EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
If you’re going to be setting up policies and regulations, we have to make sure that the Inuit are involved.
The scientists shouldn’t be the only ones doing the research because they’re not experts.
Could you consider making sure that there is an Inuk involved in the research anytime that research is being conducted?
I’ll make sure that my staff are informed about this recommendation and we will make sure that the Inuit are involved when there is research being done by helicopter.
When it comes to the polar bear issue, the whole world is watching, so we will make sure that we do something about it. It’s only because we care very much about the polar bears that we’re doing such things.
Question 606 – 2(4): Western Hudson Bay Polar Bear Quota (Alagalak)
Since this is going to be the last sitting of this government, it seems like we’re running out of opportunities to ask further questions.
This winter, I asked some questions concerning the polar bears on the Western Hudson Bay coast and I also asked additional questions.
The minister stated that he would look into the issue and that he would speak with the Manitoba Wildlife Management. So I would like to hear from him today about this.
First of all, I would like to thank Mr. Alagalak and the people of Arviat for giving me an opportunity to meet with their HTO and we were very well-received.
I had a discussion with my Manitoba colleague in regard to the Western Hudson Bay polar bear population bordering the Nunavut territory. We said that we wanted to see written documentation and we were willing to share our written documents with them as well.
I had a discussion with my counterpart in Manitoba and he expressed a desire to have a close working relationship with the Nunavut Government.
I also wrote him a letter but to date, we have not had any correspondence back in regard to the Western Hudson Bay polar bear population.
Yes, you already spoke about the meetings that took place in Winnipeg and they were not directly related to this issue, but there was strong reaction from the activists and the Manitoba Wildlife Management and their government.
The concerns we had were that the polar bears did not continue their migrations towards the north once they stopped in Churchill.
Was there any comments concerning this?
In particular, I don’t seem to recall whether you spoke on the use of helicopter. There is a negative impact on the polar bears, especially on their ears and their sense of smell, because they are exposed to very loud sounds which are very close to them.
Furthermore, after having been subjected to this trauma, the polar bears seem to be unable to smell properly.
Likewise, when a person is exposed to very loud sounds, they also suffer hearing problems.
Was there any talk about this issue, Mr. Akesuk?
We had wanted to speak on those issues and I had already written to the Government of Manitoba in regard to the usage of helicopters for research purposes and relocating wildlife. We have to look at other methods that are more animal-friendly.
Usually, when polar bears come in too close to the communities, they are put into cages before they are transported to another location.
I had also wanted to speak with the Manitoba Government to suggest that it would be best if those polar bears were sent up north instead of somewhere in the south.
Usually, whenever we are given an opportunity by the government to address something, it always has to be done in a rush.
As an example, our ability to earn an income from the polar bears was greatly reduced and as everything is becoming more and more expensive, it seems like anything that residents of Arviat can make money on is taken away.
We’re concerned about a lot of issues in regard to polar bears and there is also a negative impact when tourists are involved.
They have polar bear site-seeing tours and with the deterioration of the ice, there’s also a negative impact on the seals which are the main diet of the polar bears.
The polar bear population in the Western Hudson Bay area seems to be their main concern and there has to be some additional research done.
The quota for polar bears was decreased without any proper research.
The Government of Nunavut has researchers but those positions aren’t always filled.
They have a work plan where they identify what they’re going to be doing and what kind of research they’re going to be doing at any given year. Again, I would like to inform you that we do have a number of research positions that are vacant.
When you were in Arviat, you finally understood that there was a lot of work being done, but those researchers didn’t know exactly what they were doing.
They don’t know what kind of impact it has on the polar bears that have been researched and the type of impact it has on their meat, and so on.
With the polar bear population in the Western Hudson Bay area, I can say that the researchers also harvest polar bears.
What would you focus on if there’s going to be more research done for this coming year? Are you going to be conducting research on the polar bear or on the polar bear population?
With their numbers and our numbers, there has to be proper research done before I can respond to the member’s question. When we were having that meeting in Arviat, we reviewed some of the documents, but at this time, I can’t tell you if there’s going additional research done until we review all the documentation.
