Robert Hawkins

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for this opportunity just to provide a few general comments. Madam Chair, I find it very difficult when we see this in our budget. It was read into the record yesterday, and I welcome that by the Finance Minister and I think he’s leading us in certainly a strong direction so, overall, all our citizens can have benefits. But it wasn’t that long ago, in October, that we had read some strong motions from this side of the House into the official record. I find we’re sort of missing those types of actions that this side of the House has led with. Over 50...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My written question is for the Premier of the Northwest Territories.

How many northern Teacher Education Program students have completed education programs since the Premier’s office made the commitment to hire all students who have successfully completed the Teacher Education Program?

Of the graduates, how many are currently employed as teachers in the North?

Further, will the Premier please explain, in detail, what the incentives are that he referred to in the Unedited Hansard, pages 2604 to 2605, on February 10, 2005, to encourage education authorities to hire...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I could almost see like a candle of light starting there. There wasn’t a flashlight or a big beam, but I could feel the warmth of light. You are lighting the path in the right direction. Mr. Speaker, we are getting a whole whack of dollars for infrastructure money. I don’t have to talk about how much; this is the right Minister to talk to though. Will he use his power to create a policy that helps some of those infrastructure dollars to address this problem? Mr. Speaker, I want to hear him take control of his department and take control of this problem. Will he...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I was going to ask questions about RWED and their commitment to Expo, but I think I’m going to jump on the bandwagon about this lack of gymnasium in Nahanni Butte.

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Mr. Speaker, I grew up in Fort Simpson and I know these communities very well. I can tell you personally from my own experience of growing there as a young lad we could either go to the gymnasium to play floor hockey or kick soccer balls, or we could be out on the streets breaking windows doing nasty things. So my question to the Minister is what is his priority for our children out there? Is it...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I truly say thank you, Mr. Minister, yet I’m still waiting for an answer. I asked, when am I going to get a response to this letter. I’m waiting again now, in front of the public. My constituents are waiting. Their safety is an issue. We have people ploughing down trees in reserve areas. Are we going to wait for the chiefs to come say why we’re allowing people to destroy our land? Someday that’s going to be their land out there. The Minister almost…He said the Department of Justice, DOT. I’m surprised he didn’t say Housing and Education have a responsibility over this...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I would like to hear today that the Premier will tie that promise to funding all education authorities. I want to hear it clearly that he is tying their funding solely to the fact that they have to do this as a first step. As I see it, we have lost wages by these students who graduated on the promise that they would be hired. Mr. Speaker, will the Premier either withdraw that commitment made by the highest office in this Assembly or promise to fulfil that commitment, one or the other? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate that extra information by the Premier. I have never heard of the incentive aspect. Mr. Speaker, that still doesn’t speak to the crux of the problem. Have the authorities expressed any further problem with hiring northern graduates? Do they not want them? Do they not know that they are out there? What is this incentive? Why aren’t they hiring them? I need to know from the Premier today, have they communicated problems as to why they are not hiring these northern grads? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I wish, like my other colleagues, I could quote from Mr. Roland’s finance budget delivery address earlier today, but, unfortunately, I can’t quote what isn’t there. That is, we don’t have a plan to hire our northern teaching graduates.

Mr. Speaker, we are all well aware of former Premier Kakfwi’s grand promise to provide all northern graduates of recognized teaching programs with employment. Well, Mr. Speaker, those were nice words back in those days, which were only a couple years ago, as a priority, but the reality is that those graduates out there are not...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the Minister because I can start to feel an answer coming any minute now. I can tell you personally that the RCMP do not go out there. My constituents have phoned when they’ve heard people shooting at outhouses. Nobody goes. I mean, do we have to wait for an accident to happen? That’s why I tried to work six months ago with this department to say let’s start identifying the land. This is land right along our highway. This is certainly an area that could be addressed. I’ve suggested that, geez, let’s have land management policies out there. I need an answer...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I rise with a serious concern with the Department of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development. Late last summer I had a meeting with a constituent who had brought serious concerns to me about having a legal cabin out along the Cameron River and the fact that people were bulldozing trees down, making roads, shooting guns at their cabin as well as other legal cabins and no one was doing anything about it. No RWED officer would be there, no RCMP officer would be there. Well, much later the Minister’s staff comes to me and says it’s not their problem to...