EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
For example, Calm Air was no longer flying to Coral Harbour and Repulse Bay and no matter how many people complained about that, they didn’t even respond.
We are doing all we can do to get these scheduled flights back and we have met with them, but since they are a private airline if they don’t want to service these communities, it’s their right.
What I am trying to say is that we will work to the best of our ability and I am sure that when we get the results of the review, and we have the final document, we will have a better idea.
But I have already met with the private airlines and they have made commitments to improve their scheduling and they even lowered their prices for the Arctic Winter Games.
Canadian North has been very helpful to us and at times, First Air also assists us.
So the airlines do try to give us support and assistance.
We do have authority over the airports and runway maintenance but the scheduling of flights and ticket prices are not within our control.
We can make recommendations but it is up to the airlines to do this since they are private companies.
Question 139 – 1(6): Increased Legal Interpreters for Court System
The court circuit travels to the communities, as they are our judicial body.
They have one interpreter and I was wondering if they have considered getting more than one interpreter.
Many communities have commented about the lack of interpreters in the courts. We only have one interpreter. When the court is not in session there are many clients that would like to speak to their lawyers.
So I was wondering if they are willing to consider getting more than one interpreter especially when the court is travelling to the communities.
Speaker: Minister of Justice. Premier Okalik.
I thank the member for the question and I am very pleased to hear this question.
I sometimes feel like I am going to be shot down at times when I am asked questions.
Yes, the member has stated it very well. We have provided an interpreter training course which started around October 2001.
They have completed their training course.
We tried to get local interpreters from the communities, we ask that they be trained for this type of work, as they have to deal with very serious issues, so I am willing to provide more interpreter training courses in the communities if people are interested.
I was not asking about how many interpreters have graduated from the interpreter training course.
My question was we have one trained interpreter when the court is in session. What I am trying to ask is when the court is not in session when they are in the communities; clients would often like to talk with their lawyers and so on, not necessarily with the court interpreter.
That is what I am talking about. When the courts go to the communities would they be willing to hire additional interpreter/translators at the community level?
Speaker: Premier Okalik.  Hon. Paul Okalik (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
To my knowledge, to date there are 62 interpreter/translators in Nunavut and we use 31 of these interpreter/translators at the community level when the courts have to travel to the communities.
If there are none available then we do have two interpreters when our staff can’t find local interpreter/translators.
This has been a problem for a very long time in most of the communities that I know.
When the court goes into a community, the families or accused or the victims would want to talk to the lawyers.
Some of them are not able to speak in English.
My question is when they go to a community; can the court hire two or three people to do this task?
I’m talking about one community, when the court goes in to do hearings in the communities.
Hon. Paul Okalik (interpretation): Qujannamiik, Uqaqti.
From what I understand, there are currently 31 interpreters that are utilized for the purposes of court parties when they go to the communities.
If there’s additional work that has to be done I would like to be advised.
Currently they are being provided with these services and if there are additional services that are requested of them, I’d like to know if there are any problems so we can try and do something it and try to solve the problem.
I’m happy with that response that they would try to assist with more interpreters in court.
For example, I don’t know how to speak Japanese and if the court comes in speaking in Japanese, it would be very uncomfortable for me to be going to that court because I don’t understand what they’re talking about.
That’s the situation in Nunavut.
So, I think communities would be very happy to have that kind of service available when the court comes into their communities and I think the Minister responsible for Justice can maybe find out more about what the realities are in this situation.
I’ve had probably six calls within the last two days from the two communities regarding this.
Hon. Paul Okalik: Domo arigato gozaimasu, Mr. Speaker, Japanese. (interpretation) Yes, thank you very much.
We provided some training in Arctic Bay and we have trained interpreters available when the court goes to communities.
If you have any more problems, I would like to hear about them and in which communities you would like extra interpreters.
There are quite a few interpreters that we use but sometimes we are not able to get interpreters in the communities. I would like to be kept informed of this.
Question 140 – 1(6): New Vehicles for Home Care Program
Mr. Nutarak (interpretation): My question is directed to the Minister responsible for Health and Social Services.
In his Minister’s Statement he said that there are home care vehicles that have been purchased.
To which communities have these vehicles been allotted, or perhaps they have not designated them to any specific community.
Speaker: Minister for Health and Social Services.
Mr. Speaker, these vehicles are dedicated vehicles for use in the home care program and where available Mr. Speaker, will be providing wheel chair access.
The vehicles are being made available to every community where we set up the home care program.
So that’s every community in Nunavut.
Mr. Nutarak (interpretation): In his Minister’s Statement he mentioned an additional 5 million dollar fund.
Is that 5 million dollars going to be distributed amongst all the communities?
Is that amount of funding for all the vehicles that he was referring to?
