Robert Hawkins

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I give notice that on Monday, November 3, 2014, I will move the following motion. Now therefore I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Sahtu, that the 17th Legislative Assembly supports the national Aboriginal organizations’ call for a national inquiry and a national roundtable into missing and murdered Aboriginal women and girls;

And further, that this Assembly supports a national roundtable on missing and murdered Aboriginal women and girls to have a national dialogue that will allow all levels of government to work together to identify concrete outcomes that...

The complaining about the federal funding, the CMHC declining funding, is an old song and an old dance. I have been a Member for 11 years and I hear about the same story every year, woe is me, declining funding. We have not come up with a new formula, rather than standing here with empty hands going, Ottawa, please give me more.

What new initiatives is this Minister leading to ensure that we get new houses built? Is he working with the private sector? Can he prove that this is actually happening? Frankly, we have seen, on average, no wave of new building and we cannot keep up with the existing...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The other day I asked the Minister of Housing how many houses we built in the last fiscal cycle. He said it was 38, so if you average that across the 33 communities, that’s 1.15 house per community. Of course, we all know that we don’t build 0.15 of a house, that’s just the way it averages.

Maybe for the public’s health and, certainly, clarification, how many new housing starts, as in new houses, not replacements, new houses will be available and provided by the Housing Corporation going into this next cycle? Thank you.

Thank you. The Minister continues to avoid the question by saying what’s the delay. He says stuff that’s been brought to his attention. Well, I can tell you stuff today, such as it hasn’t been signed off. I hope that has brought the issue to his attention.

I’m not sure what the particular delays are. I hear from industry, their perspective and their concerns; I hear from labour, their perspective and their concerns. Why don’t we actually say what the concerns are? I mean, what’s wrong with being honest about the issues and problems before us? Could the Minister enlighten this House with...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to ask the Minister responsible for the WSCC on his perspective of what’s delaying the implementation of the Occupational Health and Safety Regulations. This Assembly and even the last Assembly have been waiting for some time for the implementation of them. Let’s get an update as to where they are and what’s holding them back and when we would expect them to be implemented for the safety of all. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will be supporting the motion. I can appreciate the perspective the folks on Cabinet have to be able to do this. I did go to the Government Operations meetings to hear this out. I understand about the continuity of a position. I would just think, deep down, there must be a better way to do this. I’m not actually against direct appointments; I just want transparency on them personally. I think what this does is we don’t know what’s actually… There’s a lot of vagueness to this.

This is our opportunity by being clear, honest and fair to all around. If we say vacant...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The last comment was nothing more than just a shot at me, which I’m fine with, and a promo ad by the Minister. Mr. Speaker, we can’t continue to blame others. In this fiscal cycle we are only going to build less than one unit per community. He has not said one thing about trying to get new units in above the rate we are providing when we’re provided money by CMHC. He’s not telling us how he’s fought with Cabinet to get more money. He has not told us how he’s engaged private sector investment in communities that have no market. I’m not hearing anything innovative. I’m...

I want to thank the Minister for that direct and clear answer. My math now tells me we’re doing, or sorry, the government is proposing into the next fiscal cycle to build 0.91 houses on average across the 33 communities. If you are one of those communities who is lucky to get one of those houses, or if it’s two or three of them, you are very fortunate.

I want to ask the Minister, as the Minister of Housing, what is he doing to increase the new housing portfolio, increase our stock of public housing, increase our ability to provide the affordability housing measure? At this rate, we are not...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yet again we’re all witness to hear of these platitudes that actually provide no detail, and this is the frustration the public continues to have. If it’s a legitimate reason, I think all reasonable people would say, and fairly agree, that reviews need to be done and implementation needs to be done at the right pace, but yet all we hear is we need to act on this, we have stuff that’s been brought to his attention. My goodness, I mean, anyone can give that answer on any subject. That could mean almost anything. So, today is the day.

Why doesn’t the Minister get some of...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Maybe for the benefit of the public – I’ve heard this answer before, and I’ll explain it when I say it – maybe the Minister can help us understand what “fully qualified” means.

As we all know, things like housing maintainers are not Red Seal tradespersons, so I want to make sure we have the right people on the ground making the assessment. The only thing I would say, Mr. Speaker, is a housing maintainer – this is my last question, Mr. Speaker – cannot go in and identify an electrical problem. They can suspect there’s an issue there, but they’re not qualified to say it...