EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
Some of the regional office's money is the same but some of them are not quite the same.
Which ones are we using.
Under Baffin region it is 769 thousand and under the other one it has 561 thousand dollars.
Mr. Chairman, have the main estimates been revised or how come there is a total difference.
I just want to find out what is happening.
One is 769 for Kivalliq and the other one is 977 which is totally different.
Chairperson (interpretation): Just to let the members know, these are totally different things we are doing, we are doing the main estimates today for Finance and Administration.
We are dealing with the 2000/2001 Main Estimates.
Mr. Nutarak (interpretation): I am just trying to ask the minister because he is at the witness table for us to find out from him.
Hon. Kelvin Ng: Mr. Chairman, we have both the Main Estimates and the Capital Estimates books.
We are now on page 3 – 11 I believe which is the distribution of budget, Finance and Administration.
If the member is referring to the Baffin region, there is compensation and benefits of 769 thousand and also other expenses in Baffin of 221 thousand for a total operations and maintenance of 990 thousand.
Mr. Nutarak (interpretation): Yes, thank you for that clarification and for the response of the minister.
Chairperson (interpretation): Getting back to the main estimates 3 – 11.
We are not on the other items we are on the main estimates for 2000/2001 distribution of budget.
Information item, page 3 – 11.
I just showed the minister that these are the same things that we are looking at and the other ones are the same but there is a little difference in the distribution of budget for Baffin and for Kitikmeot.
Which one do we believe.
Is it the main estimates or in another place it is a totally different figure.
Chairperson (interpretation): Yes we realize what you are trying to get at but we are not doing the other information right now we are under the main estimates at this time, so everybody should follow the main estimates.
We are under 3 – 11 information item.
Getting back to 3 – 3.
Detail of expenditures, operations and maintenance.
Total operations and maintenance, 30 million, 767 thousand.
Chairperson (interpretation): Total expenditures, 30 million 767 thousand.
I am sorry I made a mistake.
Total expenditures, 30 million 767 thousand.
Chairperson (interpretation): Do you agree that the Department of Finance and Administration is complete.
Chairperson (interpretation): Tabled Document 95 – 1(3), are you agreed that this is completed.
Chairperson (interpretation): Department of Finance and Administration. Mr. Barnabas.
If we are complete with Finance and Administration, the minister also deals with Human Resources.
We have also stated that we would like to go to Human Resources.
First I would like to thank the minister and his staff for the Department of Finance and Administration, Mr. Vardy and Mr. Tootoo.
Thank you very much for coming down to give us this information.
Mr. Minister do you have opening remarks on Human Resources.
You may proceed with your opening remarks, Minister Ng.
Department of Human Resources: Minister's Opening Remarks
I would like to thank you for the opportunity to appear before the committee of the whole today.
I am pleased to present the 2000/2001 Main Estimates for the Department of Human Resources.
It is the mission of the Department of Human Resources, through the guiding principles of the Bathurst Mandate to direct, advise and support excellence in the management of the public service.
To achieve this goal will require the necessary resources to advise, assist and support all departments so that we can attract, hire and retain employees.
The proposed budget for the department is 17.77 million dollars.
The operations and maintenance budget is divided into the following branches: Directorate, Assistant Deputy Minister, Labour Relations, Training and Development, Job Evaluation, Staffing and Decentralization.
The Department of Human Resources has no capital funding in its' budget.
The 2000/2001 budget for the department includes 967 thousand dollars for the Directorate, 2.08 million for the Assistant Deputy Minister's Office, 7.49 million for the Staffing branch, 2.63 million for the Training and Development Division, 706 thousand for the Job Evaluation and Organizational Design branch, 892 thousand for the Labour Relations Division and 3 million dollars in support of our government's decentralization plans.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to highlight a number of spending items within the department for the new fiscal year.
The largest component of the budget is relocations at about 8.5 million dollars.
One point four million dollars is in support of the Inuit Employment Plan, 3 million dollars in support of decentralization and 164 thousand dollars due to the creation of two new positions in the directorate.
A Removal Co-ordinator and a Policy Analyst.
In carrying out these programs and services we currently have 37 positions filled, out of our staff complement of 49 positions.
To date 49% of the current staff are Inuit.
Mr. Chairman, this concludes the formal part of my presentation.
We would be pleased to answer any questions you may have about the budget after the committee's report.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you Minister Ng. You may go to the witness table with your officials and we will deal with general comments.
2000-2001 Main Estimates for the Department of Human Resources
I am pleased to be able to make some opening remarks as we begin the debate on the 2000-2001 Main Estimates for the Department of Human Resources.