Written Question 015 – 2(4): Disclosure and Withdrawals under the Integrity Act (Tootoo)
I would like to direct some questions to the Premier and the Chairperson of the Executive Council of Nunavut in regard to disclosures and withdrawals under the Integrity Act.
Within the meaning of subsection 15(2) of the Integrity Act, on how many occasions since March 1, 2004, has the Secretary to Cabinet recorded a disclosure and withdrawal under subsection 15(1) of the Act?
What were the circumstances in each case where a disclosure and withdrawal under subsection 15(1) of the Act took place?
Written Questions. Item 8. Returns to Written Question.
Tabled Document 257 – 2(4): Ministerial Expenses – Duty and Home Travel 2007/08 (Okalik)
I am pleased to table the following document:
Ministerial Expenses for Fiscal Year 2007-2008.
We will just have that document brought forward to the table, please.
(interpretation) Thank you. Item 13. Tabling of Documents.
Tabled Document 258 – 2(4): Successful Winter Fur Harvest in Baker Lake - Photos (Simailak)
I wish to table today some photographs that show the product of this year’s successful winter harvest in Baker Lake.
There are wolverines, wolves, and foxes, and from what we know, at least 42 wolverines, 120 wolves, and 100 foxes were harvested in Baker Lake. There are other species that were sold by other means.
I wanted to table those photographs.
Tabled Document 259 – 2(4): Standing Committee on Government Operations and Accountability – Amended Copy of the Report on the Review of the 2007 Report of the Auditor General on the Nunavut Business Credit Corporation (Tootoo)
I wish to table today an amended copy of the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Accountability’s report on the Review of the 2007 Report of the Auditor General to the Legislative Assembly on the Nunavut Business Credit Corporation.
Mr. Speaker, the report corrects an error on page 3 of the report that was read into the record yesterday in the House with respect to the status of the former comptroller of the corporation who was on leave with pay prior to his resignation.
Tabled Document 260 – 2(4): Alcohol Education Committee Reference Guide (2008) (Tapardjuk)
Tabled Document 261 – 2(4): Fuel Tax Rebate Program 2008 Annual Report (Tapardjuk)
Tabled Document 262 – 2(4): Letters of Expectation to Nunavut Crown Agencies for the Fiscal Year 2008-2009 Nunavut Housing Corp., Nunavut Arctic College, Qulliq Energy Corp. (Tapardjuk)
Tabled Document 263 – 2(4): Responses to the Letters of Expectation from Nunavut Crown Agencies, 2007-2008 (Tapardjuk)
I would like to table four documents.
The first one is the “Alcohol Education Committee Reference Guide.”
The next one is “The 2008 Annual Report of the Fuel Tax Rebate Program.”
The third one is: The 2008-09 Letters of Expectation to:
The Nunavut Housing Corporation;
Nunavut Arctic College; and
The Qulliq Energy Corporation.
And also: The 2007-08 Responses to the Letters of Expectation for:
Nunavut Arctic College;
The Nunavut Development Corporation; and
Please be patient while we are provided with the documents.
Tabled Document 264 – 2(4): Nunavut Business Credit Corporation Annual Report for the Year Ended March 31, 2007 (Netser)
Tabled Document 265 – 2(4): Agriculture Products Marketing Act Annual Reports 2004/05 - 2007/08 (Netser)
Hon. Patterk Netser: Mr. Speaker, I wish to table two documents. The first one is the Nunavut Business Credit Corporation 2006-07 Annual Report.
Also, Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to table the following document: The Agriculture Products and Marketing Act Annual Report for 2004/05, 2005/06, 2006/07, and 2007/08.
Mr. Speaker, we are a few years behind due to lack of agricultural activity.
Tabled Document 266 – 2(4): Response to the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Accountability’s Report on the Review of the Report of the Auditor General on the Financial Assistance for Nunavut Students Program (Picco)
Response to the Report of the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Accountability on the Financial Assistance for Nunavut Students Program.
