Thank you, Mr. Chair. My apologies for missing this morning as I was over at the judicial recount. I will carefully study the statements made by my colleagues so I have a better sense of your priorities and how we can work together. Congratulations to the new MLAs and returning ones, and I am very happy to be here to work with you.

We have been asked to talk about where we want to see the Northwest Territories in 10 years and what we can do in our four years in this Assembly, but I would like to start with some thoughts about the Frame Lake riding, what I heard at the door during the campaign, and I would also like to acknowledge the work of the volunteers on my campaign.

The Frame Lake riding is a diverse area within Yellowknife. It stretches from this Legislative Assembly over to Woolgar Avenue. It includes commercial properties along Old Airport Road; Northlands Trailer park, which is undergoing some tremendous revitalization; public housing in Sissons and Lanky Courts;, and single-family dwellings along Forrest Drive, Bromley Drive and Court, and Kuntsen Court and Avenue. It is a vibrant part of Yellowknife, with many Indigenous and immigrant families. It is my home, and I love it.

I would like to thank the residents in Frame Lake for coming out to vote in 2019. Voter turnout went from 28 percent in 2015 to 45 percent in this year. That is a tremendous increase. I also want to acknowledge the work of Elections NWT, as the voter list was in much better shape this time around, and I also want to thank them for their promotion of the increased voting opportunities. Frame Lake was a much-anticipated race, and I wish to thank my competitor David Ramsay, who ran a strong campaign and presented a credible alternative. I wish him nothing but the best with his future endeavours. I recognize that not everyone voted for me and that even more residents were not able to or were not inclined to vote. I will still work very hard to represent their interests and respond to any concerns brought to my attention.

As to what I heard at the door, it varied a lot depending on where I was in Frame Lake. In the lower-income areas, the main concerns involved public housing, income support, childcare, and education. In the higher-income areas, the main issues tended to be around cost of living, especially power bills, climate change, the economy, and a variety of other issues. I really appreciated the opportunity to engage residents and will stay in touch by personally delivering one of the three annual newsletters each year.

I would like to thank all those who volunteered on my campaign. Our families loan us to this great institution, and I am no exception. My partner, Suzette Montreuil, I could not have done it without your support. I also need to thank my official agent, Bob Wilson, and the many other volunteers who helped out. I also would like to thank those who have sent me messages and congratulations. Your support is very much appreciated.

So where could and should the NWT be 10 years from now? Here is a dream that I have, and I hope that we can all share parts of it and agree upon it. We would have a diversified economy, where our peoples are more fully employed and engaged in a variety of activities that include mining, tourism, arts and culture, research and development, agriculture, and the fisheries. We would produce a lot more of what we consume. The workforce would more closely reflect the cultural and other diversity of the NWT, with Indigenous peoples taking their rightful place in senior management. We would have vibrant small communities, regional centres, capital that serves all of our residents. Indigenous languages would continue to be spoken in each of the regions and taught in all our schools, with improved access to all government services in our official languages. There would also be a strong French first-language education system that would control its own admissions. [English translation not provided.]

All of our citizens would have access to affordable, suitable, and adequate housing. Seniors, or knowledge holders, will be able to age in place, have access to appropriate services. All of our communities would be self-sufficient in terms of their energy needs. We would minimize and potentially eliminate fossil fuels through green, renewable energy such as solar, wind, and small hydro, with efficient storage systems. No more big grids, no more big energy projects. Communities would own and manage their own energy systems with appropriate support and training, incentives for self-sufficiency, and there would be a solid plan for dealing with the climate crisis mitigation and adaptation.

Caribou herds would once again be thriving through a variety of habitat protection actions, predator control, harvest management, and human disturbance thresholds. There would be a fully funded and functioning integrated environmental and resource management system based squarely on co-management and continual improvement through audits and state of the environment reporting. Legally binding water agreements would all be in place to protect us from upstream threats and would be supported through appropriate community-based monitoring and traditional knowledge.

In terms of governance, there would be a new confederation of regional Indigenous governments and a territorial public government with strong community governments, all recognized with roles and responsibilities set out in a constitution for the NWT. We would have no one living in poverty. There would be adequate, suitable, and affordable housing for all. No more family violence. Mental health supports in place to help build healthy families and communities.

What concrete steps should we take in the next four years to achieve this vision, this dream? What should our priorities start to look like over the next four years to take us along this path?