The Standing Committee notes that increased resources have been put towards training and development in support of the Inuit Employment Plan.
Over the coming year, we look forward to reviewing the department's reports on results achieved in this area.
With respect to language training, the Standing Committee recognizes that the Department has been providing language training programs to staff.
The Standing Committee looks forward to a discussion on how the Department is planning to make Inuktitut/Innuinaqtun the working languages of the Nunavut government, as stated in its Business Plan.
The Standing Committee has noted the 3 million allocation in the Department's budget for staff removals to decentralized communities.
The Standing Committee is concerned that co-ordination between the various GN bodies with decentralization responsibilities takes place in an efficient manner over the coming year.
We are also concerned with the speed of progress being made with respect to advertising new positions in decentralized communities, and how many positions are being filled by residents of decentralized communities.
The Standing Committee is aware that both this Department and the Department of Public Works have responsibilities with respect to staff housing.
Members of the Committee look forward to reviewing the government's new staff housing policy.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you Mr. Akesuk, the Chairman for the Standing Committee.
We are under general questions and comments for the Department of Human Resources.
Just as the cabinet members have been replying to our questions during question period, they have been stating that the government does not have capacity.
When do you expect to have capacity.
Before you respond, I also forgot and I apologize, to ask Minister Ng to introduce your officials.
To my right is Joe Kunuk, the Deputy Minister.
To my left is Sol Modesto the Manager of Corporate Services and we also have available if required, Denise Doyle with the Staffing Division and David Jenner with the Decentralization Secretariat.
Just to answer the member's question.
I think we all recognize that our staff are putting in a lot of effort in trying to perform their functions and sometimes going over and above the call of duty in trying to carry out those same functions, and they should be recognized for that.
As I have said in the past, it's a hard question to respond to from the perspective of, we try to answer inquiries from members in this House, from members of the public, from organizations that require information.
I think we recognize that we are not at 100% or 90% capacity.
We are roughly at 75% overall as a government.
But work continues to be carried out, it is just probably not carried out in as timely a fashion in being able to respond immediately or as quickly as a lot of us would like when it comes to responding to initiatives or questions from members of the House.
But the job is being done.
Mr. Chairman, it has been approximately a year since the Nunavut Government was established.
I have realized that ADMs and the DMs, the turnover has been quite high.
I am sure it costs quite a bit of money with the high turnover of these DMs and ADMs.
How do you expect it to be in the future, do you expect to have high turnover of these positions.
I think the turnover rate is not just unique to the Government of Nunavut but probably due to the fact that there are some additional stresses and requirements and demands in place on our employees.
I don't know if it is abnormally high.
I couldn't speak to that right now.
But I think in the long term, obviously we want to try to create a stable environment.
As stable as possible a work force and an environment for our work force to ensure that they can be productive and at the same time be able to perform their functions without being overly stressed. Also to be able to provide programs and services that all of us need and our constituents need.
I apologize again, for not welcoming you.
Welcome to you while you are up at the witness table.
I just have a couple of general comments that don't need answers.
I just went through an instance with one of my constituents.
In my community there was a casual job advertised. There were a couple of applicants and there was a southern applicant that had quite a few years of experience applied for the position and another lady that graduated from high school but worked in the school over the year as a tutor-counsellor, coached the kids at the school and things like that.
One of the Hamlet Councillors was involved in the application and interview process and he thought there was a bias towards hiring the person from the south with the experience that hasn't lived in the community.
As for the local girl that graduated from the school there and worked in the school for years applying on a temporary position the interviewer was saying well, you don't have enough experience to do this job.
It's a casual job.
So the Hamlet Councillor said well how are we supposed to get our young people today experience to apply for full time jobs if we are not giving them a chance to apply for part time or casual jobs.
So he finally went out and the young woman was hired and she is very happy and it will probably work out good for her to start a career in the Nunavut Government.
But getting back, it seems that old policy seems to have been inherited from the GNWT where sometimes we look at, not in all cases, but we look at the person with the best experience no matter where they are from or who they are, over local applicants.
I don't think that was the mandate of the Nunavut Government to start with that they would probably give other local, Inuit people chances on positions and an opportunity to gain employment.
I sometimes wonder if we are going to try to do that with Human Resources.
I was just involved in a direct appointment of one of my constituents into a position in Rankin Inlet and it took four to five months to get him in there.
We talk about capacity in the government and sometimes the capacity of this government is to hinder any kind of movement into positions because of the bureaucracy that we are creating already.