Item 19. Consideration in the Committee of the Whole of Bills and Other Matters.
Bills 26, 27, and 33 with Mr. Kattuk in the Chair.
>>House recessed at 15:42 and Committee resumed at 16:15
Chairman (Mr. Kattuk)(interpretation): Good afternoon, Members.
I would like to call the committee meeting to order. In Committee of the Whole, we have the following items to deal with: Bills 26, 27, and 33.
We wish to deal with Bills 33, 26 and 27, in that order.
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Evyagotailak. (interpretation ends) Are we in agreement that we first deal with Bill 33?
Bill 33 – An Act to Amend the Labour Standards Act – Consideration in Committee
Chairman: I would now like to ask the Law Clerk to join us at the table. Do you agree?
Chairman: I would now like to ask the Minister responsible for Justice to make his opening remarks.
Let me start by saying that the minimum wage is generally adhered to by Nunavut employers without any need for enforcement. Nunavut employers know that they can only build their businesses and the economy with the help of all of their employees, who must be adequately compensated.
If necessary, however, enforcement of the minimum wage falls under the jurisdiction of Labour Standards Officer in the Department of Justice, whose decisions can be reviewed by the Labour Standards Board.
For the past few years, the Department of Justice has been reviewing minimum wage rates across Canada, as directed by amendments the Assembly made to the Labour Standards Act in 2003.
As a result, it came to our attention that the current $8.50 minimum wage was likely not sufficient to meet the needs of Nunavut’s lowest paid workers.
As of May 1, 2008, Nunavut’s minimum rate will be the same as Quebec and Manitoba’s, but lower than that of Ontario, Saskatchewan and the Yukon.
We are concerned that the current minimum wage does not adequately reflect the cost of living in Nunavut.
The information available to the department was that employers were presently paying entry-level employees significantly more than the current minimum wage just to compete with other companies.
As a result, we recommend that the minimum wage be increased to $10 per hour to protect workers.
The Department of Justice recently wrote to various stakeholders, such as the Baffin Regional Chamber of Commerce and the Nunavut Association of Municipalities.
I have provided you with copies of the two responses received.
A number of other jurisdictions have adopted mechanisms for setting the minimum wage rate by some more automatic mechanism, many of those being based on the Consumer Price Index.
However, given that in 2002, Nunavut’s Members of the Legislative Assembly specifically wanted to reserve this decision for the Assembly, it is recommended that a specific minimum wage rate continue to be set directly by the legislation.
The department will monitor the experiences of other provinces and territories with Minimum Wage Fixing Mechanisms they have adopted in the past two years.
By way of a motion today, I will be proposing that the bill come into force three months after it is passed by the Legislative Assembly.
The purpose of this three-month period is to allow for adequate communications of the new rate to employers and employees by the Labour Standards Office.
I thank you for your consideration of this bill and look forward to your comments.
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Minister Okalik. (interpretation ends) Do you have witnesses that you would like to bring to the table?
Hon. Paul Okalik (interpretation): Yes, I do. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman: Sergeant-at-Arms, please escort the witness in.
(interpretation) Minister Okalik, please introduce your witness.
With me on my right is my Deputy Minister for the Department of Justice, Markus Weber.
Chairman (interpretation): Welcome, Mr. Minister and your official. (interpretation ends) Does the Chair of the Standing Committee Ajauqtiit have opening comments?
Mr. Mapsalak (interpretation): Yes, I do, Mr. Chairman.  Chairman: Please proceed, Mr. Mapsalak.
The Standing Committee Ajauqtiit has had an opportunity to review Bill 33 and I am pleased to make some opening comments today on the proposed Act to Amend the Labour Standards Act.
Bill 33 proposes to amend the Labour Standards Act by increasing the minimum wage in Nunavut from $8.50 per hour to $10 per hour.
The minimum wage in Nunavut was last changed in 2003.
Mr. Chairman, the cost of living in Nunavut has increased significantly over the past five years and will probably rise further, especially with the predicted increase in the price of fuel.
