EdinburghNLP/nunavut-hansard-plusplus huggingface dataset:
We are currently working on it, we are trying to move it here, but as per the member’s third question, she asked about the 700 thousand dollar figure, whether it was going to be moved here, so that’s how I responded.
When are you going to be moving that office and how are you going to do it?
Well you have to work on it, you have to have plans, you have to decide how you are going to move it and once all that is done then the office would be moved up here.
We are looking at having it move up here as soon as possible but we do have to do the preliminary work before we actually move it.
This is not the first time that we have talked about relocating the office.
We had thought that it would be moved to Nunavut maybe not necessarily in Iqaluit, but in Nunavut.
We provide short term contracts to the people out there, what’s the problem with trying to relocate it from Ottawa to Nunavut?
Before we set up the office in Nunavut we have to use the location in Ottawa in the meantime, it’s not because of the challenges, it’s because we don’t have the location or the facilities.
In the meantime we have to keep that office down there.
So what are you trying to establish, telephone lines, employees, what do you have to do before the move and to date what have you set up?
In the interim there’s quite a lot of work to do but we have to provide the training for the employees, first of all, they will be manning the telephones and that’s currently what we are doing at this stage.
The minister also stated that they are providing training on, so that they would have a Nunavut made program.
Once the program moves up here do you have to train other employees, you have trained the people down there in Ottawa on the Nunavut made program now that it’s moving up here you have to re-train the employees.
Maybe possibly what I could do is the training would be provided here and that’s the current plan.
The minister said that they were providing training already.
Now that the office is down there, there’s trained personnel down in Ottawa, can we not use that to get the employees up here?
They provide the services as far as on a contract and because they are on contract they have been able to keep the program going.
We are both speaking in Inuktitut but I don’t think that we understand one another.
When does the contract come to an end?
I don’t have the information.
I’ll have our ADM Mr. Thompson respond to your question.
It is on a one year, year to year basis that we contract this service from Health Canada and they provide the service, 1-800 number and the counsellors as well.
We haven’t trained anybody there to come back here.
Our idea is to establish through this survey that we’ve done, we determined that we need a made in Nunavut strategy, to develop a Wellness Program and the 800 number and bring it home, repatriate it here so that it’s here delivered in Nunavut.
That is for a person to phone during the counselling hours, training those employees, hiring them, staffing those positions and bringing the whole program home.
Ms. Williams: I know some of the contracts are being done annually; my question was when the contract will be finished?
September 30 of this year is the end of the contract.
Ms. Williams: There are lots of September 30s; 2002, 2005, 2020.
Which September 30?
September 30, 2002.
Mr. Nutarak (interpretation): I would like to refer back to; we have the Inuit Employment Plan and also training with the staffing and for the management positions.
Maybe I can rephrase my question.
Is this management training provided to both beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries?
Hon. Peter Kilabuk (interpretation): We have a training coordinator here in the gallery.
I would like her to move up to the witness table if it’s okay with the Chairperson and the members.
Could you introduce your staff Mr. Kilabuk?
This is Marion Love who is the coordinator of training.
Perhaps you could bring up your question again.
Mr. Nutarak (interpretation): My question was on 4-10 under Inuit Employment Plan.
There’s money available to train Inuit for management and on 4-11, Training and Development for development of leadership.
There’s training for different areas.
Can this training be taken by both beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries?
Chairperson (interpretation): Ms. Love.
Ms. Love: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The expenditures that are listed under 10-11 are primarily for beneficiaries and the whole training and development division looks after the training needs for the entire government.
Chairperson (interpretation): You want to continue Mr. Nutarak.
Mr. Nutarak (interpretation): The minister stated that there’s management training and language development and leadership initiatives and the Akitsiraq Law Program under training and development.
My question is for language programs, is it just geared towards non-beneficiaries or both?
The training development is for both beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries.
Mr. Chairman, just to follow up on…actually I’ll start somewhere else first.
Looking at the training and development section on 4-11, I believe it talks about the branch manages all collaborative inter-departmental training and development and it says that, it is currently mandated to deliver programs such as Employee Workplace Wellness Program, Professional Development, Law Program and Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit.
Maybe I’m a stickler for words but is there a reason why it says it’s currently mandated to do this?
Are there any plans to shift or move the delivery of any of these programs to different areas?
It’s in the other, under Inuit Employment Program, it’s because of that.
Chairperson (interpretation): Pages 4-11 and 4-12 go together.
Because they go together under 4-12, I have a question regarding the Akitsiraq Law School Program.
There’s 350 thousand dollars and when we dealt with the Department of Justice, there was money set aside for the Law Program.
