GN housing results to go under microscope in upcoming sitting: Savikataaq
Capital budget, 14 bills to be discussed during legislature’s fall sitting, house leader David Joanasie says
Arviat South MLA Joe Savikataaq says he’ll be looking for answers about how many houses the Government of Nunavut has built when the legislature’s fall sitting begins on Thursday. (File photo by Jeff Peletier)
Former premier Joe Savikataaq says he wants to find out how many houses the Government of Nunavut has built under its Nunavut 3000 strategy when the legislature resumes Thursday.
“It’d be nice to know how many houses have actually been turned over from the GN to the local housing association in the communities,” Savikataaq said in an interview about the upcoming winter sitting at Nunavut’s legislature.
“The government has put out a few public announcements that 500-and-something houses have been started or completed, and I think most of the MLAs will see that it doesn’t appear to be that many houses that have been constructed,” he said.
In addition to being a former premier, the Arviat South MLA is the chairperson of the standing committee on legislation and one of the leaders of the committee of the whole.
During the fall sitting, cabinet ministers are expected to introduce 14 government bills, including Nunavut’s next capital budget, government house leader David Joanasie said in an interview with Nunatsiaq News.
“The biggest legislative item will be the capital budget for 2025-26,”Joanasie said.
The capital budget outlines the costs of items such as departmental purchases and construction projects and how the government will pay for them. The operating budget is a plan to cover the cost of day-to-day operations, such as salaries, and forecasts government revenues.
The operating budget is usually introduced each year during the winter sitting.
Joanasie did not provide any details about what’s in either the capital budget or the other bills, saying that he will leave it to the respective ministers to discuss their own legislation.
The other nine bills are non-money, and include updates to older pieces of legislation.
“Most will be amendments to reflect either current practices or modernizing legislation,” Joanasie said.
It’s not clear if this sitting will include the voting in of a new cabinet minister.
After the end of the spring sitting, Tununiq MLA Karen Nutarak resigned from cabinet. Her portfolios, which included Justice, were split up among the remaining ministers.
“I can’t say whether or not that will be decided upon this fall,” Joanasie said.
“It would be a full caucus decision to fill that vacancy or not.”
The upcoming sitting is the last of 2024, and is expected to run for two weeks, Joanasie said.
It will also coincide with the one-year mark until the next territorial election, which is scheduled for Oct. 27, 2025.
Come on Joe. Don’t you read the news? They delivered a whopping 18 units from NU3000. A glorious multiplex made with only the finest of materials I am sure, and the cost per unit just seems to keep climbing!
I hope Joe presses on why so few units have been delivered and why its continued to be sole sourced when the previous tender process resulting in significantly more units built per year. Perhaps handing it all to one company just because its owned by Inuit orgs and sitting by while watching a train wreck unfold isn’t the best idea. Perhaps some GN intervention, it’s GN, aka the Canadian taxpayers money. Just a thought, but using best practices like tendering something so large would be good.
Also who are the GN fooling? Is this a statistics thing for giving work to Inuit contractors? NCC is not Inuit. Its run by Newfoundlander, managed by people from down south and the majority of trades labour is southern labour.
It seems like a running joke that we pretend these companies are Inuit. I understand that for the most part actual Inuit companies do not exist to do these contracts but can we just stop pretending work in reality. Its mockery at this point.
Slap some old Inuit figureheads on a Board, take some photos for the website who are we page or our Board, have southern Canadian companies or Canadians do almost all the work and call it Inuit.
The game is broken and its the people who pay tax that are paying the price. What a sham.
Indigenous shell companies have been getting a lot of negative attention in Ottawa lately.
It seems Inuit business isn’t really Inuit business.
And they should. Its all just a front. Looks at the mines. Those are not Inuit companies, sure perhaps Inuit as in some meaningless ownership percentages, but they are 100% run by southern companies and then the “Inuit” portion gets some tiny kickback from the work as a rent a feather fee. Talk to any who have worked there for various “inuit companies” orders come from Montreal, Calgary, Toronto, Vancouver, etc. Never once have you had a boss for those “Inuit” companies actually located in Nunavut. Shows you where things are being run.