Mr. Speaker, the 5 million dollars is inclusive of the extra nursing positions we’ll be putting into communities that will be dedicated to home care as well as the training of the 44 people that we talked about earlier and the hires on their home care.
So that 5 million dollars Mr. Speaker will be distributed to communities through wages, benefits, and salaries.
It will be distributed from the Department of Health and Social Services.
It is not actually going to go into, for example a hamlet to manage.
We hire the staff and the drivers and provide the vehicles and so on.
In his Minister’s Statement in Inuktitut, it talks about vehicles.
Is that for the transportation requirements for home care nurses to visit people?
Is that funding for wheelchairs, or is it actually for vehicles, such as the mechanized wheelchairs?
I just wanted that clarified.
Mr. Speaker, under the home care program, again I think this is an excellent initiative.
In a lot of communities there are not dedicated vehicles for patients or for shut ins.
For example in a given community, the member’s community, if there is an elderly person who needs home care support where someone comes in to help clean up, cook, provide help with injections, needles, medicines and so on, that would be provided through the home care community program.
Mr. Speaker, that program would have its own dedicated vehicle so that the home care workers would be able to go to the individual home as well as provide transportation to those elders or shut ins who need that type of transportation support.
So that would be the dedicated vehicle.
Question 141– 1(6): Training for Inuinnaqtun Reading and Writing
This is not a new question.
I have raised this question a number of times in the past to the Minister of the Department of Culture, Language, Elders and Youth.
This question is in regards to the writing system in Inuinnaqtun and speaking Inuinnaqtun.
Do you not recognize that it is becoming a problem for the residents of Kugluktuk and for those people who speak and write Inuinnaqtun?
Last year the minister indicated that there was going to be training available for Inuinnaqtun and having some people available to help teach reading and writing in Inuinnaqtun.
So I would like to ask the minister again, if this is going to be dealt with prior to the next school year.
I would like to extend my apology to the member from Kugluktuk, we were supposed to go to Kugluktuk prior to this session, but due to a variety of different reasons, we will be going to Kugluktuk and Cambridge Bay in August instead.
We could probably talk about this issue at that time.
I will plan for it and we will talk about it when we get to Kugluktuk at that time.
Thank you for your response and I am very glad that you are coming to Kugluktuk this summer.
My main question is however, still not completely answered or perhaps I misunderstood.
Last year, the minister said that he was going to get the people together who know how to read and write in Inuinnaqtun.
For example, using the elders so that they can teach the younger people Inuinnaqtun and to ensure that through this training we do not lose the language.
Do you have a copy of this letter that I wrote to you in regards to this matter?
When we’re talking about languages and spoken language and the writing system in Inuinnaqtun, I can say to the minister that some time in August, the second week of August, myself and the Education Minister will be going to Kugluktuk so we can meet with the MLA for Kugluktuk and the Hamlet Council to find out how best we can discuss this matter.
(interpretation ends) Mr. Speaker, what I’m trying to say to the member is that we’ve committed to going to Kugluktuk and if need be to Cambridge Bay along with the Minister of Education to talk on the issue of Inuinnaqtun language and the oral and written.
But what I’m also saying is that we would work with the member as well as the Hamlet Councillors, maybe the Education Society or Education Authority to come up with the agenda on the items to discuss.
I understand where you are coming from and I’m glad that you’re coming to Kugluktuk. (interpretation ends) Last year the minister for the department indicated they’ll be holding a workshop or conference for Inuinnaqtun speakers.
If there was a meeting is there a report coming out from that conference?
Hon. Jack Anawak: Unfortunately Mr. Speaker, I don’t have that information with me either, but if there is a report then we’ll make it available or if there was to have been a conference then I’ll make the commitment to have that conference in the coming months.
Question 142 – 1(6): Allocation of Funding Based on Pupil-Teacher Ratio
Earlier in the week when we were doing Committee of the Whole, there was a community brought up that they had a pupil teacher ratio, I think it was of 23 to 1, in one of the schools here, I think it was an elementary school.
I just got off the phone with the principal in Baker Lake and they told me that the pupil teacher ratio at the elementary school there was 28.5 to 1.
My question today for the minister is, how come there is such a discrepancy in the pupil teacher ratio and the funding?
First of all, let me try and clarify.
The class size and the PTRs are quite different and because the pupil teacher ratio is what we used in determining the budget for the number of teachers that will, for all of the schools and the class sizes in the schools do vary greatly even within the same community with the different classes.
We tend to see more students in the classes in the lower grades versus the high school classes where there were less numbers of students per class.
So, just to clarify Mr. Speaker, the pupil teacher ratio that we used in the formula funding is consistent and the same for all the schools in Nunavut.
I think I grasped the answer there.
So the minister can confirm to me that every school in Nunavut is funded the same on their pupil-teacher ratio and that not some schools are funded more.