The committee recognizes that the increase in wage rates will have a welcome impact in helping to meet those rising needs.
Mr. Chairman, the standing committee has noted that some other jurisdictions have recently established mechanisms to increase the minimum wage rates in direct link with increases in the Consumer Price Index. For example, this is the case in the Yukon Territory.
Members note that the Consumer Price Index for Nunavut, based on the community of Iqaluit, has only been measured for a relatively short period of time.
However, the standing committee urges the government to closely monitor the progress of this initiative in those other jurisdictions and evaluate whether a similar system could be implemented in Nunavut at a future date.
Mr. Chairman, the Standing Committee Ajauqtiit met with the minister last week to discuss the proposed legislation and was pleased to discuss these and other issues.  That concludes my opening comments, Mr. Chairman.
The committee supports Bill 33 and recommends its passage to all members.
Before we proceed, I would like to remind members of the following: according to Rule 77(1), you have 10 minutes to speak, and according to Rule 77(2), (interpretation ends) subject to the discretion of the Chair, a member may speak more than once to a matter under discussion but not until every member wishing to speak has spoken.
I am pleased to have the opportunity to provide some comments on Bill 33, An Act to Amend the Labour Standards Act.
Mr. Chairman, the minimum wage rate in Nunavut has not been increased since November of 2003. Over the past five years, the cost of living in Nunavut, and in the rest of the country, has steadily increased.
For northerners, the costs of daily living are even higher than anywhere else.
Mr. Chairman, I am sure that many of my colleagues have had similar experiences to my own, where constituents have come to you and described their difficulties to provide for their families, to put adequate nutritious food on the table, to make sure their children are properly clothed, and to pay the basic bills.
Mr. Chairman, many Nunavut families continue to live in poverty. Many cycle between social assistance and low-wage work. Even those who manage to find full-time employment at the minimum wage rate are struggling.
Mr. Chairman, increasing the minimum wage rate is one step in the right direction towards addressing the very real needs of the most vulnerable people in our society, the working poor.
Mr. Chairman, much more needs to be done to address the issue of poverty in Nunavut.
Increasing the minimum wage rate is one important step forward and for this reason, I am in support of Bill 33.
Anybody else for general comments?
We will now proceed with the clause-by-clause review starting with page 1.
Mr. Chairman, I certainly support the bill; I think it’s a step forward.
With the way in which the economy is turning around these days, it’s very crucial that we amend some of the legislation that would increase this for our workers in order benefit from the source of their funds.
I have a question with respect to the enforcement part. I know that there are many in the Nunavut communities, including my constituency, who I know and have told me that they have been working below the minimum wage before it’s amended.
I tried to get some of the evidence, including the pay stubs and so on, but they were not able to provide me with those immediately. So I got curious as to how exactly this bill would be enforced to ensure that the employers are complying with the provision, this bill particularly, the Labour Standards Act.
We have someone working with this Act.
He visits the communities to monitor that it is being complied with. He also provides information through the telephone from his office.
We also have to ensure that Nunavummiut are aware that we have an individual here whom they can contact concerning any complaints that they want to make. He has the authority to enforce this Act.
We also have a board that they can appeal to.
What is the title of this position? If you can provide us with that information, it would be very helpful so that we can tell those who are getting paid less than the minimum wage. (interpretation ends) Thank you.
Hon. Paul Okalik (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yes, in English it is called Labour Standards Officer. I don’t know what it would be called in Inuktitut.
He is the Labour Standards Officer and on top of that, there is a Labour Standards Committee that is outside of the government that anyone who wishes to make a complaint can go to.
Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Curley, or Minister Okalik, I’m sorry.
This is the longest session ever.
The numbers are quite short but it is a very hard-working session.
This is a follow-up on Mr. Curley’s question a little bit.
If and when we are asked from our constituency, we will reply to our constituency when we get back what bills we have passed.
Some of them will be just information and some of them will be interesting, like Bill 33.
Perhaps you can supply our offices, and there are only 19 of them, of who will be the contact and numbers through our email system because we would not want to slip it through this House with just having one question.
