Shane Thompson

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this past weekend, I had the pleasure of returning home to attend and help out the Connie Loutit Memorial Soccer Tournament.

Mr. Speaker, Ms. Loutit was a secretary at the Bompas School, and the manager of their family plumbing company. She was very active in the community, whether it was sports, school, or community events that improved youths' lives. Her and her husband have two daughters who love soccer, and she could be seen at every game. She was very supportive, did a lot of fundraising and chaperoning through her life. To keep her memory alive, the...

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I thank the Minister for his answer. So with this evidence-based decision making, what was the timeframe? Was it a year, two years, five years, or the length of this program that was from it starting to being where we are today?

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I thank the Minister and the deputy minister for their answers. Now, that just opened up a whole bunch more questions. When we talk about the pupil-teacher ratio of 12:1, this is a territories ratio; this is not a school ratio. Correct? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the Minister's commitment. I am hoping it is within the six months that we have heard from himself and his staff. I am going to turn to another set of questioning here. It is regarding the increase in funding for the TEP and social work program. This money is coming from SFA; correct? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I move that this committee defer further consideration of the activity education and culture under the Department of Education, Culture and Employment, Main Estimates 2017-2018 on page 34 at this time. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I thank the Minister for that answer. I guess I'm a little concerned, though, that we are going to a see an influx of approximately 1,200 students in junior kindergarten, and we are going to see a reduction into this area here; specifically, for my junior kindergarten to grade four classes that are in the small schools. Has the department looked at that, and how inclusive schooling will, in fact, impact the whole classroom? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I thank the Minister again for his response. I am a little disappointed that we are not getting a number. Again, I don't want this to be a salary subsidy program. I want a partnership. I want to be able to give the communities the money so that they can actually employ people and get them to work and provide training so they become a better, skilled workforce. Is the department really looking at this to become a job creation or just a subsidy program? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I thank the Minister and Ms. Haener for her answer. So just to clarify again, this Healthy Children's Initiative, all it was is the money has moved up and that's where it was before in the development of this mains? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I thank the Minister for his answer. Can he clarify what he means by the department is doing it, or the DEAs are doing it, or the school boards are doing it? Because I am looking at a fact sheet here, and it says that the DECs are the ones in charge of putting the funding and utilizing the funding where they see fit, and now I'm hearing the department is taking a role in this. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am assuming that was a commitment to work with the Finance Minister and try to line it up to where it is. I appreciate the answer. I guess going back to small community employment, when you talked about there were 200 jobs which are salary subsidy, 69 formal training, but again it comes back to my question previously: we have 3,900 people who are on income support and we only see a small increase. Will the Minister look at these facts and information and see that we have a glowing arrow -- not an arrow, but people are stuck having to go to income support to survive in...