R.J. Simpson

Thank you, Madam Chair. I know that we are on this number here, but these two numbers are connected. There is $600,000 total in here for Indigenous language revitalization. The $450,000 is being put towards the development of an Indigenous languages immersion pilot program, and the $150,000 is going to Indigenous governments with the idea that that can be used to cover the costs that aren't covered by SFA to have people attend this program. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Like I said, I'm not the one who signs the cheques around here. I'm anxious to see what the schools have come up with because the Member is right. There are a lot of restrictions on what can be done. There is no singing in schools, which is one of the saddest things I can think about saying. There won't be any indoor sports. Things like that. We have to come up with some different ways of doing things. A lot of schools combine on-the-land activities with Indigenous language revitalization. One thing ECE has done is: they can carry over that unspent Indigenous language money from last year...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. A lot of the things that the schools are doing won't cost extra money, but the Member is right that PPE is something that we didn't have before. You can make hallways one way and adjust drop-off times for students for free, but when it comes to PPE, then that is an issue. Right now, we are well on our way to providing schools with PPE. I am going to, obviously, find out what the needs are and go back to Cabinet and find out how we can support schools. I can't say what the final decision of the Financial Management Board is going to be, but like I have said before, I am...

Just like people, the age of buildings isn't always necessarily the best indicator of what kind of shape their in. J.H. Sissons was in a shape where it needed to be replaced, whereas Chief Jimmy Bruneau is in much better condition. The Member is correct that there have been conversations with the Tlicho government. He accompanied me to Edzo, and we sat in the school and spoke with the Tlicho leadership. They made very clear what their preference would be. I made some commitments to them, and I followed through on those commitments. I am almost at the point where I am going to be reaching back...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That's a technical question. What happens is that there is an evaluation of the school done, the structure of it, and a determination made of whether or not it would be more cost effective to retrofit the school or rebuild it. When I say "retrofit," I don't mean just patch it up. I know that the Member said that in his statement, "patch it up." The school I went to, the school that my father went to, is 50 years old. It just got a retrofit, and it looks brand new. It's not just a patch job here and there; it's a full-on renovation. That determination is made on whether...

That's a good question about proper-fitting PPE. We can't just say students have to wear PPE and then not have stuff that fits them. Those are conversations that are happening right now. In terms of just PPE in general, ECE has received, I can't recall the numbers, but thousands of pieces of PPE have already been donated that are going out to the schools. The boxes of them are sitting here downtown right now. We're working on that. The Emergency Management Organization is procuring PPE for all government departments, including ECE. I can get back to the Member on those details because I have...

Thank you. This school, we put it out for tender. All the bids came in quite a bit over-budget, so we tried to work with one of the proponents. There is still some distance there, so we are looking at next steps. We want to get this done, as well, so I don't have a target date right now. It is dependent upon some decisions that will be made in the coming weeks, hopefully. There are other entities involved. I'm sorry I'm being so vague about this, but really, that's where we are right now. Again, this is another school that is a priority for us. Thank you.

Thank you. There's a lot of work done. There is constant collaboration and communication between ECE and the education authorities, and ECE does their best to know the state of all the different schools and what might be coming down the pike, and Infrastructure plays a big role, as well. You know, we rely on their expertise, so it really is a collaborative effort, trying to figure out what is an emergency, what needs to be done, where can we help, what are the surpluses like in each education authority, there are a lot of different factors, but it's not like there's a ton of money that's just...

Thank you. Now that we've gotten into the world of decentralized delivery of education, the Minister of education isn't almighty in terms of education and really has limited powers compared to, I think, what the public thinks. What we do do is we collaborate with education authorities, and there's very close collaboration, and we have great relationships. I think, in other jurisdictions, they would be envious of how we relate to the education bodies. If we need to tear down a school and build a new one, it will be a GNWT asset once it's rebuilt, and we will provide that. Even though it's a YK1...

Sure. This is a carry-over. This is money that was already appropriated and is being carried forward. We're not looking for money that was never appropriated. It's not overbudgeted; it is what was already appropriated, but the cash flow didn't flow during the timeline that was anticipated.