Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I do not want to prolong this business of making introductory comments to a report that we have had for some time now. What seems to have happened is that we have never really sat down in committee to deal with something that really was a product of the 11th Assembly, and it is quite clear that that was the origin of it. What bothers me a lot is that during the 11th Assembly the Executive started -- it is fully explained in the Beatty report how the 11th Assembly got its agenda.
Not long after the election, the Executive Council went out to Snare Rapids and began developing a kind of agenda, unusual in the sense that you have an agenda for government after the election rather than before it. But in our system that is the way it is. You decide after the election what the people are going to get, and the cabinet goes off into the wilderness.
It was outlined at the beginning of this report what kind of government the people were going to get. They outlined five areas: economic growth; improving education; shaping public government; supporting aboriginal initiatives; and also taking our place in Canada as a territory and also a place in the world. Two other ones were added at a later stage: The social issues became a major topic of discussion during the 11th Assembly, and we spent quite a bit of time, including a mid-term session of the caucus in Baker Lake, in which social issues were supposed to have been dealt with in some depth. Then in June 1987 a seventh priority was set -- it is pretty late in the mandate of the committee, half way through -- the improvement of government administration.
So really the last Assembly did have a kind of a platform or an agenda. What bothers me a little about this report is that it has somehow assumed the status of being the government's agenda. This is what this government is all about. The danger is that we are going to spend all our time navel-gazing and looking at the machine and oiling the machine, and you know, shining the machine, and looking at the machine, and admiring the machine. The point is that governments do things, you know, and it is very, very difficult for me, having sat now in this House -- it is the second session -- to know what this government is all about, because it has been dominated by this government's obsession with the famous Beatty report, and we therefore have come to the conclusion that since so much of the energy of the government is going to look at the machinery, that we had better spend some time at it, because it is our government. It is not just the Executive Council's government; it belongs to everybody. If we are going to spend our time in an obsession, if you like, with the structure, then it makes sense that everybody, in fact, would become involved.
The concern most people have is that despite all the good will indicated publicly that we were going to have a different kind of government now -- it would be an open government and there would be a real attempt this time to involve people -- the understanding, I suppose, was not clearly enough set down at the beginning when we listened to these overtures to involve people.
Really, what we had in mind as ordinary Members was to say,"Fine," you know, "It is wonderful to do something like this, because a lot of it I agree with personally. There is an awful lot I can agree with." The problem that we have is that when we agree to do something, there is always some kind of gap in understanding on what we have agreed on. I know from talking to people that I meet every day that our understanding was that, having got this document Strength at Two Levels, what would happen was that there would be an involvement of people to look at this piece of work and then decide what to do with it, and since that has not happened people now feel like outsiders. They say, "Well, what is going to happen is that the government will involve us when they have already taken the bike or the truck down the track so far that you are never going to take it anywhere else," because they have decided where they want to take it, and there is that feeling among Members that they really are only going to get involved when they can do no damage, when they can make no significant changes to anything.
Momentum For Change Must Be Built Early
I appreciate what the Government Leader is trying to do, because there are all kinds of evidence that unless you move and get something done, and get it done early on and build some momentum and some energy, and so on, it is very, very difficult to accomplish change. But if you will accept that, will accept that is what you have to do -- you have to move on something; you cannot wait forever -- but what has happened now is that people have been given an understanding that they would be involved in a significant exercise, and the fear among the ordinary Members I have talked to is that this is just tokenism in the sense that, yes, we will agree, you know. We will go along with it, but we cannot involve people at the stage that is so critical that they may slow down the process. But I would argue that by not following through on the commitment, on the same understanding that the rest of us, had the government is in fact slowing up the process itself. We cannot be blamed for slowing the process up if the commitment is not made that from this document here we would be fully involved in determining the direction it should take. It has taken a life of its own, and now whatever we do will be seen as an afterthought.
In my opinion it was a mistake not to get all of the three people that were chosen by other Members right at the beginning so that they could examine this report, because once you have agreed on what you are going to do, then people who have a little bit of pride are not going to be satisfied with saying, "Well, you guys have decided, anyway, and all you want us to do is to go along now on the ride. The bus has left months ago, but you can come along and enjoy the scenery."
I am afraid a lot of people will not be satisfied with that, because once you have decided what you are going to do, how you are going to do it, and so on, then that really becomes an administration job. As politicians we are interested in policy. What is the policy? What is the program? What is the direction? What is the shape?
You have already developed a second document dealing with the shape. You are going to reshape something, and you are going to decide what the shape is going to be without any input from any Member on this side. There were some very willing people here who would have been quite happy to have helped to take a document like this and to put it into a form where we know what the shape is going to look like. Then you would have some willing, co-operative people who would have been part of the process, would have a sense of ownership, and would want to go with you for the rest of the ride. But they do not have any sense of ownership in the program, the process, the reshaping, or anything, and the fear is that you are going to bring them in too late and there is going to be a loss of dignity among those people who feel that they are an afterthought. Those are my opening comments, Mr. Chairman.