EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
From what I understand, the renovations are going to be started this spring and the problem will be solved.
I’m not exactly sure how income support operates, but in regard to the benefits that are received by families, for example, if you have one child, I think you get about $245 for the entire month. I’m not exactly sure why they have set up that rate. When you have a child, $245 doesn’t go anywhere.
Do you think that it’s adequate, or is this $245 figure just pulled from the air? Are they just writing cheques?
You have to realize that the child needs diapers, formula, baby food, the mother has to eat, and the whole family has to eat, but $245 a month doesn’t even cover the basics. It has to be reviewed again thoroughly.
Those are some of the concerns that I have.
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Kattuk. (interpretation ends) General comments.
No, (interpretation) okay, I’m sorry. (interpretation ends) Thank you.
Mr. Arvaluk (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for acknowledging me.
There’s no Arvaluk at the other end of this line.
Mr. Chairman, in regard to the comments that were touched upon by Mr. Curley, the minister’s opening remarks don’t have any page numbers but I think it’s page 3, he stated that, “Bill 21, Nunavut’s Education Act, was recently introduced in the Legislative Assembly.
The department worked with Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated to co-chair a steering committee.”
As the co-chairs, the department and NTI jointly worked on a report called Saqqiqpuq, which Mr. Curley was referring to, is totally different from the minister’s opening remarks.
I don’t see why there has to be a difference between NTI’s and the department’s points of view when it’s stated that, “It creates a framework for education based on teamwork with schools, parents, District Education Authorities, and communities, and the principles of Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit.”
And, in the Saqqiqpuq document that Mr. Curley was referring to, there’s a heading entitled, “Why Government Should Not Run Education.”
It doesn’t say that they shouldn’t provide funding but why they shouldn’t run education.
At the appropriate time, I will be asking some questions on why your department and Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated, as co-chairs, haven’t mentioned anything about what you agree with, or if you agree with the report that you worked on as co-chairs.
When you were referring to Bill 21, you also stated that the bill will be very beneficial.
As a Health and Education Committee, we heard that the DEA Coalition was opposed to this bill.
They also made a report that states why they were given the tasks that the government didn’t want, they got the leftovers.
That’s what it stated and it said other things, too.
NTI is still not satisfied with Bill 21, so why didn’t you include that in your opening remarks?
Why didn’t you state out where you have come to an impasse with NTI?
I will be asking those questions, so I will leave it at that for now.
Chairman (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Arvaluk. (interpretation ends) General comments.
We will now proceed to the page-by-page review of the departmental estimates starting with page G-4.
I wanted to ask what Mr. Arvaluk mentioned in the minister’s opening comments on page 4. (interpretation ends) The minister referred to Bill 21 in his opening remarks.
He has indicated that the new Education Act, if passed, will bring in an additional $14 million in anticipation of the passing of Bill 21 in 2008. Is that $14 million included in the 2008-09 budget for the Department of Education, and if so, where can it be identified?
The bill hasn’t been passed. You can’t put money in the budget for something that hasn’t even gone through the House, so the answer is no.
What we’re saying in the opening comments, very quickly, is that $14 million is the result of the Act going through, meaning the enhancements and everything else that you see in the Act, and that would be phased in over a period of time.
Mr. Barnabas (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Do we, as MLAs, have to approve the $14 million before it’s planned?
I don’t see it in the Education budget, so exactly where is that $14 million on this page?
Just very quickly, again, what we said is the cost involved in the Education Bill is $14 million of new money that would go into the Department of Education to carry out the processes in the bill.
We’re not approving $14 million in this budget because we haven’t passed the bill.
If the bill is successful and goes through, say in the springtime or what have you, then whatever the funding dollar values from April 1, 2008 to March 31, 2009 would be built into the budget of the department through a supplementary appropriation in the House, and then future years’ expenditures and so on, so $14 million over that period of time.
Thank you, Mr. Barnabas. (interpretation ends) Page G-4.
Total Operations and Maintenance, to be Voted. $1,326,000.
Mr. Arvaluk (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I had stated earlier that I was going to ask some questions and I believe my question is under Directorate. The department and Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated are co-chairs, so I’m wondering why the statements made in the Saqqiqpuq Report and the minister’s opening comments with respect to Bill 21 are not the same.
I appreciate the member’s question so we can clarify. The steering committee with the government and other groups, including NTI, that were on the steering committee, everything was signed off and agreed to, except two areas - one was the language of instruction, the timeframe to put Inuktitut into schools, and the second one was the bringing back the regional boards of education.
So in my report to the House, basically, we talked about Bill 21; I’m not talking about a report done by a different agency. So I think it’s fair to say there was like a 90 percent agreement on everything in the new Education Act, except for those two outstanding issues - one was the boards and the second one was the language of instruction.