Its an absolute atrocity, calling these “Inuit” companies. The RIA’s and these old-figureheads must think the bulk of Nunavummiut are stupid. Either that or everyone knows how the game is played, no one cares, and the GN and Federal Gov’t and RIA’s can all go on touting totally meaningless statistics that are so far detached from reality. I am not sure which one is worse.
“Inuit owned” is too funny.
Majority seem to be….”My wife and children are Eskimo.”
Maybe the McGill twins from Tanzania can get in on the action. Y’know… cause they were adopted.🤣😂🤪
Create perverse incentives, get perverse results…
The claim was that NCC was going to train Inuit tradespeople.
How many Inuit have received how much training so far?
Until the training of Inuit tradespeople is made a specific deliverable in the contracts, and the contractors do not get paid until the training is successfully completed, training will not happen and the jobs will continue to go to southern workers.
The only way to reduce the cost of house construction in Nunavut is with local labour, so we don’t have to continuously pay for travel, accommodations, meals, and profit to southern firms.
If only it were so simple, so easy… surely you realize there’s a lot more to this issue than just ‘training’ people?
You certainly captured the situation very well. Going in 3 years into a multi billion dollar project with no progress reports asked for or provided. You just couldn’t do anything worse if you tried. When the questions start there is going to be a lot of “yes,but,ah,well,maybe,kind,of,sort of,of course,” Give us a couple of months so our spin doctors can come up with some kind of answer.
Before investigating how many units have been built, you must prioritize ensuring that local housing associations are staffed with competent individuals who consistently show up for work. It’s essential that they perform their duties effectively while on the job, and nepotism must be eliminated from the workplace.
You are correct. We do need more staff to assist with the overwhelming repairs to local housing units, and they do need to be competent.
However, you left out the most important part that nobody seems to want to talk about, and that is the overwhelming tenant damage to these units. Windows broken every weekend, doors kicked in every weekend. Holes kicked in walls every other day.
How can we expect housing maintenance employees to keep up with this endless damage.
Our MLA’s and senior government officials need to take a tour (The real tour) through some of these units and see the insane amount of damaged caused by the tenants.
This is the real source of the problem, and will be for the future until somebody finally puts their foot down on tenant damage.
As clearly outlined in the tenancy agreement, it is the responsibility of the Tenant Relations Officer to document and address any tenant damages, whether reported or unreported, during their visits. Tenants must follow the guidelines to prevent damages and ensure that rent is paid on time. If tenants fail to pay or repeatedly violate the terms of the agreement, the Tenant Relations Officer may take further action, which could include terminating the tenancy. This process is straightforward and ensures that both parties are held accountable.
Many foremen tend to assign casual staff to handle regular work orders, although these workers should ideally be hired for Maintenance and Improvement (M&I) projects. However, these long-term casual employees can easily enroll in the apprenticeship programs offered by the Department of Education. This approach will benefit the organization in the long run, as it ensures a stable workforce of maintenance staff who can be replaced as retirements occur.
Nunavut 3000 joke! HA 18 built only 2982 more to go. Job well done PJ you can pat yourself on the back all the way to NTI
Joe, JoeJoe. Criticize all you want but in all reality your had your chance as premier and done nothing. Why are you so critical of those who are actually trying to make a difference? Keep padding your pension buddy. We all know that’s the goal.
Exactly! How many units were building whilst he was Premier? Imagine what could have been accomplished if Joe and George put their egos aside and focused what is what needs to get done to better the lives of Nunavummiut?
Uhh…Malaware attack…COVID. Joe was a great Premier during a horrible time. And then was treated deplorably. I’d love to see him back in Cabinet.
Joe was not a great Premier, a great listener for his staff telling Joe what to do and what not to do.
Joe was never really in control.
With all the federal funding available in the last decade he did not accomplish much, but he sure wants to get back in at Premier, his staff too.
Sorry to burst your bubble, while Joe was premier there were more houses built. That’s a fact not a fiction like Nunavut 3000 is
Nepotism will never be gone from Nunavut communities. It’s part of “who we (Inuit) are.”
Local housing boards are a perfect example of nepotism.
Nunavut with different landscapes where mountainous places has controlled winds near communities, in kivalliq it’s very flat, always windy. It’s taking a toll on climate change to Inuit in regions. It is like that. Too small I guess
And your point is?
Stomach just makes noises, and always has headaches. No privacy, no protection. Just emptying our pockets with our pockets left inside out.