Can you confirm that to me?
I almost choked on that one.
The pupil-teacher ratios that we use in our formula funding today is applied the same in all regions and then further down in the schools.
So, the answer is yes, it is the same for all our schools and regions.
Question 143 – 1(6): Fees Charged to Patients in Boarding Homes
I would like to thank him for sending me a letter in regards to the question that I had about the Winnipeg Boarding Home, why they charge two dollars if they send out 100 dollars.
The Northmart and the Coop also charge about 15 dollars for sending money and then on top of that they charge another two dollars if it’s 100 dollars and if it’s over 100 dollars then it is 5 dollars.
He states here, if you want to send a fax, it would be 50 cents per page and if there was a fax that came in.
Some of them charge 5 dollars for a meal.
If they would like a ride it costs one dollar.
I would like to ask the minister if that’s the case in Iqaluit, Ottawa, Yellowknife and Edmonton Boarding homes.
Speaker: Mr. Arvaluk, you are quoting from a document that the rest of the House does not have but it is in relationship to a question that was asked yesterday or the day before.
So I would just caution members about quoting from documents that the rest of the House doesn’t have and allow the question to go forward to the minister.
When you’re leaning back on the chair sometimes you can’t see that light.
First of all, I was very pleased to be able to provide the letter to the member on the fee schedule.
Mr. Speaker, in consultation with the boarding home in Winnipeg, depending on where the location is for the money pick up, there is no charge.
For example Mr. Speaker, if I personally go and pick up my own money, they do not charge any money for that.
But if you send the driver by himself and say can you go to Northmart and pick up the money for me, then they do charge a nominal fee, I believe it’s a dollar and I don’t have the document in front me and the actual number is off the top of my head.
But it’s a nominal fee that they do charge and they say it’s for security reasons.
For example if I go to pick up 500 dollars, or 600 dollars on behalf of the patient, as the driver, then they are responsible for that money.
It falls, Mr. Speaker, outside of the contract that we have in place.
The contract that we have in place with all the boarding homes is to provide medical transportation to and from the airport, to and from the hospital, to the boarding homes, in some locations for example, in Ottawa, Iqaluit and in Winnipeg, free of charge. The boarding home also makes available the vehicle to take patients shopping for example, and they do that free of charge.
So the instance with the picking up or the transference of cash or funds, they do charge a nominal fee of, like I said, maybe it is a dollar whether it is 100 or something like that; the reason being the security issues involved for the transport.
At the same time it is my understanding that in Winnipeg there is no charge when the person goes and actually picks up their money, but they do charge if they ask the driver to do it for you.
That is my understanding Mr. Speaker, from the information that was provided after Mr. Arvaluk’s question.
Mr. Speaker, I did not ask that question.
Mr. Speaker, well by the way the reason I didn’t table the document first of all is it is because it is a letter from the minister himself that I will be addressing the question to.
I simply asked Mr. Speaker, if it is the same practice elsewhere in all the boarding homes in Iqaluit, Yellowknife, Edmonton and Ottawa that we have.
That is the only question that I asked Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, well the short answer to that is it is hard to say.
For example if I am at the Tammaativvik here in Iqaluit for example, and I want to go to Northern Store, how would the driver know that I am picking up cash?
I might be going there to pick up some food, groceries and so on.
So it’s a little bit different.
In Ottawa we don’t have for example, a Northmart to transfer money or an ACL to transfer money to.
Therefore it would not be the case.
In Winnipeg where the head office of ACL is located as well as Northern Stores, there is the opportunity for people to transfer money there.
In that case specifically, and that was the case that I responded to because the member was quoting from my letter on Winnipeg, there is a nominal charge for picking up money by the van, by the driver himself, but they don’t charge the patient if the patient goes along.
That’s what they informed us after the question in the House by the member.
It’s not so much whether the company that’s being contracted to look after the patients, it is just that there is no precedent in the past with Gloria Penner for example, or I have not heard that from any other centres, whether it is in Ottawa, Edmonton or Yellowknife or here in fact in Iqaluit.
I think we are not dealing with casual visitors to Winnipeg here, we are dealing with patients for the hospital to see the doctors and sometimes they get stuck there when they are being diagnosed with illness.
These people that we are supposed to make as comfortable as possible psychologically, emotionally and that if we are going to treat them without any exception, even down to a penny, fifty cents, for a piece of paper, we are not saying very much to those patients, the contractors of the Winnipeg Boarding Home. If it costs them a penny, will they charge that too?
Can we have a little consideration because they’re getting so much from the Government of Nunavut, that we would forfeit maybe 5 hundred dollars a year that we would get from these little collections so that we will be seen as helping the patients to make them feel comfortable, happier, and feel welcome in our transient centres.
