EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
Mr. Speaker, I will direct my question to the Minister Responsible for Community Government and Transportation.
I remember back in the summer of 2000 when you were doing the community tours in Taloyoak.
On our way to Taloyoak we saw the airstrip and the dump was too close to the airstrip and we felt that was a safety issue.
The deputy mayor, Mr. Taqtu, and I felt that the dump was too close as well.
So I was wondering if the minister is willing to look at the safety issue of whether the dump is too close to the airstrip or not.
I would like to know what kind of plans the Community Government Department has and what the status is of those plans.
I apologize. I cannot tell you where we are at now but one thing that I have observed in some communities is that their dump is very close to the airstrip and that’s a safety issue and we would prioritize those by consulting the communities.
So therefore I apologize to the member because I cannot tell you where we’re at but I will look into it.
But I could tell you that we are aware of the community's concerns.
Perhaps it might be a safety issue because usually the seagulls and the ravens hang out at the dump.
So we usually deal with the priorities first when there are safety issues.
So I’ll look into it first and get back to the member.
Mr. Speaker, we have been asking your department to look into this issue and whether it’s a safety issue and we have heard from your department that this could be a safety issue.
We have been waiting for it to start.
I would like to be able to give that information to the community of Taloyoak and it still hasn’t been worked on.
Because we feel that it’s a safety issue and our leaders at the community level know this issue because they know their community issues.
If you could write to me as to when you can start looking at it and reviewing it, I would like to see a document.
I have to bring a document back to my constituency in regards to this.
I didn’t say that they have started working on it.
Personally myself all I’m saying is that I don’t know where they are at this time. I know that they started reviewing it but I’m just telling the member here that I don’t know where we’re at.
But I could tell the member that I could give you the information tomorrow in regards to the dump being too close to the airport.
Question 317 - 1(5): Public Housing, Staff Housing and Rent
I would like to direct my question to the Minister Responsible for the Housing Corporation.
She made a very interesting statement earlier. The government provides funding to the Housing Corporation for the units that will be built in the communities.
The communities put in RFP's for construction of those units, so I would like to find out what the real process is.
Speaker: Minister Responsible for Housing. Ms. Thompson.
I didn't quite understand his question. I apologize.
Is he talking about government leased units, or is he talking about the units that we are building or is he talking about homeownership.
I need some clarification on his question, please re-phrase.
I apologize if I was not clear.
The government builds units through the Nunavut Housing Corporation.
I am speaking about staff housing, they pay expensive rent for the units they are renting and these units are provided by the government.
The public housing units run by the Local Housing Organization, they have to pay for the O&M of these units.
So I don't quite understand that process.
The government provides funding and the tenant pays the rent, so I was wondering what kind of process there is.
If I can't make this clear, I could ask that question outside the chamber.
If the member would like more clarification, I could speak with him outside the House in regards to rental of the public housing.
I am not sure if he is speaking about the teachers' staff housing.
What I can say Mr. Speaker, is that if the member wishes to come and speak privately to me to try and understand the process of paying rent as a staff member, or for a public housing unit.
There is a difference between staff housing and public housing rentals.
Mr. Speaker, in the statement she made it is very interesting and the money that she spoke about, 15 to 25 thousand, that's government money.
When they get paid from the government, then they build more houses.
I am not exactly sure but if I was working for a government department and I was renting staff housing I would pay a lot of money.
Say for instance two thousand dollars a month or more.
What about the money that Public Works is paying and where does the money go to help in assisting a person who is renting a staff house.
These staff houses are not fully paid for as of yet because they all have to be paid for.
Say for instance if somebody bought their own home.
Because he has a mortgage on it he would have to pay for it for so many years in accordance with the agreement with the bank.
So the money for staff housing is coming to the Housing Corporation.
The operations and maintenance part of it is 1 thousand 600 dollars a month for the oil and the utilities and what not.
So it is about 20 thousand dollars a year that they need for that one house.
Say for example if we are going to build a house this summer according to what was approved yesterday. One house requires about 20 thousand dollars for operations and maintenance in a year.
And it is actually a lot more.
There is a lot more to pay for such as utilities and fuel oil and for the operation of the house.
Some people don't pay much attention to having to put out the lights when they leave the room and stuff like that.
So these are all the expenses that we have to pay.
Question 318 - 1(5): Increasing the Minimum Wage in Nunavut
Mr. Speaker I rose on numerous occasions in this House to ask about the low minimum wages that are paid to the hard working workers in Nunavut.
Has the Minister Responsible for Justice come up with a plan to raise the minimum wage in Nunavut.
Hon. Paul Okalik: Are you sure you got the right minister.
