as transportation. The goal being that most people should not be...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there's a host of different opportunities -- or possibilities here too. And certainly could be anything from, you know, looking at whether or not there's been a breach of contract in a more extreme circumstance, and then that could then lead to a number of different potential outcomes. There's also certainly, under our procurement policies, the ability -- or possibility that someone can, in particularly egregious situations or repetitive situations, someone could actually be named or noted as being a non-responsible contractor which could then lead to them...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'm not in a position to speak to a specific procurement event here on the floor of the House. Certainly would be happy to find the details. We do, if there's a procurement event, obviously we are monitoring now to make sure that contracts are complied with and that commitments are applied with, whether it's to northern hiring, northern spends. That is part of vendor performance management now, and so certainly happy to make the commitment that we will do that. If there's fundamentals that have changed in a contract and they're not being met, again, that...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There is a second component of what's happening right now in this space, and that is led, really, by staff at Executive and Indigenous affairs is to have discussions with modern treaty holders, specifically to determine whether or not there are opportunities to create MOU arrangements so that there can be more formalized agreements as to how procurement might happen on the land -- on the lands for modern treaty holders. That may well end up in something of the way that the Member is describing. Obviously, it's premature for me to conclude what that would look like...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we in the last government set up what's called the health recruitment unit. This is an entity that works in concert with a team lead from the health authority. So we have a human resource specialist and an authority specialist working together specifically focused particularly nurse recruitment. Mr. Speaker, they are seeing some significant outcomes and benefits. For example, we are now consolidating competitions, which means it's a much more efficient process. Rather than hiring individually, we can actually bring nurses into a competition for any and all...

Yes, Mr. Speaker. Happy to do so. The only -- what we -- the stage we were at, Mr. Speaker, is we're negotiating -- there is, of course, the infrastructure cooperation agreement with the Tlicho government, and so we were working with them to negotiate the final stages of a design contract. That may well even be signed by now, but certainly the last time I had checked in on it, we were at the final stages of that. That will go to design, and then from there, we will be hopefully jointly going to help get some funding to see this project to its completion. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. At this point, Mr. Speaker, I mean, looking at using AI technology in areas of infrastructure and actually replacing type of different infrastructure systems is beyond what I'm speaking to here. What I'm looking at here is how the public service is using AI really more in day-to-day functions. So, again, don't want to be overpromising in terms of what it is, but it's really meant to be guidance for the public service in how we use it in a public service context and not necessarily when it comes to, for example, battery systems. Certainly open to having an opportunity to...