NORTHWEST TERRITORIES

Nutrition North, the new incarnation of the Food Mail program, rolled out on April 1 and residents across the NWT have been making their opinions heard on whether or not the new program is helping to reduce the cost of food for people in remote communities.

Since the program started, residents in Norman Wells have seen a dramatic increase in food demand, leading to rows of empty shelves, all for what one resident said were minimal savings. Due to increased cost in shipping and a mountain of new paperwork, specifically keeping track of every product that goes to each community monthly, grocery stores in Yellowknife and Winnipeg have cancelled their personal order programs, leaving hundreds of customers to rely on their local stores.

With voters going to the polls on May 2, News/North asked the five candidates vying for the Western Arctic seat their thoughts on the $60 million program.

NDP incumbent Dennis Bevington said no matter what community he visits, the complaints are all the same - residents are upset with the program and the added bureaucracy is forcing some grocers to get out of the personal order business.

"They're very concerned about the supplies," he said, pointing to the lack of availability of fresh foods in some communities. "When the Conservatives brought in the Nutrition North program, we wanted people to still have personal orders. They agreed to have personal food orders, but it's not practical to do that now."

Conservative candidate Sandy Lee said the program, while still in its infancy, has some issues that need to be worked out, but added it's something that can work in the long run with some improvements.

"We are hearing some transitional issues we need to address, so I will be working on that," she said, if elected to office. "That would be my focus should I be in there."

Lee said the program's base funding has increased to $60 million from $40 million and hasn't been cut like Bevington said in a media interview last Wednesday.

"This process is more transparent in that the savings will be shown and it'll be passed onto the consumers," she said. "Under the Food Mail program, Canada Post would get most of the money. It was unclear who was getting the benefit of the subsidy.

At the end of the day, once we work out these wrinkles, it will benefit the Northerners."

Liberal candidate Joe Handley said the program is a complete disaster. He said the program was built from Ottawa down and the old program should come back into place until the government can do more consultation with community governments and residents to find a way to make it more effective and cost-saving.

"I haven't heard one person say this is a good program," he said, adding restaurant owners in remote communities are feeling the same pinch and higher meal costs could be in the future.

He cited the same problems about the program as Bevington has - no real saving at grocery stores and the loss of personal orders. "It's only a few pennies saved. People are saying it's costing us more now than it did before Nutrition North came in," he said.

Bevington said the Conservatives "really missed the boat" and the program needs to be seriously reworked or even scrapped.

"(Nutrition North) needs to change and it may have to be scrapped altogether or get rid of the regulations that are the result of this boondoggle," he said. "It's been poorly thought out for a such an important program.

"We will have to identify where the problems are and how to fix them. We can't spend two years doing this, it needs to be fixed."

Eli Purchase, candidate for the Green Party, said the program needs to be monitored closely to make sure it's doing what it is set up to do - reduce the cost of living for residents and provide reasonably-priced, healthy food.

"This program is supposed to be reducing the cost of groceries and everyday necessities for everyday people in isolated communities," he said. "This is something where we have to be really careful to ensure that this program is doing what it set out to do."

Bonnie Dawson, candidate for the Animal Alliance Environment Voters Party of Canada, said her party doesn't have a specific stance in its platform on the issue of Nutrition North. However, on a personal level, she said the program needs major improvement.

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