I don’t think I’m making $10 an hour now. Here is a contact person and here’s the number, that kind of thing so that things will be efficient and not all over the place for that individual person who might not want to be exposed.
I would like to clarify to you that the minimum wage is still $8.50 and once this bill has been approved, their wage will increase to $10 per hour.
We have the authority and if they’re making less than $8.50 an hour, then their employer is not following the Labour Standards Act.
So I will provide that information to my colleagues and also to the public out there. This has to be made public once this Act comes into force. Yes, we will provide that information to the public.
I am in support of this bill but I do have a concern with regards to raising minimum wage, especially for stores that are operating in Nunavut. They will be hugely impacted this coming winter with transportation and the cost of fuel and everything else.
Nutritious foods such as milk and infant formula should be affordable in the stores.
I know that through the Income Support Program, there is support there, but in Nunavut, there are quite a few people working in stores and there was no one for them to make complaints to, although there was a phone number made available.
People don’t like to make complaints to the RCMP, so could they be provided with information as to who they could contact when making complaints?
Hon. Paul Okalik (interpretation): Yes, they have an office here.
It is evident that we need to provide more information on that. We will try and correct that for Nunavummiut. There is an Inuk working there who can respond to phone calls and we will be sure to provide that information for the public so that they can abide by this Act.
I know that the Minister responsible for Income Support is listening and I’m sure that the government is going to start considering this and I know that the Members of the Legislative Assembly will probably make statements in regard to this in the fall or winter.
The Department of Justice is responsible for legislation and people in the communities don’t know where to go when they are facing problems like being paid less than minimum wage, working in the underground economy. Even when they learn that they can lodge a complaint, they don’t know who to direct their complaints to at the local level.
When the Act comes into force, perhaps you can have an agreement to make sure that we hear from individuals experiencing problems in the workplace.
This Act will apply to all income earners and come into force over the next three months to allow the public to be informed. A phone number will be provided which people will be able to call to make complaints.
It will be manned by people familiar with the legislation and they will be able to look into complaints.
Once the bill is enacted, we will become better able to enforce the Act.
Chairman: Thank you, Minister Okalik. (interpretation) Are you done, Mr. Alagalak? (interpretation ends) Thank you.
Just a question on the minister’s statement, he says, “As of May 1, 2008, Nunavut’s minimum rate will be the same as Quebec and Manitoba’s, but lower than that of Ontario, Saskatchewan and the Yukon.”
Could the minister provide some information on the rates in Ontario, Saskatchewan, and the Yukon?
Hon. Paul Okalik (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As of May 1, 2008, in Quebec, it was $8.50 per hour; as of April 1, 2008, in the Yukon, it was $8.58 per hour; as of March 1, 2008, in Ontario, it was $8.75 per hour; as of April 1, 2008, in Manitoba, it was $8.50 per hour; and as of May 1, 2008, in Saskatchewan, it was $8.60 per hour, so those provinces’ wages were higher than Nunavut.
Last week, I mentioned in the House that Indian and Northern Affairs Canada had conducted a food survey I think in the year 2006 and they indicated that a nutritious basket of food for a family of four in Cambridge Bay was $382 and in Edmonton, it was $202, and I think in Yellowknife, it was maybe $204.
So to me, that indicates that the cost of living in communities such as Cambridge Bay might be two to two and half times the cost of living in southern communities and yet, the minimum wage rate in Nunavut is almost the same or if we pass this bill today, it will be slightly higher than some of these other jurisdictions, but it would not be twice the minimum wage rate in these other jurisdictions.
So I’m wondering if the minister could indicate if he feels that the $10 will help individual Nunavummiut to purchase nutritious food in the communities.
I know all communities are a little bit different, it might be higher in some and lower in others, but I’m wondering if he feels that this minimum wage rate will help Nunavummiut eat nutritious food.
Hon. Paul Okalik (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. (interpretation ends) I’m sure it will definitely help those that may be struggling, but I must say, this is the minimum wage, they could be making more.