There were 15 students when the program first started and I think now there are 12 students if I remember correctly.
Even though there are fewer students, it seems to be the same amount.
The Akitsiraq Law School Program, half of it was put in last year and this year the full amount was put in.
What is the reason for this when some of the students have dropped out?
This is for the students that are taking the program.
There are five instructors.
Mr. Tootoo: I would just like to ask the minister, on 4-11, under the training and development description, it says that it is currently mandated to deliver those programs that I mentioned.
I asked if there were any plans on, because it says that it is currently mandated to do that.
Are there any, maybe, why does it say currently mandated?
Are they looking at moving any of those programs, the delivery of those programs somewhere else?
I don’t believe I got an answer on that earlier.
I’ll get Ms. Love to respond.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you. Ms. Love.
Ms. Love: Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Currently refers to the fact that there may be some programs migrating to another division and because, for example, workplace wellness may go over to another division.
Also, because of the Inuit employment plan and our obligations under Article 23, we want to keep it in a separate branch to emphasise the importance.
Where would you look at moving the employee workplace wellness program?
Is that something that they’re looking at doing?
Workplace wellness may have a better fit in another division. The training and development would stick strictly to training and development, professional development and developing other programs.
I don’t know where it makes it better and listening to the comments that were made earlier in talking especially about this program in particular and I believe the minister mentioned earlier that they were training people to do this and the Deputy I think indicated they weren’t training, they want to look at hiring and training people to take over this program, the 1-800, I’m referring to the 1-800 service.
That is currently contracted out and given the time frame that is taking the Department to put together a Human Resources system, maybe it might be better to look at strictly contracting, to continue to contract out that service rather than try and build something.
Has the Department looked at any potential organizations or companies that potentially could offer and deliver that service on a contract basis in Nunavut?
Who will respond?
I apologise, there’s a request for interest that we’re going to be giving out to see who would, who is interested.
Chairperson (interpretation): You want to continue? Mr. Tootoo.
Mr. Chairman I know in Iqaluit there’s a crisis line that offers 1-800 service throughout Nunavut and I’m just wondering if the, as far as I know they are the only organization, the only group that offers, or Nunavut that offers that type of service and they have a dedicated amount of individuals and volunteers and trained to man the line, the crisis line.
I’m just wondering if the Department could approach them and see if they can supplement somehow to integrate the use of what they currently offer and the delivery of this program as well, I know that they already have I think last year, or two years ago was their tenth year.
Tenth anniversary of providing that service so they’ve got many years of experience and dedication of people to provide and trained individuals that provide that service.
Now given if they were to take a look at going and evolving into on a contract basis and offer the type of service that’s being offered out through the existing contract, that they would need to change their structures, and that but I think there’s an organization that exists in Nunavut already and with some foresight and co-operation and some willingness to work together to try and develop and bring home and repatriate those services here.
I think that it would be excellent if the department would approach them and see if that’s something they’d be interested in looking at and developing with the department, it could come to a way in which they may be able to offer that service here in Nunavut.
We could, that’s a good suggestion and we could consider that.
But with my response earlier, I just want to clarify that the RFP, I read the opposite side, we’re going to be putting out a request for proposals for that contract.
Mr. Chairman I think if I’m correct any RFP that goes out it has a disclaimer that say any proposal received may not necessarily be accepted.
But in the event they don’t get any proposal from an organization that’s established in Nunavut, if prior to moving forward if they approached the crisis line people to talk to them to see if it is something that they would be willing to do.
Could the minister commit to doing that before they act on any proposals that they received through the RFP process if all of them are from outside of Nunavut?
Chairperson (interpretation): Mr. Kilabuk.  Hon. Peter Kilabuk (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Yes, the, it will be, the information will be clear.
Chairperson (interpretation): Any more? That’s it.
Page 4-15.
Labour Relations.
Total operations and maintenance 1 million 261 thousand.
You have the branch also responsible for administering and interpreting collective agreement, human resource policies and procedures.
You recognized in previous page that, on previous page 4-10 the Inuit Employment Plan to employ Inuit under the Article 23.
Why is, why when you are doing labour relations work worth 756 thousand dollars for working towards to administer and to interpret collective agreements and to develop human resource policies and procedures and there’s no reference to Article 23 under that labour relations in this page?
Labour relations is responsible for the interpretation and the management of the collective agreements with the FNT, NEU as well as the agreement with the Power Corp. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Arvaluk: Maybe a better question would be if you have all these things, where is the Article 23 in terms of Labour Relations funded in the Human Resources Department?
I’m not sure where we are 4-10, it’s under this page.
Mr. Arvaluk: I disagree because 4-10 says that various training initiatives in order to fill the Article 23.
