R.J. Simpson

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The last major amendments to the Residential Tenancies Act were in 2015. There have been amendments in 2017, 2018, and 2019. But since March, the department has been focusing on getting its current initiatives over the finish line. This is really the busiest time of the year, and we're trying to get everything wrapped up so there has not been work on the Residential Tenancies Act; however, the rental officer, in the annual reports, has been putting forward recommendations and so, you know, this is a live issue that the Member is talking about. So it will be considered...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And those are the same questions that I am asking. Sometimes drug houses might be fortified and so perhaps there is a way through existing legislation to enter those premises. The Residential Tenancies Act does have provisions which allows for evictions to occur when residents are carrying on illegal activities but that's initiated by the landlord, not by the RCMP. So there are some options available but not what the Member is looking for, but we are exploring those. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. If the RCMP has seized money or other property under the Criminal Code or Controlled Drugs and Substances Act or other applicable federal legislation, there's a number of options available to the court with respect to that seized property. If there's been a conviction for any offences for which the accused has been charged, the Crown may make an application to have the court consider whether or not the seized property is related to the offence for which the conviction arose. If the court finds that the seized property is related to the offence, the court may order the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That is the regular work of the department. There's ongoing conversations, sometimes specific to this, this exact issue, sometimes peripheral to it that will inform the issue, so this is just what happens on a regular basis. And I will also say that school boards do have a surplus that they're allowed to maintain. It can't be greater than 7 percent but that is only to ensure that money is actually being spent on students. But school boards do have surpluses for instances where they are finding themselves short on funds. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And in a way, these are champagne problems as they say. We have been working on increasing immigration and so we've seen those numbers go up. As well earlier in this government, we introduced some more liberal regulations, expanding access to French first language education to nonrights holders so this is sort of a situation of our own making. And in terms of the conversations about facilities for CSFTNO, I wouldn't say they've started, I would say they've never ended. They've been ongoing for many, many years.

The way that our process works is that each year school...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So when I spoke to the Minister, I said that there needs to be consultation; people need to come to the territory and they need to talk to people on the ground, not just to us and Indigenous governments, but to the hunters, the residents, who are going to impacted by this. So I have made that strong recommendation to the Minister.

First, the Department of Justice of the Northwest Territories is not going to go out and do consultation on a federal bill. That's the fed's job. But I think that they got the message. They're aware of the push back; that's why they removed the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So personally I have reviewed the draft bill. It's very similar to other bills across the country the Member named a number of jurisdictions that have this. And as I've already stated, I won't repeat myself, but we are turning our minds to this. We know we have to do something, and we need to take action. Thank you.

Thank you. Over the last number of years, the tools that the RCMP have traditionally used have been eroded by changes to the Criminal Code, by Supreme Court decisions, so the reason to look at civil legislation is so that we can do our part to support the RCMP in addressing some of those issues. Civil legislation, it's much different than the criminal legislation. It doesn't need to be enforced by RCMP officers. It uses a balance of probabilities as opposed to proof beyond a reasonable doubt. So there's a number of benefits to using civil legislation, and it just expands the toolbox that the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wish I could say that we would never go to court again, but I think every jurisdiction in Canada is engaged in ongoing court cases with their respective French first language education bodies. I made attempts with the regulations. I admitted the students that were at the centre of the last court case. And I will say that we actually did win that on appeal. But it's a difficult subject. I understand where the school board is coming from. They want to protect their rights. They want to advocate for their students. And there's French first language school boards across...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And those portables, they are old. I believe they were supposed to be in place for two or three years but here we are 13 years later. And we have had issues with them. There's ongoing maintenance issues that we've been dealing with. So we would all love to see those replaced. Unfortunately, like I said, we have 49 schools. Many of them are in worse condition than the facilities in Hay River. And so it's difficult to make a case to, you know, renovate or build new facilities to replace facilities that are in better shape than other facilities around the territory.

So I'm...