Robert Hawkins

Thank you. Although actual employment rates are trending downwards, we’re going south, as I said, literally and figuratively. We’ve noticed that the federal government has slashed the EI program, which is going to now fall onto the territorial government to pick up the slack. As I said earlier today and I’ll just make one more point, which is the Yellowknife rate of unemployment is closer to 3.4 percent, and of course, as we all know here, the community unemployment rate is closer to 30 percent, if you’re lucky to be that low.

The reality here is, and my next question leads into, if the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement I talked about concerns with employment rates, so I have questions for the Minister responsible for employment. In this particular case, that would be Mr. Lafferty.

Could Mr. Lafferty provide some examples of true unemployment figures in several of our communities, and I’ll allow him to pick his own examples of what the true unemployment figures are in some of our northern communities, please.

I was proudly educated in the Northwest Territories, growing up in Fort Simpson and in Yellowknife. My education taught me that negative 218 persons is a lot. So when the Minister says to me – and remember, this is the gentleman in charge of our books and our finances – we’re not losing ground, perhaps the Minister of Finance can explain how a loss of 218 people isn’t a loss to the Northwest Territories and the Northwest Territories isn’t losing ground. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m going to take the opportunity to recognize constituent Julie Green. She’s been a wonderful woman, she does a lot of great things in the city and I think she spends a lot of time with the YWCA. At this time I’ve forgotten her position so I won’t try to name it, but I will say that she has an enormous impact in the North for women and their rights.

I’d like to recognize two missionaries in the back of the gallery I can see there. They are both from the United States doing good work here in the Northwest Territories. They are Elder Ames and Elder Anderson, and although...

Yellowknife’s population has relatively remained the same and we’ve been fortunate only on the principle that we’ve had growth from the communities. That’s terrible, because where the real impact is happening is in the communities. Getting the jobs out to the communities will have a positive effect on the whole territory, every single program we need.

In my Member’s statement today, I said let’s put two teachers in every single school. That would bring new families to every community; that would bring new job growth, new vitality and new cash on the ground where people spend money. There’s an...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement today I spent a bit of time highlighting some of the words the Finance Minister had provided this House on February 6th. It was really talking about embarking on a new adventure of trying to create this initiative that would draw 2,000 new people to the Northwest Territories over the next five years, but as our NWT Bureau of Stats has clearly said, outlined – and I put great faith in their hard work – we’ve had a drop of 218 people in this last year, which puts us about 10 percent below that greater mark.

So, what I want to hear from the Minister...

[English translation not provided.]

I’ve been practicing. Mr. Speaker, on February 5th of this year the Finance Minister proclaimed an aggressive yet ambitious target to attract 2,000 new residents to the NWT. Our most current publication from the Bureau of Stats says the NWT’s population fell by 218 persons. Now, that is a negative 10 percent shortfall on that particular number.

In the Finance Minister’s words on February 6th, again, it said our fiscal future is closely linked to economic prospects and healthy population growth. The Minister continues to go on by saying we are also aware the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I said in my Member’s statement that the net effect would actually be awash because our growth and our federal grant transfer would actually cover the cost of those teachers. May I also briefly remind the Minister that he had pointed out in his February 6th statement that in 2013 we continued to lose population? What’s happening here is, year over year over year we continue to lose population.

My last question is simply this: Where have there been any results of population growth in the Northwest Territories under the tenure of this McLeod government?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am fully in support of the context of providing statements from financial institutions. That’s not the issue here. The issue here is they don’t necessarily guarantee that they line up. First and foremost, if you are running from a small community that does not have a financial institution and there’s no guarantee that there will be an available one every time, every election, you are then forced with options. It’s easy to say there will be one in every Northern… Well, not every community has a Northern. So the issue is if someone makes a donation to a particular...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s interesting; they’re abstaining on this motion, maybe because they don’t have the numbers. It’s just to reference a point.

I worry, frankly, that the Minister has misunderstood the issue. He’s too quick to comment and point out and reference experts, experts none of us would deny. Frankly, I don’t care what the experts are saying about JK because that’s not the issue. It’s about the implementation. I believe the expert Shanker had said by age four it’s already too late anyway, so are we accomplishing the goals? Not one Member on this side of the House spoke against...