It doesn’t say for Labour Relations.
It doesn’t say in 4-30, it actually says, Labour Relations.
In other words it will work with the union members developing resource policies and procedures but nothing specific to Article 23 in page 4-13, that’s what I’m trying to get at.
There has been a problem with the government employees under Article 23, that have been squeezed out or mistreated or made, or harassed some way or the other.
They become how you call, they become frustrated and I think a lot of that turnover that Mr. Tootoo was asking about earlier is attributable to those kinds of lack of labour relations with the beneficiaries under the Article 23.
That’s why I’m asking, I guess the better question would be, Mr. Chairman, will there be plans to dedicate some kind of funding, small funding on the labour relations to honour Article 23?
Page 4-13 is for labour relations.
It’s for all people whether you are Aboriginal or not.
The reason why it’s different here is that I can clarify 4-13 is for the labour relations.
I understand that 4-13 only in existence for all Nunavummiut including beneficiaries only under the collective agreement.
But there is nothing in this department, main estimates to protect and preserve the Article 23 except in 4-10 for the purpose of hiring and training beneficiaries, but nothing to counsel them if there’s an event of mistreatment or personality clashes from other employees of the government.
Inuit employment with the government is very new.
We didn’t have a good experience with GNWT.
Woman didn’t have a good experience with the GNWT, that’s why this pay equity thing came up. They are still fighting it.
Inuit were like that too.
And there’s nothing yet to counsel for the purpose of retention of the Inuit employees in the government in your budget.
I’m asking you Mr. Minister when you will put labour relations for the purpose of retention to Article 23 in your budget?
Perhaps I can answer this way.
Under labour relations item, it is for all employees.
They are protected under this agreement whether they are from Nunavut Employees Union or the Federation of Nunavut Teachers.
They are all protected under this Labour Relations section.
You also have an obligation.
You say you have obligations in 4-10 under the Article 23.
Under the Article 23 of the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement, I hire the beneficiary.
I’m following, but if I don’t like his jeans for some reason and that by slowly shoving him or her out of my office through personal harassment or comments or whatever, then if that person goes, I’m still abiding by Article 23.
What I’m saying is where are your retention measures to make sure these inexperienced Inuit employees are protected from more aggressive employees in your labour relations.
That is what I think the 766 thousand dollars is for.
The difference is the fight is not with the employers like yourself and the union.
The fight for the uncomfortable relationship sometimes that develops between two cultures, two languages but in most of the cases Inuit don’t have enough experience to fight back or at least complain to a proper person or a proper body of government to get the fair hearing.
Just a comment at this time.
Chairperson (interpretation): Just a comment.
Would you like to respond?
Mr. Chairman, the description on this is it says, this branch is responsible for negotiating collective bargaining with unions and so is this correct, that the minister is the lead person, like the person responsible for negotiations with any of the unions?
Yes, the portfolio I’m holding, as a minister is responsible for negotiations.
Although I have been identified to be the lead for the negotiations, there’s already another agreement within our government that we would like to be up to par with the other provinces of Canada.
Although this is my first time, we have moved that responsibility to the Minister of Finance and Administration for the negotiations process.
Mr. Tootoo: So then this isn’t accurate in here, if he isn’t the person responsible for that and maybe you can correct me if I’m wrong but as far as I know any of the agreements and things that are in place right now on policies and a lot of it is the Minister of Human Resources that is the lead person and who the unions are supposed to be negotiating with not the Minister of Finance.
Now the minister just indicated that they did an agreement within the government to switch that.
Did they consult with any of the unions that they are supposed to be negotiating with as to whether that is something that is acceptable to them?
In order for all of the members to have the same level of understanding within our policy, according, yes the way it is written, it is true.
Yes we take the lead during the negotiations when we have collective bargaining with the unions but the highest, at the highest level we agreed at the FMB level that the Minister responsible for Finance would take the lead on negotiating collective bargaining during the negotiations and once that negotiation is completed then we’ll sign it off.
I’m just wondering if that violates any agreements that we had in place with the unions representing the employees we have working for us whether through the Nunavut Employees Union, the Teachers Union or the Power Corporation Union.
Is it in the collective agreement that it is the Minister of Human Resources that they are supposed to be negotiating with?
It’s not that case in there.
Mr. Chairman has the minister or the department been approached by any of the unions or representatives of any of the unions expressing concern that, you know, they are supposed to be dealing with the Minister of Human Resources and they are getting passed off to the Minister of Finance.
The only time according to the way it is stated is because we have to take the lead once, before they come to collective agreement the Minister responsible for Finance will continue to negotiate.