Can the minister work on, or talk to the contractors and say, I’m trying to give a little consideration for the patients, to the patients’ well being.
Mr. Speaker, the member had asked me to provide him with documented evidence and what the policy was and I’ve done that.
At the same time Mr. Speaker, I agree with the member that patients that are travelling even if it’s in the nominal amount of a dollar or what have you, and the member’s correct, over a period of 12 months it might be 3 or 4 hundred dollars they would collect in fees.
It is an inconvenience to our patients, especially in that case because in some of our communities there are no banking facilities and so on.
So, Mr. Speaker, I would take the member up on the suggestion and speak to the operators of the Winnipeg Boarding Home and cease and desist charging even the nominal amount where it is in the best interests of our patients, to help facilitate the transfer of some cash to ACL or indeed to Northern Stores head office on 77 Main Street in Winnipeg and see if we can help facilitate that.
Question 144 – 1(6): Costs of Severance for Senior GN Staff
I will be asking a question that’s quite unusual.
We became a Government on April 1, 1999 and everything started from there, right from day one, in terms of operations.
There have been quite a number of changes in regards to positions within the senior levels; Deputy Ministers, and Assistant Deputy Ministers who have resigned from their positions or those who have been forced to resign.
Others have reached the mandatory retirement age and have been released.
We tend to find out the reasons up here due to our small population and when somebody resigns from an ADM position, especially from the senior positions, the usual questions that follow are in respect to what caused the resignation from the position, and in most cases, there was pressure placed on the individual whether they’re Inuit or Qallunaaq.
The reasons for dismissal are usually quite easy to find out, whether it was personal or professional friction or some other reason.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the premier about severance pay that is paid out to Assistant Deputy Ministers who are forced to resign.
There are different procedures which we abide by.
We have regulations we have to follow that are established by legislation.
There’s severance pay that’s paid out depending on the number of years of service.
There are a variety of reasons ranging from abusing our regulations, policies or legislation.
We can also remove people for a variety of reasons, depending on the circumstances.
Usually, there’s decentralization involved where the member doesn’t want to move to the particular community or they take education leave.
So, there are different types of policies and practices that we follow so I’m not quite sure how to respond to your question.
Mr. Speaker, when we were dealing with the pension plan, there were some things that we don’t see out there that were visible.
How much does it cost to hire a person, how much does it cost when a staff person resigns?
Those are the types of things that we are not informed of and sometimes when a person is forced to resign they are paid upwards of a year’s salary.
What I am trying to obtain from the minister is an approximation of the costs, and my question is in regards to this issue.
If an employee is forced to resign and the position has to be advertised, how much does it cost to hire a person and how much does it cost to let an employee go?
We have to follow the different employment agreements and they are not all the same.
After I became the Premier, we have tried to decrease the amounts of salaries and adjust the agreements.
This is currently in place with the new employees and it’s going to be our usual practice.
There are different agreements we have to implement according to the relevant legislation, and we try to keep the government’s expenses as low as possible.
I can’t respond directly to your question because of course, employee information is confidential.
I understand the confidentiality issue, but my question is about employees who reach the pension age and go into retirement.
Of course the position has to be filled.
How much does it cost to fill the position with the advertising, the interviews and everything else?
There are standard procedures that we follow but we try to keep the costs as low as possible.
When we were looking for Deputy Ministers we asked for applications and there was a national advertisement when we were looking for people to fill these positions.
There were submissions made and through that process we were able to find deputy ministers and that’s going to be the usual process of the government, because we look for employees on a daily basis.
Tabled Document 016 – 1(6): Gjoa Haven Gasoline Study
I wish to table a document that was previously tabled in this House on October 26, 1999.
I wish to table the Gjoa Haven gasoline study, 1999.
Tabled Document 017 – 1(6): Gasoline Requirement Specifications
We are looking to see if this can be translated because of the technical nature of this document.
Mr. Speaker, members of this House, I would like to table the following document that Mr. McLean requested on May 7, 2002, on the gas requirement specifications.
Tabled Document 018 – 1(6): Building Nunavut Through Decentralization – Evaluation Report
I wish to table the following document, Building Nunavut Through Decentralization - Evaluation Report.
Tabled Document 019 – 1(6): Kivalliq Chamber of Commerce AGM Resolutions
It gives me great pride today to table 21 resolutions from the very successful Kivalliq Chamber of Commerce.
I must add, I’d like to thank Honourable Olayuk Akesuk, for giving them base funding to hold this Annual General Meeting every year.
Tabled Document 020 – 1(6): Annual Report of the Integrity Commissioner – April 2001 to March 31, 2002
I have a document that I wish to table.
The Annual Report of the Integrity Commissioner – April 2001 to March 31, 2002
Bill 11 – An Act to Amend the Legislative Assembly and Executive Council Act – Notice