Monday, May 4, 1998
Making the salaries of territorial employees public is another step toward open government in the Northwest Territories.
Premier Don Morin didn't like the idea when it was brought up shortly after Ontario published the salaries of its top wage earners. He thought the NWT was too small for such openness. MLAs went ahead with the motion to do the same with territorial employees in May of 1996. Morin put the issue on the back burner then turned the burner off.
Yellowknife Centre MLA Jake Ootes and Iqaluit MLA Ed Picco kept the pressure up. Morin finally compromised by releasing salary levels and names of some employees rather than specific figures on all government employees.
The salary ranges do give the public an idea of what people are making and the names tell us who these people are. Government workers may not like having their names made public but it serves as a good reminder they are well paid to work for the people of the Northwest Territories and not some bureaucratic machine accountable to only itself.
Ootes is not satisfied and wants more details on who is making over $100,000. Whether we need more specific information on these individuals is debatable. What we really need is similar information on everybody not already released, including union members, contract workers boards and agencies.
Such information would complete the picture on government salaries. It is a matter of course now for the salaries of ministers and MLAs to be made public. People have a legitimate right to assess the value government workers and politicians offer for the money they get.
This exercise in open government will also give the new Nunavut government a yardstick by which to measure how much bureaucrats should be paid. There is a danger of salaries in the Nunavut government getting out of control. Now people will have enough information to judge how well the politicians and bureaucrats are paying themselves.
It is sad to hear of Roberta Vaneltsi's struggle to reclaim custody of her two children.
In 1994, the Canadian courts split custody between the parents into one-year shifts. The children, Roman, 11, and Petra, 8, have now been living with Vaneltsi's estranged husband in the Czech Republic for four years. Czech courts awarded him sole custody.
While this shows a blatant disregard for Canadian laws, it's the lack of support Vaneltsi has received Canadian foreign affairs officials and Western Arctic MP Ethel Blondin-Andrew that is most worrisome.
Why are these people not doing what is right?
Prime Minister Jean Chretien is not a fan of an elected Senate, and he shows no sign of paying attention to any candidate elected by Alberta to fill vacancies in the Upper House of Parliament.
If the Western NWT were to elect a candidate to fill the Senate seat created by territorial division in 1999, Chretien would be forced to consider that the North in general and its aboriginal people in particular are underrepresented in Ottawa.
Passing up the chance to honor our choice would not go down well among Northerners.
Appointing an elected senator has already been done once before. It's worth the time and money to hold a vote to see if it can't be done again.
As if Nunavut's architects don't have enough problems, a housing shortage threatens to slow the new government's decentralization plan.
At a recent meeting in Cambridge Bay, interim commissioner Jack Anawak identified housing as a major challenge for the Nunavut government. He said his deputies recognized the need to promote the construction of housing units and to look at other options. But there is little time in the 11 months before division to shift government departments when there isn't enough housing for staff.
It seems inevitable that the lack of housing will slow the devolution of services from the GNWT to the Nunavut government.