Nunavut government department shakeup takes effect
Department of Transportation and Infrastructure, Department of Community Services established
A shakeup of two GN departments announced last year by Premier P.J. Akeeagok, seen here speaking to reporters, is in effect as of April 1. (Photo by Jeff Pelletier)
The Government of Nunavut has phased out two former departments and replaced them with two new departments as a shakeup announced last year took effect Tuesday.
The Department of Community and Government Services and the Department of Economic Development and Transportation were phased out as part of this realignment, with the two new bodies splitting some of the former departments’ roles.
The Department of Community Services’ mandate includes emergency management, land-use planning, recreation and supporting economic development such as mining, fisheries and tourism. Within the department is Service Nunavut, which will handle motor vehicles, consumer affairs, safety services and government liaison offices.
The Department of Transportation and Infrastructure Nunavut’s responsibilities include infrastructure development, transportation services, information technology, petroleum products and procurement.
With these new departments, David Akeeagok is the minster of community services and David Joanasie is the minister of transportation and infrastructure Nunavut.
“The launch of these new departments reflects our commitment to improving access to government programs and services for all Nunavummiut,” Premier P.J. Akeeagok said in a news release.
Renaming a couple of departments is meaningless when our biggest problem is the inadequate, undereducated and incompetent bozos in Cabinet.
This provides another excuse for poor and slow performance. These departments will use this for months as an excuse to pause, delay and ignore requests. As the GN as a whole is doing with the changeover in financial management systems. The scripted answer right now if you ask on the status of a payment from a gn department is that staff are being trained in the new system and to expect an update within a few weeks. How the hell is this gong show of a government ever going to manage devolution?
The rollout of that new payment system was an absolute mess. Just a complete gong show, and the poor people who have to provide those stupid “I’m sorry” answers to inquiries about missing payments are stuck in the middle. Shame on the ones who decided it was ready roll. It 100% was not.
This deserves a story all of its own.
In a normal world, staff would be trained before this “shakedown” were to occur
I can’t wait until this premier gets voted out. Meaningless departmental shuffle, oh wait, he’s used to all these shuffling. Using the same old ADM’s and DM’s, that means no change happening.
PJ , What is going on in our Government!,
Cutting position and have more in the plate does not work well to get answers,
Look all around and open your eyes and ears as some areas this Government is short of staff heavily,
When will this Government see this 85% inuit staffs in Government as this was voted for Inuit was it not ,
All we are seeing from Inuit Organizations to all Government levels hiring none Inuit ,
Total disgrace not over seeing why this is happening 25 years gone…
How are the government supposed to “see this 85% inuit staffs, when thee y do not apply?” Is this government supposed to go door to door and find employees? Are they supposed to hire people that might not have the requirements or education for certain positions just to satisfy this 85% you would like to see?”
My department is so majorly short staffed as are most departments. I think your goal is not attainable unless people go get these jobs and the education needed to excel at these jobs.
Inuit do apply
Please get your head out of the snow bank
Let’s face it lots of Inuit apply the problem is the management hiring their friends from the south
You hit the nail right on head. You can apply bit it’s who you know and you gotta be friends never mind the qualification ops let me clarify this! Get hired by your friends and you will get paid to get the education. I remember a store clerk who got hired by a DM and she got a paid education. She worked part time as a director od finance and studied during the day. It must be so nice to be that privileged eh!
Waste of time and resources, PJ stop taking a page out of your buddy Justin’s book and get work done here! Please!
Hope this Nunavut “premier” copies Trudeau and resign effective immediately. Please?
Next Nunavut election can’t happen fast enough.
Later on PJ can move on to NTI or ITK twilight zone and fade.
I wonder when our Premier will tackle the issues that plague the GN? This government has been broken for decades and it only seems to be getting worse and there has never been any real attempts to fix it.
I have been disappointed with our Premier pretending that everything at the GN is fine and dandy.
With nearly 3 BILLION dollars per year GN budget for less than 40,000 people the GN cannot get much done and there is some much dysfunction and waste that continues to go on at the GN.
Way too many transient workers after 20 plus years, the Nunavut Agreement continues to be ignored by the GN, when will the GN start a major review of all departments to start making changes and find out what is wrong and how to fix it? When will the GN start listening the the Auditor General and start implementing all the recommendations?
Enough of pretending our GN is running fine, stop brushing everything under the rug and start cleaning things up.
Blah, blah… I have gripes, blah, blah…I’m miserable, blah blah… can’t articulate one single point, just vague generalizations… yawn me back to sleep.
Scatter mind you sound fun at parties 😂
It’s funny but I actually thought that they had this organized best on Division in 1999 and it went down hill ever since. I’ll tell you what I mean. When Nunavut was created, Community Government was paired with Transportation. This made so much sense the hamlets are so dependant on the airports and they are such crucial infrastructure to community governments. most hamlets are involved in operating airports. As a result, it made so much sense to have both areas overseen by one department. Things went down hill when they split them up IMHO.