What we did try to do earlier on was consult with businesses and unfortunately there wasn't the broad response that we were hoping for on the issue.
The issue of raising it was favourable.
What we wanted to do was a bit more consultation because it is going to affect all of Nunavut especially the small businesses.
We want to make sure that they can afford the minimum wage that we would be looking at.
In addition we are looking at the Labour Standards Act which includes the minimum wage with Maligarnit Qimirujiit which will table their report in the coming year.
So we want to see what they have done in that area before we move on it too far.
Now I understand which minister is supposed to answer the question.
I'll ask a supplementary.
On that Mr. Speaker, there are jurisdictions across this country looking at minimum wage rates.
We used to have one of the highest minimum wage rates. I think we are in the middle of the pack again.
And it is no secret that we have the highest cost of living in Canada.
One of the issues that other jurisdictions are looking at is a one tier minimum wage where students aren't paid less than the average person going into the workforce.
Can the minister advise if they are going to look at one minimum wage rather than a two tier minimum wage. One for adults and one for students.
I want to be open to initiatives but I don't want to preclude any decisions at this point.
I want to be open, as I mentioned, Maligarnit Qimirujiit looked at this as well, so I will look at your recommendations along with my colleagues here in this House.
I am glad the Minister Responsible said that.
When this report is done would he commit to tabling it in the House.
Moving on to item 7. Written Questions.
Tabled Document 048 - 1(5): Briefing Note from Hamlet of Kugaaruk
Mr. Speaker, I would like to table a document from the Hamlet of Kugaaruk in regards to fuel oil.
Bill 12, Appropriation Act No. 1, 2002-03, Bill 13, Supplementary Appropriation Act No. 2, 2001-02.
Minister's Statement 96 - 1(5), Ulaajuk School - First of Many to Come.
Mr. Puqiqnak will be in the chair.
We will break for 20 minutes.
>>House recessed at 3.24 p.m. and resumed at 3.51 p.m.
Chairperson (Mr. Puqiqnak) (interpretation): Thank you, and good afternoon Members of the Legislative Assembly.
I would like to call the committee meeting to order.
Yesterday we were dealing with the Minister of Education.
During the committee of the whole we will be dealing with Bill 12, Appropriation Act No. 1, 2002/2003, Bill 13 and Minister’s Statement 96-1(5).
The committee would like to deal with Bill 12, Department of Education Capital Estimates and after the Department of Education we would like to deal with Community Government & Transportation.
The minister made his opening remarks yesterday.
Would you proceed to the witness table please.
Bill 12 – Appropriation Act No. 1, 2002/2003  - Consideration in Committee
On my right is Tom Rich, the Deputy Minister and on my left is Lorne Levy, in charge of capital planning.
Welcome and good afternoon.
Mr. Nutarak, the Chairman of the Standing Committee on Health and Education, do you have opening comments.
As the chairman of the Standing Committee on Health and Education, I am very pleased to have this opportunity to make some introductory remarks as we begin deliberations on the capital budget of the Department of Health.
The Committee is pleased that the Government has adopted the Standing Committees’ suggestion to move this component of the budget process forward in order to facilitate the meeting of sealift and construction deadlines.
The Committee on Health and Education appreciated the opportunity to have an in-depth review of the Department’s draft capital in June.
Once again, the Department of Education has been allocated the largest share of total Government Of Nunavut capital spending in 2002-2003.
The Committee recognizes that this reflects the Government’s commitment to improve access to educational opportunities for Nunavummiut and members support this as an investment in Nunavut’s future.
The Standing Committee noted that over 350 thousand dollars is allocated in 2002-2003 for the planning and design of projects that are not fully costed out within the five-year capital plan.
In the past, members have raised the concern that amounts allocated for projects often differ widely from actual costs due to cancellations, deferral or simply unrealistic estimates.
Members would like to see more detail on future costs of planned projects as well as for projects currently underway.
The Standing Committee feels that forced growth in communities such as the capital city of Iqaluit and the decentralized communities is still not being adequately addressed in planning for schools.
Members feel that more consideration should be given to allocating capital dollars to building new cost-effective facilities rather than continually renovating current facilities, some of which already face capacity problems.
Members have raised the concern that the amount allocated under minor capital for contingency funds has been reduced to 200 thousand dollars from 500 thousand dollars in last year’s capital estimates.
Despite the fact that insurance coverage is available in the event of large-scale disasters, members are concerned that even repairs resulting from minor emergencies such as general damage, or problems with electrical or heating systems for example, may cost more than the budgeted amount.
And that, Mr. Chairman, concludes my opening remarks.
I am sure that individual members will also have questions and comments as we proceed.
