Shane Thompson

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just to go back to a comment that was made regarding bridges. Could the Minister please clarify, because I was looking at the business plan, there was some talk about the Jean Marie River Bridge being looked at. Could the Minister please confirm that this is going to be looked at? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I, too, would like to congratulate the winners of the Heritage Award, and specifically Lindsay Waugh and Roxanna Thompson, who are constituents of mine and very great volunteers in our community, as well as Barb Cameron, who is a former teacher of mine. So, thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We're on page 2, correct? Thank you, Mr. Chair. Previously we talked about the Health and Social Services about replacing the health station in Trout -- or Sambaa K’e. Could the Minister please provide us an update on what the status is with this project as DPW asked is the department actually building this structure? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I thank the Premier for his answer. I appreciate the fact that you work in this operational needs out there; however, if we're developing business plans operational needs should be identified throughout the year. Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh asked the Minister of Human Resources to sit with Cabinet and develop a concrete of summer employment opportunities for post-secondary students. Will the Premier work with his colleagues to set the goal of 400 summer students for the 2017-2018 fiscal year? That would work out to about a cost of $4.5 million; money well spent, I figure.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today, Mr. Speaker, I spoke about summer employment. Mr. Speaker, I'm going to try a different avenue with questions today; I'm going to ask the Premier what he can do. We've heard in this House that the Premier spent the last year encouraging his colleagues on Cabinet to hire more summer students. Mr. Speaker, can the Premier please advise the House how he's encouraging his colleagues to hire summer students? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, on Thursday, October 27th, our colleague from Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh spoke about the importance of summer student employment. This past spring, I spoke about summer employment for our returning post-secondary students and the students that are graduating from our high school. Mr. Speaker, as a person that was born and raised in the NWT, I understand the importance of summer employment for the students. I'm not going to talk about the days that I was employed as a summer student because it kind of ages me, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, when I was in university, I had...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. That's actually good news. I just wanted to get it clarified on that, and I hope the department is able to keep me updated. I know the community will, but, if the department can, as well, on the process of this as they move forward on this project. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I guess my struggle is that the health centre, health cabin, whatever you want to call it, in Sambaa K’e, the one presently is owned by the community and they've used that as an opportunity for revenue themselves. In my conversations with the community, they were looking at a number of options. Has the department finally made a decision to move ahead and just build it, and does the Government of the Northwest Territories own it? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I was asking about the Sambaa K’e Health Centre, not the one in Fort Simpson. That's all right. I understand. So, again, it's the Sambaa K’e Health Centre. Can you please provide the status on that? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the Premier for his answer. I'm not talking about taking jobs away; if there's vacancies, you can put that part of the business plan I honestly believe, and work on it. My colleague spoke about a subsidy for small businesses or communities to help them hire additional summer students. Mr. Speaker, will the Premier commit to work with the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment to set up a subsidy of $5 an hour for at least a hundred positions at a cost to the GNWT of about $250,000? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.