God bless each and every inuk who rises to the occasion and takes full advantage of what the NLCA is offering. But just look around, most skilled positions, be it in trades, education, government or health are not being filled locally. Until more inuit start taking advantage of what is offered, and looking at a job and an opportunity to build themselves rather than just an opportunity to get staff housing, there will always be an influx of non-inuit needed. Having kids in your teens and early 20’s is also a problem that prevents people from moving forward in life, but that’s not something we talk about.
God bless all the transient workers that come to Nunavut and make a meaningful difference.
Receiving extra benefits to come here and also hire their families and friends. Status quo is the motto here.
Even after 20 plus years things stay the same and it actuates more difficult for people from Nunavut to get into the GN, most times it’s on a term or casual position with no housing.
The games played at the GN never changes and this is what we have to put up with and we do see that the GN is not working very well especially for Inuit, I don’t see much changing even with educated and qualified Inuit trying to get their foot in the door at the GN. Too many ol boys club still at the GN.
We have tried to hire local and train and help . We found many times the ones we hired could not fill in the required documents themselves, could barely sign thier name, had little to no math skills even though claiming to have completed grade 10 or 12.All this could be worked around however when we tried to pick them up for work many were not out of bed. There were
some exceptions with some very good workers. We found workers in thier 50s much better educated and dedicated than 20 to 30 year Olds. These are facts and the reasons must change before the youth can progress.
So what has the GN done to address this for the last 20 plus years? Has there been improvements made with our education system? Has there been reviews done to see why it has been failing so much more the last 20 plus years? What is going on at the Arctic college with the NTEP to produce teachers? Did you know the schools in Iqaluit will not hire graduates from the Arctic College?
The system and how the GN is set up currently does not work for Nunavut at all, has there been any studies and research behind that? Or are we continuing the status quo and cater to transient workers?
Did you know that arctic college doesn’t issue teaching degrees?
So how does the GN expect our schools to have enough local teachers? If the Arctic College doesn’t provide teaching degree’s?
They just want to hide evidences from them. Lawyers and health workers were in a meeting for sure and they don’t want to work what they suppose to do. There should a public inquiry and talk about first each community. See the topic, it’s from last year and they finally working on it. Look at arviat too about the how many people suicide last year and this year and minister of health was talking about suicide prevention and almost cried when he did the speech. That’s a pretending to almost cry, he was just trying to make his work done. Listen to foster child in igalaaq too when they talk about it. There were serious incidents too and there not working on it too.
Some of these people commenting have such big ijjuks online but wont ever step up themselves hahaha
Look who’s speaking!
While you are on a tangent about the transient workers, has it occurred to you many of them go months/years without seeing their parents/kids/family to provide a service for you?
The money is too good to pass up. Yes, their services are appreciated but let’s not play victim and say they are away from their families. It is a choice they make. If anything, locals could learn from transient workers. Move where the money is, if a local cannot make it in Nunavut, it is on them. Inuit have first dibs at EVERYTHING in Nunavut, yer just got to want it bad enough to make it work for you.
We Inuit need to step up and get educated!!!
There are a lot of programs available already to help you. Quit complaining and get moving!
Nobody is going to hold your hand forever, you need to take advantage of the resources already available!
That’s Parents and Young People!
Too many free hand outs make for lazy people unfortunately.
The GN is so dysfunctional. The ministers and the staff are poorly educated. It’s not their fault. But the costs of providing on the job training. For these people is enormous. So much money is wasted through poor management, corruption and nepotism.
The people of Nunavut are the ones who are being hurt the most. Absenteeism in all departments. Disarray in housing, health care socials assistance, it’s every where. Local government is the same. The question is.
Who is too blame for the failures. And how can it be fixed.
The only question we need to ask is how can it be fixed.
The GN needs to stop ignoring all the issues that are plaguing the GN, stop with the bandaid solutions, full GN review department by department, find out what is working and what is not working, make changes, implement the auditor general’s recommendations, that would be a start.
Nunavut has the lowest basic high school graduation rate and lowest overall education rates in the country and it shows. It shows in all our systems and Nunavut deserves better. So, parents encourage your young ones to finish high school and go to college after, live outside of Nunavut for a year or two then come back, you won’t regret it! Nunavut will always be here, go live out your 20s to learn and make memories then come back home for work – an educated Inuk would have so many options. Plus those years builds resilience and character building, you will be thankful of how strong you can be! Please do it!
I’m afraid there will be more changes as the countdown has begun. A lot of coffee lies ahead for the next Premier and Ministers, and probably a few sleepless nights too.