Mr. Arvaluk: Then, Mr. Chairman, why was it not mentioned in the opening remarks?
Because we’re approving the main estimates for the Government of Nunavut, I mentioned where we were with Bill 21; it’s already been tabled in the House. I wasn’t going to comment on our report that was tabled by the Members in the House; that has nothing to do with the budget of the Government of Nunavut.
Then, perhaps, something closer to home is the DEA Coalition’s objections to Bill 21. It was also not mentioned how the department and the DEA Coalition are going to work together to come to a conclusion.
My reason for asking that is quite simple: DEAs are representing parents and students and that they have a stake at home of how the children will be taught and how the school system will be administered, including the implementation of policies that might develop from time to time.
So why was this not mentioned also in his opening remarks?
As the member knows, the DEA Coalition was set up under the auspices of this government a little over a year ago; we actually fund them.
If this bill goes through, the DEA Coalition will actually become a formalized group. They’ll actually have a budget, they’ll be able to hire their own full-time staff, and we’re actually funding that staff on board right now, similar to the NAM.
We just received the submission from the DEA Coalition and I could tell the House that I’m scheduled to meet with the DEA Coalition next weekend and there are some of the issues that they have. I would suggest, fundamentally, that they support many of the things that are in the Act, there are some things that they have issues with, and we’ll have an opportunity to work with them next week.
Hopefully, that helps clarify the member’s question.
As a regular member, I would really like to work with the department, well, with the whole government for that matter. If we only see opening remarks or reports from the government that sound like Christmas presents with words, it’s very difficult for us to see the bigger picture as to what approach we are trying to take here.
Surely, it wouldn’t have been very difficult to say, “Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated and the department will co-chair a steering committee.” However, there are several points that are still different as the minister has mentioned. The same thing with the DEA Coalition’s objections to Bill 21; we’re still a little bit from there but we want to work on it so that Bill 21 can pass.
If there’s a lot of public pressure to the members, especially the regular members, who have a freedom to vote with the public, then this may die on the order paper again.
I think it’s in the best interest of the students and the parents that we start working on this bill with good faith, all of us, including the regular members.
So I would encourage the minister to start working very quickly with stakeholders and take corrective measures in some clauses of Bill 21 so that we can pass it.
I was hoping to find more information and less elaboration on his opening remarks in that section.
That was just a comment, Mr. Chairman. (interpretation) That’s it for now.
Page G-4.
Mr. Chairman, I’m speaking in your language so that you clearly understand what I think are the concerns of our constituencies and the reason I’m saying that is because I think you’re more limited in Inuktitut than I am.
Minister, you indicated that Bill 21 was one of your main challenges, obviously.
I think that we have made it quite clear and also the fact that the bill, as drafted, was going to be posing two classes of workers - one privileged and one less privileged - to continue with the bill as it is. For instance, members on the other side are probably not aware that all the DEA employees under the new Act are not members of the Public Service of Canada. It’s stated more than once, whenever it referred to the counsellors, Inuit counsellors, or Inuit Qaujimajanginnik Pilirijiit, according to the Act and the Public Service Act, that they are not members of the Act.
Can the minister explain why he would propose to have two classes of people when it’s actually one Nunavummiut we’re trying to strive for?
The reason is this: if you work for the Department of Education, you’re automatically a member of the Public Service of Canada, you’re entitled to pension, and you’re entitled to all of the privileges that are included in the collective bargaining agreement, but if you work for the DEA, you’re not in there. And, I mentioned those to the government.
Why would you continue to do that, Mr. Minister?
Just very quickly on the comments just made by Mr. Arvaluk and sharing that information, I appreciate the member’s passion for education also.
I had an opportunity last week, as the members know here in the House, to actually do a briefing with all members on Bill 21, the Education Act, and went through some of the issues with the DEA Coalition and as well with NTI’s concerns.
Specifically on Mr. Curley’s question on employees of the school and them belonging to the public service, we transferred the majority of DEA employees, Mr. Chairman, to the Government of Nunavut and made them Government of Nunavut employees in the last budget go around last year.
What that means is that people, for example, the secretary at the school, and so on, become members of the public service.
Mr. Curley’s pointed out that if a local DEA, for a local hire, hires someone for six weeks, for example, it would be on-the-land program or three months to fill in for someone, then they’re actually employees of the DEA. If that is the case, then the DEA is the employer of choice. They may not necessarily be a member of the union, meaning they don’t pay union dues; they’re not involved in some of those things.
So that’s the clarification on that.
DEAs have told us they want the flexibility to be able to hire on a temporary basis and to be able to support local programming, and that’s what they do when they hire those positions.
