Robert Hawkins

Mr. Speaker, I thank the Minister for that. But one of the issues I highlighted in my Member’s statement is that if somebody gets a job — and let’s say they’re a renter here in Yellowknife, and they get a job maybe somewhere in Nunakput, like my good colleague here — they have to break their lease. What if they’ve just signed a year’s lease? This isn’t a hypothetical question, because this actually does happen. So they’re forced to pay out the remainder of the lease if they want to take a great job advancement somewhere else. The protection doesn’t exist to allow them…. They only get out of...

Today I will speak on behalf of many of my constituents who rent their accommodations in Yellowknife Centre.

The Residential Tenancies Act allows landlords to raise the rents once per year with adequate notice. This puts tenants at a disadvantage when it comes time to renegotiate a lease. They can be left in a position with little options: they can be offered a 12-month lease with a rental increase, or they can enter into a month-by-month lease with even a larger increase.

The problem arises as to whether you commit yourself to a long-term lease and realize some savings, or you lose the...

Today, I’d like to table a letter sent to me by the Minister of Health and Social Services on February 5th. The title of the letter is: Follow-up to Oral Question 43-16(1), Addictions Treatment Program.

Document 15-16(2), Letter from Minister of Health and Social Services re: Addictions Treatment Program, tabled.

Mr. Speaker, we’re asking for a simple process. The Minister can set forward an initiative, a directive, by saying “Create a consultation process that phones people once every three months, six months” — whatever the Minister feels appropriate — “to re-engage folks.” We’re throwing money away if we send them out for treatment and we don’t help them follow through. Treatment is a lifelong process. We just can’t say, “Here’s a pill. Take it. Good luck. See you later. You’re on your own.” I want to see that we follow up with people. It’s a good investment for people; it shows the government cares...

Mr. Speaker, in November I raised the issue of follow-up on treatment programs for individuals. My questions were directed to the Minister of Health and Social Services. The Minister wrote me back, just a couple of days ago, in response to my concern about not having a follow-up process. One of the statements in her letter to me basically put the onus back on the person who’s sought treatment programs and basically said it’s their obligation to work through this process, and if they want to call in for support, it’s up to them

Mr. Speaker, my concern is that the Minister is taking, back to my...

I wasn’t 100 per cent clear on the Minister’s answers there. Did he say he would take into consideration those two areas of concern I raised: the way increases happen in the context of the amount; and further, about helping people get out of their leases if they’re built into contracts and they have to leave the normal municipality they live in?

Mr. Speaker, today I raise the issue of concerns I have with the Residential Tenancies Act. I know it’s coming forward eventually, and let’s hope it comes forward in this Assembly.

Mr. Speaker, the issue is about concern with protection, and the fact that I, not unlike in many other constituencies hereabouts in Yellowknife and throughout the Territories, have many rental units. It was told to me that someone was forced to sign a lease of…. I don’t want to belabour the circumstances, but it was like: you sign here and pay this much, or basically get out if you don’t like it, and the cost to...

With a whole bunch of leases coming up, the time is now to act. With us having to find this money through our financial exercise of reductions, this is the time to act.

Mr. Speaker, what is this Minister doing to make sure that this consolidated clinic becomes a reality in this coming budget and a reality in this session of this Assembly?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I encourage the Minister, in this case, to talk about it now. What better place than this Assembly?

In a time where efficiency is…. We have a dire need to create efficiencies within our system. If we can prove the fact — which has been done already — to create a system that gives us more efficiencies, better service for less dollars, what’s the problem here?

Mr. Speaker, where is this plan in the process? There has been capital money already directed toward this project. What’s happening to date?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, I am not going to say that I agree with the Minister, because I didn’t agree with that at all.

Mr. Speaker, there is no system to help a small business like a restaurant hire a professional cook who cooks a very special style. There’s no program out there that helps other small businesses bring in foreign workers so they can fill gaps for skilled and semi-skilled workers. He may have a system out there — who knows where — that helps them learn English. Yes, I know there are cases of that. I know that there are a few other things. But there’s nothing to help them...