I sometimes shudder to think that we are going to be up to capacity and how long it is going to take to hire somebody in certain positions.
So is there any movement, there's going to be a one time flurry with decentralization that we are going to have to hire four to five hundred employees to get the government up to speed.
There are going to be direct appointments because I think it is politically correct today in the Nunavut Government.
Political appointments to my knowledge today and I haven't had much to do with them other than one, is that they have to go through all of cabinet.
This to me seems absurd because why should seven or six cabinet ministers have a say on a constituent being hired that is qualified for a position.
Would the minister consider giving the Minister of Human Resources, or the cabinet, or whoever does the direct appointments, consider just giving the minister the power and authorization to do a direct appointment rather than having to sit around with five or six cabinet ministers at once to okay or rubberstamp it.
Because we all know that after this session there is going to be a flurry of hiring in several communities and every one of the ministers is going to be off doing things because we kept you here too long.
I keep hearing that, but it may be impossible to get you all together for a couple of days to look at direct appointments.
Would you as Minister responsible give the authority and power to the individual ministers to do direct appointments.
Mr. Chairman, as it stands now because of the Public Service Act there is a requirement to go to cabinet for direct appointments, but that is not to say that we couldn't work around that and allow individual ministers to have that responsibility for direct appointments.
It is a valid point and I think that we will take it into consideration.
Mr. Ng, an additional comment.
Hon. Kelvin Ng: Thank you Mr. Chairman. Just on Mr. McLean's earlier comment on job competitions and qualifications and that. Like I have said in the past, the Government of Nunavut is trying to, or has started to implement a competency based evaluation system where there are more behavioural descriptive interviews, I guess is the terminology.
That quite frankly, is a change from the way that the GNWT used to have hiring processes which were more qualification based to what we see right now is more competency based.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you Minister Ng. Mr. McLean.
My final comment on that is that, yes competency based, you hit the nail right on the head.
In some instances we look at a bunch of paper and the people and the inexperience of the people doing the interviews at the time.
Because of capacity, they have a tendency to look at the paper and ignore the true value of the person that has lived in a community all their lives and knows the individuals when they are dealing with them on a daily basis.
Rather than transplanting somebody in that doesn't have a clue about that community, to interact with the community and important roles in the community in regards to things that people have to deal with in their day to day lives.
We still miss the boat on that one, we talk about Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit and that's a perfect example of it.
What are we doing to integrate it into the community in your department in regards to hiring staff into a community.
Because years ago, the government up here used to have what we called the program where southern transplants come into the community and they were given an orientation and it sometimes took a week in regards to how to deal with the community.
Because culture shock is still a thing.
Sure people down south see Nunavut and they see the flag and they see how it is up here and as we all know there is a commercial on TV right now that I am Canadian.
Still the south has a stereotypical view of us up here that we live in igloos and we eat blubber and we have dog teams.
So is your department looking at some sort of orientation for southern transplants in the communities to orient them on what it is really like to live up here.
Because most times I still see it myself that these southern transplants, they haven't got a clue about the culture and how to deal with people in communities.
Is there any kind of orientation that you are looking at giving our southern based employees so that the culture shock isn't as hard on them as it should be.
And yes, I am Canadian.
In fact, Mr. Chairman, just as of last week we did start employee orientation programs.
We have a staff orientation sessions right now and we are developing and are going to deliver training for managers on staff orientation and also develop and implement departmental staff orientation programs.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you Minister Ng. Mr. Nutarak.
Mr. Nutarak (interpretation): My question has already been answered.
Thank you, any general comments.
There is a very high unemployment rate in the Nunavut area. There is a lot of people working but when they do apply.
Many the people do not apply for job opportunities because they know they do not have the experience or the qualifications. What are you going to do about providing training for the unemployed.
I am not the Speaker so call me the Chairperson.
Mr. Chairman there will be a focus in the training and development opportunities by actually having staff travel to the communities to identify and recruit individuals.
Particularly in the area of decentralisation and I know Human Resources is working with the Decentralisation Secretariat in that regard.
In further to that the Inuit unemployment plan that is being developed is being finalised.
It has many initiatives that we are hoping to boost up the Inuit employment and the Inuit participation levels in the civil service.
Any further questions or comments.
On the bi-lingual bonuses in the Nunavut Government.
I know that Inuit teachers get a bilingual bonus.
Do other employees get the bonus also.
For a position that is designated as requiring bilingual usage in carrying out their functions as other duties.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Ng. Mr. McLean.