For example, if they bring in someone to teach the land program for three weeks, then that person would be an employee of the DEA and they wouldn’t be working in an indeterminate or a term position for government.
I believe I quoted that according to the bureaucratic view, that may be very good and that’s why we made these substantial statements on how the bureaucratic control tends to have no relationship whatsoever with the local viewpoint.
It’s not right to have two classes of workers in Nunavut - one privileged for the rich and the staff of the minister, who control pretty much the schools, the school superintendents, and the school supervisors in the regions. There’s no question about it; they are members of the public service.
The minister continues to defend the policy that is really not acceptable to have two classes of workers. He says that local control, in his view, is good, providing they’re not professionals or whatever, certified in that regard, and therefore, should not be members of the public service.
That is not right. This is wrong. Any minister who supports that should not be in that job.
Why would you continue to defend that the bureaucrat’s recommendations to you is the best one?
I’m not talking about the secretaries; I’m talking about people who are actually providing class/school work, culture, and so on.
If you can’t state the reasons clearly, then there must be a reason for that.
I just want to clarify. I understand again what the member is trying to say.
Maybe if I explained it a little different.
The regional offices, these regional bureaucrats, these faceless individuals that the member is talking about, don’t involve themselves in the hiring at the local level.
Let’s say if you’re looking at a community, let’s say Whale Cove. The DEA in Whale Cove wants to hire an instructor to go into classes, as Mr. Curley indicated, if that position was an NEU position, meaning the Nunavut Employees Union, if that position is an NTA position, Nunavut Teachers’ Association position, then they have to be a member of the public service because that’s what those two positions are.
However, if the DEA hires a casual for two weeks to do a land program, then it’s not a unionized position, and therefore and thus, would not be part of the PSA.
Now, because they’re not, then they wouldn’t be paying union dues and so on and so forth, so the majority of their monies would be kept.
The DEA becomes a private employer in that case; they can employ some other staff persons.
For example, if Mr. Curley was working and getting $35 an hour as an instructor, maybe the DEA would hire and pay him $50 an hour.
Could they have the right to do that as the local DEA?
For the first time ever in this new Education Act, what it says is if you were an elder, for example, and you go into the classroom, you should be weighed on the information that you bring to that work, meaning most elders have a masters degree in lifelong learning, and then the DEA would have an opportunity to pay them that way.
No legislation, and let’s be clear, no legislation can create two tiers of people where it would be susceptible to a charter challenge through the courts and you would lose it.
No government, whether this one or this minister, could bring forward something knowingly that would be constitutionally or court challenged and be permitted. So let’s be clear that that, for the record, is there in this case.
It clarifies once and for sure that the private groups like DEAs are not entitled to hire workers that will be considered public servants of our territory.
I got that info and I have been stating that quite clearly.
So it proves to me that there will be two classes of people working for Nunavummiut and that is wrong. Hopefully, we will honour them a little bit more than the minister is honouring them, which he truly is not giving them any.
I have another question for the minister in terms of the local control.
Minister, which legislation are you working under now?
Is that the same one as the one that was transferred from the NWT in terms of running the department?
Again, I want to clarify what the member is saying because it’s incorrect information.
The DEAs have, need, and want the flexibility to be able to hire local staff.
As a registered society, they can accept third party funding, for example, Brighter Futures money, which would give them funding to be able to hire people. It’s not creating two different types of employees.
As I just stated and I’ll state it again for the record, if the position is an NEU or an NTA, they have to be part of the collective agreement and be part of that public service.
Mr. Chairman, the member just asked me what legislation gives me the authority as the minister, I think is what his question was and as the member knows, there are several pieces of legislation with guides to principles of elected bodies in Nunavut; in this case, on the appointment through the Executive Council Act, through the Education Act, and so many other pieces of legislation.
I hope that when the bill comes through and as you meet with the DEAs, you will see that we’re not speaking out of the blue.
We may be hardnosed, but I want to say to you that we’re not stupid. We have constituents that we represent.
I have met with the chairman and the local board more than once and what I see is that there will be two classes of employees in Nunavut.
The minister is saying he has a very demeaning kind of role of DEA that they can only hire two months work, three or four months at a time, and that doesn’t qualify them to be long-term employees. The people that the DEAs hire will not have a career path to work through the Education Department, like DEA groups and so on, and provide advice to schools and so on. That’s a shameful view.
I see the government hiring consultants and they keep them on retainer; $5,000 a month for perpetuity until the contract is cancelled.
I mean the government can do a whole lot of things. So in this case, I have actually sent the minister how I have read the Act, I have actually highlighted them a number of times, more than once, any staff member of the DEAs hire to work for schools during the school year are not members of the public service.
