Robert Hawkins

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Today I’d like to raise the issue of the Aboriginal Employment Strategy. That framework was worked on and certainly developed in the last government about three years ago. Like the analogy of fireworks, it came out with a big bang, there was a bit of a fizzle and some oohs and ahs and it sort of disappeared. The question really is: What has happened to the Aboriginal Employment Strategy that was once heralded as a new opportunity to tap into a human resource such as the Aboriginal people that has not been promoted often enough? Thank you.

There is no page for hotel tax.

Thank you, Madam Chair. There is just one of the items that haven't been mentioned as I listened to my colleagues. I won’t spend a lot of time repeating the other items already mentioned, but there were some pretty good ones.

The issue that I noticed had been missed – and if it had been spoken on, I apologize for that description – is hotel tax. We all know it goes through this department. The Hotel Association has been working quite diligently to bring this initiative to the forefront. The fact is the hotel tax, if implemented properly through our Municipal and Community Affairs in partnership...

Thank you. That was a good segue into my next question, which is I’m under the understanding that the advisory committee hasn’t met for almost a year. So if it’s finally back on track or the wheels of this machinery are moving along, what have they actually produced in the last, I’ll call it the term or the inception of the Aboriginal strategy and how much money has been invested to develop what we’re about to hear from the Minister?

Thank you, Madam Chair. I move we report progress.

---Carried

What type of summary information can the Minister actually provide to me, so I can provide to my constituents, on what is actually happening with this project? I mean, every time we bring this particular issue up, to me, all they hear is the discussions that are happening. When I go back to them it doesn’t seem to be a satisfying answer. Will the Minister commit to putting some type of profile onto this project to bring it to fruition, what’s being done and some of what the objectives are and would he be able to do it in a timely way?

I’m not sure how the lease deals with the discussion with the corporation. I’m curious; when will you be able to shed some light on who this corporation may be and is it a real partnership or is it just someone giving us a call, not really committing? I mean, we really know what’s actually happening out there. We’ve been led along for quite some time as to whether there may or may not be partners. When will the Minister really be able to make a substantial commitment of information saying these are the people we are talking to and this is what we’re working towards? Thank you.

I’ll thank the Minister for scooping my third question, which ultimately only left me with the fact that is it anticipated that there will be amendments coming forward this fall? I’m just trying to get a sense of what he was after. Ultimately this issue needs to be reviewed. It sounds like that is what he was about to do. I want to make sure that it gets reviewed in a timely way so that we don’t put other people at risk. Is that what he’s saying? That he’ll bring forward amendment to regulation changes that can be implemented immediately?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I said in my Member’s statement today, there seems to be a bit of a crisis out there where cars are more important than the safe access that some women want and deserve to their apartment building. That seems to be a real shame. I tried to highlight that narrative in my Member’s statement. I’ll have questions to the Minister of Justice about what he will be willing to do.

In this particular case my question is: What remedies are now available to the enforcement order of a rental officer when a landlord or tenant, as in this particular case, has trouble getting the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m going to use my statement much in the same manner as MLA Bisaro has just done. I’m going to use it to paint a bit of a narrative, a story, because we have a situation here where cars appear to be more important than people. Cars appear to be more important than safe access that’s lawfully written into the law. It’s a story about cars and where safety of women is certainly being overlooked. Cars seem to be more important.

This ongoing dispute between the UNW and its tenants seems a bit of a shame. You’ve seen the widely spread media reports, some of course very...