Does the Minister know how much that bilingual bonus is a year.
It is 12 hundred dollars a year Mr. Chairman.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Ng. Any further comments Mr. McLean.
Mr. McLean: Yes.
You sure are rewarded being bilingual in this country.
So anyhow I think that is a pittance.
But that is just my humble opinion.
Twelve hundred dollars a year for being bilingual.
Yes I will Mr. Picco, maybe we could include you in the bonus too because you are almost there.
But my next question is in regards to the Ministers.
It sort of fits in the Minister Forum on the economy.
We are going to look at the economy.
I guess a vibrant economy is based on how many people are working and what their qualifications are and things like that.
I know this is a tall order. But sometimes and I said this before. We regurgitate people in the civil service.
We train, train them and I know for a fact excluding the people in this room that there are people out there that have been trained for 20 years.
And they do not seem to go higher in the civil service. But they are always to get the recognition and stuff like that.
We all know we have a very large and young population out there that we are trying to get through the education system and get them graduated and get them into the civil service.
Are there any plans for non-government training program to help younger people acquire the skills other than what Arctic College is offering.
It is somewhat limited.
Is there any kind of training there.
Are you going to be identifying training outside of the government and come in to the government and train in and advance you in the system.
That is all my questions today.
Student employment, summer placement program for the departments.
Generally all Government of Nunavut departments that is what the member is referring to. Bringing in the people in to have that job experience. I am sure if that is where the member is getting at.
Mr. McLean: Maybe I will be a bit more direct.
Being coming from a decentralised community. What the prospect is 30-40 whatever eventually filters in there and know that the government is trying to train as many people and hire as many people in the communities to fill these positions because it makes sense.
It is probably going save the government money in the long run not having to move southern based people in and out.
It is just that you have a community that is looking at 40-50 jobs.
I know a lot of them are going to need quite a bit of education. But there is also going to be the entry levels and middle management. And it is the people in the community that are working at the Northern Stores, the Health Centres and the Co-ops, the schools and various other organisations.
With the right amount of training could probably could get into one of these government jobs.
But that is what I am getting to moving from point A to get them into point B.
In the long run, like Mr. Picco’s great phrase that what you put it front end and you get it out the back in regards to training people.
It is a good quote and I will have to remember that.
Is there any kind of plan there to try to get people at the local level trained that are not in the government to get into these positions.
Hon. Kelvin Ng: The bulk of the training opportunities would be with Nunavut Arctic College and some of the programs that they have run successfully in the past.
I think basic office procedures and general upgrading.
Education does have on the job training initiatives.
Sustainable Development from their employment initiatives.
There are different parts of government programs that are available and the employers could access over and above Government of Nunavut specific initiatives and funds.
My final question I hope.
That is basically what I wanted to hear.
Will your department make sure that the people in place that are doing the hiring and supervising will have a degree of sympathy towards that person that may move into a job that they might not be a 100 percent up to par and give them a break.
I have heard in government offices that for years that you get the supervisor saying you are not qualified enough for this job.
The person leave discouraged and then we hire a southern transplant.
And of course the world is filled with qualified people. So can you that for the decentralised communities and saying it is going to take a while to get everybody up to speed.
Sometimes we have it is there.
There is a preconception well you do not have the qualification that you are not good for this job.
And there are subtleties put on employees not to stay. And I have seen it for 30 years just because you do not have the BA or BED or MA or something like that from your paper you can not do some data processing.
You can not do an entry level position.
So will you commit to this House that give them a break and lets take our time and training them.
Eventually it will come around.
Yes, I will commit to that because that is the goal and long term intent of the government is to try to maximise as I indicted earlier is participation from our constituents at large.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Ng. Mr. Barnabas.
Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit is being implemented into the government departments.
I am not exactly sure how the Human Resources department could will be using Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit because we have not been using training material from Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit.
How is it going to be implemented in the Human Resources department.
Mr. Kunuk.
Mr. Kunuk (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
In regards to Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit, when we looked at this with the committee on Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit.
There was a meeting in Apex and what they wanted to do is encourage applicants that are applying for government jobs.
After the meeting in Apex we invited some elders to help us with the programs we could start with Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit and we talked about behavioural job descriptions.
The staff that we have right now are not all Inuit and we wanted them to understand Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit.
We have meetings with the committee Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit to teach our present staff that are not Inuit about Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit.
We have heard numerous times that the staff that we have take training either in southern Canada or the Arctic College here in the North.
What we have thought about is to for the staff to be taught Inuit ways of doing things when they are non-aboriginal staff.