I'll start with the economy. I said during the campaign that I don't know what else we can do to attract more investment in resource extraction, as this is mostly dictated by commodity prices and financial markets. What we can control is the completion of the remaining land rights agreements, and this needs to be a high priority. We need a more flexible approach and new mandates to allow the regions to evolve as they see fit. I look forward to a new approach to negotiations from GNWT and stronger involvement by the Regular MLAs. We also need to fully implement the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and make sure our policies and legislation is consistent with our obligations under the declaration. We need to continue to co-drafting process with post-devolution legislation and regulations.

We can and should also better promote ourselves as great place to live, work, and do business with greater certainty than many other places. Our resource management systems are different by design, but there is a lot of guidance and assistance available. We also need to make sure that we get a fair return for resources extracted by reviewing royalties and taxation, the scale and pace of development, and benefit retention. We need a new arrangement with the federal government to ensure that we retain more of our own source revenues. A review of our Heritage Fund is also required during the term of the 19^th Assembly. We need to stabilize our fiscal regime to the greatest extent possible. We need to invest more into our people, not just big infrastructure projects. We need evidence-based decisions.

Housing, education, universal childcare, guaranteed basic income, energy self-sufficiency, and food security are the long-term investments that are needed to build sustainability and healthy communities. These should be the priorities when our government goes to Ottawa and the federal government for support and investments. This was certainly not the case with the 18^th Assembly Cabinet, which cut programs and services to fund big infrastructure.

I believe we need to focus on systemic changes that will reduce our cost of living by building more self-sufficient communities. We need to refocus the NWT Power Corporation towards community energy self-sufficiency, rather than relying on big projects and big grids. Renewable energy investment will help lower the cost of living for remote communities and all energy consumers. We need a better-coordinated approach to the climate crises that includes carbon pricing. We need to set a lead department, and give them the authority to work with others inside and outside government. GNWT spending should consider impacts on greenhouse gas emissions, and there should be strong public reporting.

We should build stronger food security to help lower our cost of living by promoting more local food production through community gardens, commercial market gardening, and rejuvenation of local fisheries. We also need to work together on Nutrition North to focus on food security that includes country foods and inter-settlement trade.

We need to increase our investment in our education system and return to the Education Renewal Initiative as the way to further improve outcomes. We also need to build a strong network across the NWT for post-secondary education that includes the community learning centres, campuses in Inuvik, Fort Smith, and Yellowknife. There is huge potential to attract and focus research and development on our needs and build a knowledge economy.

Children and housing need to form the foundation of our new priorities. We should increase funding for early childhood development programs and services, as we all want to get our children off on the right foot. This is simply one of the best investments we can make as a government, with tremendous cost savings down the road. This necessary work on children also includes a universal childcare system, for which we already have a feasibility plan. We need to keep on top of the necessary improvements to Child and Family Services, and I believe that includes a child and youth advocate.

I am not convinced that a northern-based treatment centre is our best solution to addictions. Aftercare and on-the-land programming such as the Arctic Indigenous Wellness Foundation's healing camp here in Yellowknife are a good start, but we need similar efforts in each of our regions and also available at the community level. I look forward to continued efforts on our downtown area and believe that a managed alcohol program is part of the path moving forward.

Without housing, our residents cannot properly participate in their communities or in the economy. The Housing First approach has shown some success in Yellowknife and elsewhere, and we need more options for seniors and young families.

I look forward to working with all the other MLAs and Cabinet on this important suite of priorities under the themes of economic diversification, investing in healthy communities and children and families, and addressing the climate crisis.

Now I would like to talk a little bit about how we work together. Change was certainly a major theme and outcome in the recent election campaign, and I certainly am happy to be part of that process. Are there ways to improve collaboration and consensus government? Absolutely. As happens every Assembly, lots of ideas and recommendations were put forward by the Special Committee on Transition Matters. I was a member of that committee for the 18^th Assembly. Some of our recommendations included:

• Better orientation and ongoing training of MLAs;
• Setting clearer and fewer priorities;
• Options for the structure and selection of Cabinet and standing committees;
• Improved and more collaborative budgeting;
• A mid-term review with a focus on priorities and the mandate; and
• Improvements to how legislation is developed, introduced, and reviewed, including future regulations.

At the end of the day, we cannot possibly do everything that has been raised today. We will have to make choices. We all come to this government with different backgrounds, education, and experience. We are not going to agree on everything, but that is also a healthy reality. We should take advantage of the diversity here to help make better decisions and build a stronger Northwest Territories. Mahsi, Mr. Chair.