Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment Minister of Education, Culture and Employment
The Honourable Caitlin Cleveland was first elected in the 19th Assembly as the MLA for Kam Lake in 2019, and has served as the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, and Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment since 2023 after being acclaimed to the 20th Assembly.
In addition to owning and operating a northern business for over 20 years, Minister Cleveland worked in a variety of communications and policy roles in both the public and private sectors before entering politics.
Between 2019 to 2023, she chaired the Standing Committee on Social Development, fulfilling a goal to be a part of the discussions and decisions affecting social programs in the Northwest Territories. Her noteworthy work on the Committee included guiding the considerable review and input into recommendations on housing in the NWT, suicide prevention, and improvements to caring for children in care and building supported families.
Within the scope of her portfolios, Minister Cleveland is focused on helping children grow into successful NWT residents that recognize opportunities and develop successful careers that contribute to a growing economy. She advocates for new approaches to sector diversification and innovation, and ensures the North is welcoming both skilled foreign workers and investment in the critical mineral resources across the territory. She persistently explores solutions for efficient and equitable access to programs and services, upholding a shared vision of an NWT where people are supported in the ways they wish to live, work, and grow.
Minister Cleveland is a lifelong resident of Yellowknife where she lives with her husband and their three children.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my second set of questions are for the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Mr. Speaker, schools have struggled with staggered and delayed enrolment for the 2020 and 2021 school year as well as the 2021 and 2022 school years. A lot of parents didn't send their kids back to school right away. They held the kids at home if they were able to, just to see what the pandemic was going to do and to reevaluate how families wanted to reintegrate their kids back to school. Schools, unfortunately, have a cutoff for funding enrolment for September...
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my first set of questions, if I can get in a second set, is for the Minister of Health and Social Services. I'd like to start off by thanking the Minister, staff, Stanton, and especially OBS staff for working hard to get labour and delivery open and running again at full service. So thank you for that.
My first question, though, is some people are already in Edmonton waiting to deliver, and they'd like the opportunity to come home and deliver in their home territory of the Northwest Territories. So how can people, or can they come home from...
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. And I appreciate the Minister's comments, and I think it's important that on this side of the House, we continue to talk about the things we would like to see more money go into because those are the things that are important to the people we serve.
That being said, I know that education is top of mind for many Northerners, if not most Northerners. And I'm wondering if the Minister would be willing to revisit the education funding formula in advance of the modernization of the Education Act in order to address things like inflation and increased needs for...
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. So then if schools are coming back to their MLAs and saying that they've seen significant differences in enrolments, would those schools not then qualify for that and so can we not make that commitment that schools will see stability in their funding so that they're not expected to educate students without the funding for those students? Thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Another thing that the Minister alluded to were funds for education. And one of the things that I'm finding with different constituents that I serve is that funds for education aren't clearly accessible depending on what department that you work in. Some people work in departments where it is part of their mandate to provide that training because it helps with the job that they're currently in, whereas other GNWT employees may have found themselves in a position where they want to go into nursing; they want to be part of the solution and they want to serve the...
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, and I appreciate that, and I look forward to seeing that plan when it's shared with Regular Members. I think it's one that not only Members but a lot of people from one end of the territory to the other are looking forward to seeing.
Currently, Stanton is very reliant on agency nurses, and I know that this is common right across Canada, and I'm wondering if the Minister can speak to whether or not this plan incorporates agency nurses as a key component and longterm plan for continuing to maintaining staffing levels at Stanton or what the future of agency...
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, and thank you to the Minister for that. I think that there are residents who will be very happy to hear that.
My last question for the Minister is in regards to cost. Cost of COVID has been quite extreme everywhere, not just in the Northwest Territories. And I think when we first began this, we were counting down the days until we could wipe COVID costs clear off the books, but the reality of it is that there still will be a cost to managing and dealing with COVID because people are still expected to do the work that goes with that. And so I'm wondering if the...
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'm wondering if in this work health is reevaluating how and who provides services. Examples of this would be maybe someone with a nursing degree is doing a role that doesn't require a nursing degree. Potentially other provinces and states are currently looking at expanding athome testing kits to include not only HIV but STIs as well. And so is that type of work being done as part of this? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, as the territory speaks of transitioning from pandemic to endemic, it’s important that we as Northerners understand what this means. There will be timelines for eased restrictions and the eventual dismantling of the COVID Secretariat. But, Mr. Speaker, I want to understand what it means for the GNWT healthcare system and services to residents. Although an endemic is supposed to mean some stability of transmission, hospitalizations and death, the virus will continue to circulate, and can still be widespread and deadly.
Here in the North we are already familiar with endemic diseases...
Mr. Speaker, I'd like to report that Bill 38, the Miscellaneous Statute Law Amendment Act, is ready for consideration in Committee of the Whole. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