So while we stated a question to clarify that and that’s the only time they had asked the question.
I didn’t quite understand his answer.
Maybe have they received any concerns in regards to the fact that they are supposed to be dealing with the Minister of Human Resources on negotiations and they are being passed off to the Minister of Finance for negotiations instead of the Minister of Human Resources?
I have received correspondence in regards to the one that I just mentioned asking for clarification as to who will be taking the lead, which department will be taking the lead on negotiating the collective bargaining with the unions.
That’s the only time we have ever received correspondence from them.
Again I just wonder why that’s even in here if the minister and the department are not going to be doing that.
Maybe that’s something that should be either moved somewhere else if for whatever reason that the minister and I don’t know why, maybe the minister, I can only speculate why, I don’t want to say any reason why they have a different minister looking after responsibilities that are supposed the responsibilities of the Minister of Human Resources.
If that’s going to be the case, why don’t we just switch it to the person that can be doing it and not just have it in one area and yet in reality it’s being done by someone else.
I’d like to also find out I guess, you know, in the collective agreement that we have in place with our union does it specify who and through our whole negotiating process, does it specify that the representative of the employees what ever union it is, is supposed to be negotiating with the Minister responsible for Human Resources?
I’ll have my ADM respond to that.
There are two questions there.
The first of course, refers to staff.
We do have staff, Mr. Pinto and the staff at Labour Relations are involved in the negotiations as part of the team for FNT and for the upcoming NEU.
The Public Service Act was changed prior to division.
As you know the GNWT dissolved the Department of Personnel.
So there is at this point no reference to Human Resources as a department in the Public Service Act and that will need to be reinstated so it refers to the Financial Management Board to the department the former GNWT established when they dissolved personnel.
We are at this point in time, we are continuing to do the negotiations with our staff and at the time when hopefully a successful agreement is reached, our minister and the Minister of Finance will be signing off on that agreement.
Chairperson (interpretation): Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Mr. Tootoo.
Mr. Chairman, Mr. Thompson brings up another topic that I could spend a lot of time talking about and that’s the changes that were made to the Public Service Act.
I’d like to ask the minister if by the absence of the mention of Human Resources, in our current Public Service Act, as it is something that was just carried over from the NWT, when will amendments be coming forward to the Public Service Act so that it does accurately reflect the situation that we have here in Nunavut?
It contains a lot and it’s evident that the funding.
I’m sure that if you would like to get further clarification besides negotiating collectively with the unions, Mr. Chairman, at this time, I can’t explain all the information that is contained in the negotiation of collective bargaining so I cannot tell you and inform you and explain those overnight so, if it’s okay Mr. Chairman, outside of this review of the operations and maintenance, I was wondering if I could elaborate to the members and clarify to them, give them more detailed information what is contained in here.
Mr. Chairman, all I was simply asking was does the minister plan on bringing forward amendments to the Public Service Act so that it accurately reflects the situation that we face, that we have here in Nunavut.
And right now it doesn’t.
Does the department planning on bringing forward an amendment so that it does?
Yes, we are reviewing the act right now and we are going to continue to review it.
When does the minister anticipate bringing forward changes to the Public Service Act?
Perhaps within this fiscal year.
Do you want to continue Mr. Tootoo?
Mr. Chairman, it’s something that I’ve asked in the past and that has to do with grievances that have been filed against the government and I’m just wondering if the minister has any ideas of how many grievances have been filed so far this year and also whether that number is increasing or decreasing?
It has slightly increased and we have had an increase with our staff numbers and the figures, I was going to just talk about them.
In total there have been 111 that have gone through NEU and FNT, 4.
How much of an increase is that over the last year and that’s part one to that question and does that fact that we’re getting a significant amount of grievances not raise a concern or red flag with the Department of Human Resources and Labour Relations that there are problems out there that need to be addressed?
You know these numbers are considerably higher if memory serves me correct than what they were before in the GNWT.
You know for running into problems for grievances like this.
Since division it’s getting worse.
That should be an indicator of there is some kind of problem out there.
I’d like to ask the minister 1 – how much of increase and 2 – because of the substantial amount what’s the department doing to try and alleviate that problem?
I don’t have any information on the previous years but I will provide the member with the information with detailed information as to how much the number has increased and how it had fluctuated with the other previous years.
Once I get that information I will provide that information to the member.
Chairperson (interpretation): Please identify if you are going to ask another question, Mr. Tootoo, you have 2 minutes and 45 seconds Mr. Tootoo.
Then can you fix my clock because mine says 2 minutes and 40 seconds.
Mr. Chairman the minister, I look forward to getting that information I would also like to ask what is the department doing to try and curb the number of grievances out there.