That’s the message - they will not be considered professional workers as long as they work for DEAs.
My second question, Mr. Chairman, is: in terms of the local school boards, why is the minister so against having school boards in Nunavut and only believe that centralized school boards, like only with the minister having authority, the best solution for Nunavummiut?
Again, for the record, I think what the member is stating is incorrect.
As I said earlier, if the DEA hires a position, which is an FNT, which is an NEU position, which is a position under the PSA, the Public Service Act, then they are members of the public service.
The member throws out things like, “I can hire a consultant and they will be working for five years perpetually on a $5,000 a month contract.” Well, if we hire a consultant, then they’re not a member of the public service are they? No, of course they’re not.
That’s a red herring. So, hopefully, that helps answer the member’s question.
Mr. Curley: I think the minister could be helpful if he wants to, but in this case, he does not want to be helpful.
He appears to be intimidated, but he believes the questions I’m raising are personal; they’re not personal. You guys can smile at it if you guys are not serious about these jobs. What I’m trying to get at is I think we need to honour the people that are working for the DEAs as important and we could provide them with more authority so that they have an opportunity to build professional staff and not have a token responsibility.
I read the Act; I was a person who fundamentally changed the education system in the 1980s when I was a member of the NWT. We had a public hearing that you haven’t seen before and you haven’t even done that.
You’ve had one person running around in Nunavut, and really, without any special personalities and such, whatever, that may be good for the minister, but I think we can offer the DEA a lot more; a more decent role in running of the schools and have the responsibilities with the students.
Everyone agrees with the minister, and I’m sure he does, that we have a failure rate; kids are walking out of school at a very young age and never return again. That figure, if were to make it public everyday, is frightening.
You’re trying to assume that I’m just trying to demean what you’re offering; it’s not right. I actually read the report more than once and I am convinced that you have a different document than I do because what you’re saying is in the Act is not what I read, so you’re going to have to provide me with the new version which I haven’t seen yet.
The member, again, is probably one of the few people in the House that actually have read the Act and it is a very large piece of legislation.
I can tell the member that I have also read the Act and I’m sure Deputy Minister Okpik has read the Act.
We’ve had a lot of debate before we actually brought the Act forward; we had over 100 consultations and meetings with all different groups throughout the territory.
I’ve had an opportunity to meet with teachers, principals, and the DEAs throughout Nunavut to discuss the Act.
As I said earlier, I believe and I think, you know I stand here to say to you today that on the Education Act specifically, I would say we’ve had over 90 percent support for the Act.
Yes, the regional Inuit organizations and NTI have concerns when you look at the phasing in of Inuktitut specifically. The DEA groups are concerned with some of the more responsibility, authority, and power they would like to have as local DEAs. I would suggest that’s the two largest outstanding issues.
We will have an opportunity later to continue discussion on the bill.
I’m sure the minister has heard from a whole lot of different groups as he says, but why is it that you differ with them so much on devolving actual powers and authority that would be clearly stated in the legislature, as opposed to just having “if the minister may this, then the minister may that” in terms of having power?
Why do you want to keep that responsibility directly within your hands?
The member and I have had a chance to discuss this in the past.
I just want to say again for the record that this legislation is permissible legislation, meaning if the DEA wants to take on different aspects and control, hiring and firing of teachers for example, then there’s a mechanism within the Act to be able to do that.
Why does the minister want to hold a check and balance? You have to have a check and balance in the legislation.
If you don’t have that, the minister doesn’t have authority and when there’s a complaint about the education system, who would the member go to?
I would just throw my hands up and say, “Look, according to the Act, I gave it all to local controls, so sorry, you’re out of luck.”
That’s the reason why, in plain language, you need to have a check and balance or control at the ministerial level.
I think that’s quite well understood when you have an opportunity to discuss it with different groups and stakeholders, Mr. Chairman.
Hopefully that clarifies the reason for it.
Chairman: Mr. Arvaluk, I will use my discretion as per Rule 77(2) and allow you an additional ten minutes.
I just wanted one clarification. When the minister says “local hire, local control,” are teachers and principals considered local?
I think two or three years ago, the elementary school in Pond Inlet had 100 percent local teachers, including the principal, meaning no one was hired from outside of Pond Inlet.
Is that considered as a local hire?
Everyone else who is hired from the outside, who are also teachers of the same school or a different school of that same community, is not considered a local hire.
Can he clarify which are local hires of the teachers and principals that are hired locally?
Just as an example, here in Iqaluit, the DEA is involved in the hiring of teachers. They can hire teachers here that may have a Bachelor of Education Degree. They would be coming right from Iqaluit, so they would be local.
When you hire locally in the community, that’s what local hiring is.