At this time then we have to be ten to make a quorum.
There are only eight of us.
I’m going to ring the bell to get a quorum.
Before the members ask questions, perhaps before we ask questions and concerns to the Minister of Education the members can make ten minute comments.
After ten minutes, please try not to go over ten minutes so we can proceed properly because the members have to have a chance to talk.
We have to try to think of others not just ourselves.
With that, are there any comments from the members.
I’m not going to be asking questions, I just have comments in regards to capital planning.
When we deal with capital plans, Nunavummiut have started to think that the school system of Inuktitut and English should be separate and I would like this to be considered.
The schools that are built in Nunavut in the communities, even though the schools are being given to Nunavummiut and they are taking classes in the same building they should have a separate entrance for the ones taking Inuktitut classes and English classes.
In the past what we have tried to do in our community, what we wanted to do was split the school where there’s just all Inuktitut speaking classrooms and English speaking classrooms.
And we have noticed that some of the curriculum in the schools is very good for the students that are taking traditional knowledge and traditional skills.
And the Inuit people a long time ago had their own traditional skills when they were taking their schooling.
The first thing that we had as Inuit was tool making and other equipment and being taught the Inuit way of survival.
When they get up to grade twelve then that’s when we started going hunting as men and the women started doing sewing and they were able to know what is in their future.
I know that there are options here but when the schools have English speaking and Inuktitut speaking together, perhaps we are losing some skills in there because they teach different subjects at once.
The people in the communities realize that they are basically surrendering their children to the schools for a majority of the day until school is out.
We like this, as we want our children to do well in school.
But there are also things out there that can be taken out of the school outside of the classroom that could be very good, such as survival skills which are very valuable because the subjects are not in schools.
And these also should be taught.
The others could be taught to do math and English and everything else.
But there are no visible skills out there that we can learn such as Inuit survival skills, traditional skills.
Perhaps these kinds of things could be taught in schools today.
There is a lot of suicide and it seems like the schools should be thinking towards those kinds of things that can prevent suicide.
But looking at it in regards to Capital planning, I think we should be able to plan these types of things to help the communities that way.
I think that should be an option when we are dealing with Capital planning for the future.
I have no questions at this time.
Mr. Chairman and thank you, Mr. Chairman.
There were no questions.
I want to make a short comment in terms of the education system in the schools and the population in the schools starting to expand.
And for the future of the students we have to start thinking about the jobs that they could possibly be getting.
As we know, our communities are starting to grow and as a whole Nunavut is expanding.
And in some communities when the student enters grade 12 they should perhaps be thinking about a career.
Once they graduate some of the students consider going down to the Universities or Colleges.
In terms the school curriculum today as we know in the southern schools we should start thinking about integrating the students and to prepare them for their careers.
For example in the southern schools when they graduate in our communities they would be considered as grade 10.
Chairperson (interpretation): The capital estimates for 2002-2003 for the Department of Education.
We have to look at the estimates and your comments should keep in mind the Capital estimates.
I understand where you are coming from.
My comments will be directed to those concerns.
I will begin to move my comments towards the estimates.
I will rephrase my comment.
As we know the student population is growing and the classrooms are getting smaller and we know the cost of building schools will begin to expand as well.
I would like to say to the minister and his staff while our communities are expanding we should consider now to build better schools to adequately serve the population of our students in our communities.
Another comment I wanted to make in terms of the Capital plans.
Looking at what is involved.
When you question something in the Capital plan and it is not written down it gets very frustrating.
Perhaps I am not the only one that is concerned.
As Members of the Legislative Assembly we represent out communities.
I now know that when it is not in the Capital plan the concern seems to be dropped or deferred.
Those are all the comments that I have.
You could raise your questions. Right now the floor is open if you would like to raise your question to the minister.
I want to raise a question in terms of the 5-year capital plan.
My concern is in your plan, as I stated I am not happy with that.
As we know in 1998 the GNWT was aware of the Kugluktuk library and it was in the Capital plans.
Now that we have a Government of Nunavut.
Why is that not in the Capital plans.
That is my question. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I appreciate the question on the capital estimates and the five year plan that he is referring to.
Regarding his question, he referred to the GNWT 5 year plan.
I cannot say why it was taken out of the 5 year plan at that time.
That 5 year plan is not in front of me but I could find that out.
I would appreciate it if you would look into this and where the concern went. I will encourage you to try and look into the 1998/1999 capital plans of the GNWT and as well the 5 year forecast for 1999/2003.
It seems that those concerns that we had raised at that time are no longer there.
I would appreciate it if you could look into that.
In terms of Arctic College responsibilities, I will raise this question in terms of last year.
