‘Extremely disappointing’: Minister slams Ottawa over funding cuts
Family Services Minister Margaret Nakashuk asks for restoration of $625M fund
Family Services Minister Margaret Nakashuk says she and other territorial and provincial ministers are calling for a meeting with the federal government to discuss the possibility of restoring a $625-million fund to support job training. (Photo by Jeff Pelletier)
Family Services Minister Margaret Nakashuk says federal funding cuts are impacting her department’s ability to expand job training programs in Nunavut.
Nakashuk criticized the federal government May 23, the opening day of legislative assembly’s spring sitting, for not including additional Targeted Labour Market Transfer Agreement funding in this year’s federal budget.
Last year’s federal budget allocated $625 million through the transfer agreement to support job training, on-site work experience, career counselling, and job search assistance in the provinces and territories.
“I planned to rise today to highlight the work Family Services is doing to train Nunavummiut for job readiness using federal government funds from the Targeted Labour Market Transfer Agreement, but I am unable to do that because the Government of Canada cut $625 million [from] the labour market transfers in budget 2024,” Nakashuk said.
“This is extremely disappointing and means a loss of $890,000 [in] training dollars in Nunavut, which forces us to make deep cuts to 18 different training programs and cancel a call for training proposals.”
Nakashuk said the funding would have helped with education and training programs, and to address the high costs of living in the territory.
Without it, she said Ottawa is sending Nunavut “backwards in time.”
“The Government of Canada is hindering the ability of Nunavummiut to contribute fully to the economy, perpetuating unemployment, underemployment, cycles of poverty and limiting our progress toward a more equitable and prosperous society,” she said.
Nakashuk was not the only government minister frustrated with the cut. Her counterparts across Canada issued a statement last month asking for the funding to be restored.
Those ministers, Nakashuk said, have requested a meeting with Randy Boissonnault, the federal minister of employment, workforce development and official languages.
Nunatsiaq News contacted Employment and Social Development Canada on May 24 requesting a response to Nakashuk’s statement.
At the time of publication, Nunatsiaq News has not received that response.
Trust Trudeau to go back on his word. It’s probably just the start of a string of broken promises.
Whacko Pierre will do the same.
The orgy of spending has to end sometime. I certainly hope Poilievre maintains these cuts.
Pierre’s going to reduce the deficit by cutting income tax?
I wonder what NTI is doing with all the training monies it has received? How about the royalties received by the RIO’s for mining? What are they doing with that?
What NTI does with its training money is totally upto them as they’re not GN with cut funding from the Feds.
Also NTI should be using the money for Inuit as to GN they hire Inuit and Non Inuit, as NTI is a birthright company they should only focus on Inuit training.
A lot of words to not answer a very straightforward question.
There fine wording of the Settlement Agreement does not give NTI a free for all on this $175m (maybe $230m in 2024 dollars). GN and Hamlets could access it, but is usually denied. NTI invests the money and enjoy the profits while regular Inuit don’t get trained. No one asks NTI much about it, certainly not the media. Ask how much in ten years they’ve spent from the fund and I will bet my house it is negligible.
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https://www.tunngavik.com/files/2015/05/FINAL-SIGNED-SETTLEMENT-AGREEMENT.pdf
saving it for trips across the pond that wont change a thing
How about students get their REAL diplomas as there are trade schools and universities across Canada.
What happened to each department’s training funds?
The GN continues to pay high costs to consultants and offer unnecessary courses such as MS Word, MS Excel, and MS Teams. These should already be known by new employees. Orientation can easily be provided to new employees in a folder instead of being included on the GN training calendar.
Why isn’t family services relying on funding from the Inuit Organization or even NTI, as one of the comments pointed out?
Typical of Fiberals and other governments Give people hope but crush their spirit at the end.
I want more peanuts so let’s discuss peanuts. I just dropped one on the floor, shall I eat it, throw it out or put it back in the jar for the next person to eat.
2024/25 GN budget is $2.1 Billion, yes that is $2,100,000,000.00 (tabled budget)
2024/25 Family Services budget $180,000,000.00 (approximate
Minister of family services is concerned about $890,000.00.
$890K represents 0.04% of the overall Government of Nunavut’s budget or 0.5% of Family Services budget for 2024/25.
$890,0000 seems like a large number to the everyday person but when you look at the bigger picture of the GN and the Family Services Department $890,000 is a just a drop in the bucket and a waste of time.
How many trainees were trained and what skills did they learn for 890k for 18 different programs. That should be a simple number to produce. It would be disappointing if that number was less than several thousand. Prepare to be disappointed.
trained for what? counselled for what? how many people were actually hired. heavy duty machine operators. taxi drivers, working at coop or northmart? counselling for someone in kinngait with a grade 8 education. ya it all looks pretty hazy and bleak to me.
The government of Nunavut has no interest in statistical data. I’m sure you can imagine a few reasons why.
This, coming from a government that just negotiated a devolution agreement with the feds to take more responsibility? Hands out again? Want their cake and want to eat it too? Good grief, Nunavut – what a disaster you are.
Last year’s federal budget allocated $625 million through the transfer agreement to support job training, on-site work experience, career counselling, and job search assistance in the provinces and territories.
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Nakashuk’s argument would be much better if she focused on what was accomplished with last year’s funding, rather than speculating what will be lost this year.
Where’s your data?
Do like international university students. Work your butts off instead of constantly demanding more hand outs.
International Students start with money, Go to a university campus and look for the nicest cars. They’re not owned by profs, they’re owned by 20 year old International Students with dad’s money. So who really has the most handouts?
It really depends on the students. Some are wealthy. Some have familles who sacrifice every penny they have do their kids can lead a better or safer life. Stats are important here too to avoid generalizing.
There is No accountability with this current Department of Family Services – cabinet Minister to it’s Executives! inclusive Deputy Minister of Family Services that just pulled out 35 job’s out of Naja Isabelle Home Care in Chesterfield Inlet. The job’s were recently pulled out to Ontario Home Care Services (Private Business) from Nunavut in Chesterfield Inlet that created Employment’s and Training opportunities! Notice this backward GN system???
In the meantime, billions of dollars in land settlement money and Baffinland royalties are sitting idle except for supporting bums on seats in governance parallel with GN. Of course, investment returns are not keeping up with the cost of housing. These funds should be divided up into family trusts so they can do some real good for beneficiaries–to buy housing or pay for education and skills training. People can then look after their own live and they own money instead of sucking at the federal teat.