The adult education programs in Kugluktuk seem to have decreased.
I raised this question last year in terms of the industries and hamlets who want to train those who want to work in the mining field.
For example cooks, so that they can get employment.
Perhaps construction as well.
Without a building you cannot train people, or teach people without a building.
As we know there is a need for training facilities.
My question is, what is the forecast for the adult education program in Kugluktuk because it doesn’t seem to be in the 5 year plan.
Firstly the concern that the member raises regarding the library, the library is not in the 5 year plan.
The adult education centre isn’t a priority in that community and if we were to find more funds we would put them in the supplementary lists, we have them noted.
The two concerns that I had raised, I do not want you to forget the concerns that I have, right now they are not in the 5 year plan.
I am not the only one concerned.
I have to tell my leaders back home where it is at, this is my concern and I have raised this question to you and I will appreciate it if your employees would look into this.
Because you have stated that it is not a priority, perhaps you should do a study and get back to us as to why this is not so.
Hon. Peter Kilabuk (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I apologize but I think there was a misunderstanding.
I wasn't trying to say that it is not a priority, in your community it is probably a priority, and I would like to follow this up with the community.
We need to find out what the community would like to see as a priority.
Our planners will work with the leaders in your community to see what they would like to see priorized.
I will keep my opening comments very brief. Mr. Chairman, what I am starting to notice when I did my community tours on tourism was the amount of money that we are putting into schools in Nunavut is commendable, by the previous minister and yourself and the Premier when he was Education Minister.
There seems like, when I visited the thirteen communities, a building boom in most communities and it's great to see that the schools are getting upgraded, extended, built in Nunavut because the population as far as I am concerned isn't going to decrease any time too soon.
We are in the boom years, and it is great that this government is investing in a lot of these schools that we need.
Education is the future.
But the thing that I really noticed is that we seem to be jamming these beautiful buildings in areas that have no space for future growth.
One spot that I went into, I think it was Pangnirtung, where the school is right beside the airstrip.
If there is going to be an expansion down the road it is going to be very hard to expand that school.
So my comments on capital are, I know we don't have a lot of control over land in communities, that's a municipal issue, but I am hoping and it's a suggestion that if you are designing buildings, that we try to get in on the ground level that we have lots of land for future development around the building.
Are we designing schools to be extended today.
The old GNWT used to build that standard school that they built in Rankin Inlet and Baker Lake, it was a standard, straight forward design, and I think Arviat had one also, and they are very functional and they are user friendly and things like that, but they were designed to be expanded, which is a good plan.
My concern is, are we still on that track where we are building a school, whether it is an elementary school or a high school.
Are we looking at the land around the building and for future expansion. Sometimes we get carried away with some designs that you don't know if you will be able to expand on it later.
But I am hoping that the department is going in that direction where if we are building a new elementary school or building a new high school, that there is enough land around it for a playground, it is not in a dangerous area, close to an airstrip, and that the design is functional that if we have a sort of a boom.
If a mine opens up or another government department gets transferred to a decentralized community, that you will have an influx of population so it won't put that much strain on the capital budget overall.
So what I am basically putting in my comments, is that I am hoping that we have some sort of a twenty year plan for expansion around the buildings and like I say I would like to see more land around the buildings in our schools.
I know, like I say it is a municipal issue, but it is our issue too.
Because in some cases we have to design the building and I don't know what the costs of the little pieces of property that we have available.
So I think we can work with the municipal governments and say listen, we are looking at planning for 20 years and we need lots of property for future development.
So that's basically all I wanted to say in my comments, Mr. Chairman, and I have no questions.
I have Mr. Arvaluk on my list.
I will make it brief. Partly like Mr. McLean's opening comments but it is a bit different.
We used to have to put an extension on the schools in the past. All the communities could be used as an example.
I don't know for how many months we had to make additions to the Arviat school.
Perhaps there is space for expansion. I am sure there is no space for expansion in other communities.
In Arviat when they were putting additions to the school the students’ population had increased.
So therefore, there were so many students that they weren't getting along.
So we had to get the parents in there every time we had a high number of students, there seemed to be conflicts between the students.
Like for example in Chesterfield Inlet school there is room for expansion, and the GNWT had constructed the school and it filled to capacity right away.
It seemed like the construction of the schools was not their priority.
But Mr. Chairman I would like to direct a question to the minister. Do you have goals or objectives.
Do you have any plans for governance, so where there is only a certain number of students allowed in one school.
I think there are over 400 students in Arviat.
I am sure there is a high number of students in one school here in Iqaluit.
Have you considered putting a limit for the number of students to be enrolled in one school so if that school is filled to the capacity you can build another school.