I would like to speak to my proposed amendment, Mr. Chairman. When the Standing Committee on Legislation examined this piece of legislation, what was being proposed was a rationalization of the structure of several parts of government. There was obviously a deep requirement that the Arctic College be constituted into two separate colleges. It seemed convenient at that time, since the decision had already been made to devolve the Science Institute, that a good place to put it would be one half in the east and one half in the west.
The problem that some of us had with this proposal was that at that time, it doesn't seem as if a decision was anything more than an administrative convenience simply to rationalize a decision that hadn't been carefully thought through.
The other issue was that when the Science Institute had been originally established, there was a strong feeling at the time that as we emerged politically, we needed some place, as an Assembly, where we could put some trust and faith in getting objective information about issues that emerged from time to time. The theme was so strong at that time that we saw fit to provide money and resources, so that we could establish a Science Institute with its own act.
There is no such justification in the proposed reorganization of the Science Institute. It is very difficult for some Members to even justify the money for it because it seems to have lost its focus. So the purpose of my amendment is to provide at least some way in which the original spirit and intent of establishing a Science Institute in the Northwest Territories, in a rapidly changing part of the world and where there is tremendous political activity, that we would still have some way in which we could get independent information on issues that matter to us.
I am the first to concede that this has not been an institute which has been boiling over with issues that we have referred to it over the years. But I remind Members that the Science Institute has in the past considered the issue of post-secondary education. It has examined the issue of alternative energy, during that time of crisis where we weren't quite sure about our self-sufficiency or supply. It has examined the issue of uranium mining and that is the one that stands out in my mind as the occasion when the Members really felt gratified and grateful that we had people who could help us to understand a very complicated issue. There was some work related to the trapping industry and I remember, more recently, the issue of preparing skins to make into leather for the leather trade.
Those are just a few examples; there are others that we referred to the Science Institute because we wanted to have this kind of objective information. The purpose of this amendment, Mr. Chairman, is to provide at least some comfort that this Legislature, that asked for this institute to help it many years ago, could still from time to time have the institute respond to requests to have something done. Since we would no longer have an act or control, I felt that the wording in the proposed government amendment wasn't strong enough. Because if it really isn't a creature of your own Legislature, then a request or some question doesn't have the same weight.
I compare this, to some degree, with the powers that we have retained, even though the agency is at arm's length from government. We have a Power Corporation, for example, that has its own board and its independence; however, the Minister still maintains the right to be able to tell that corporation what to do. I don't think that this particular clause goes beyond what we have got in some legislation that already exists to give us some comfort if we want something done.
I have never been too concerned about structure or how things are gong to be organized, but I really believe that it is important, when the time comes, that we can ask that some work be undertaken and undertaken in an objective fashion and isn't science for hire. We all heard from our days with the Mackenzie Valley pipeline inquiry how science really was for hire. You had people arguing both sides of the case. I never had much faith that we were getting a good picture of what that impact would be because the pipeline isn't built, it is there, and many of the predictions never came to happen.
So that is the purpose of the amendment, Mr. Chairman. I don't think it is a harmful one. It just means that this Legislature that saw fit to establish this institute, for very good reasons some time ago, should at least have some way in which it can ask it to do something, even in 1994. The wording the Minister has provided from the other act isn't strong enough, given the new administrative arrangements that he proposed to put into place. If this amendment fails, Mr.
Chairman, I have no further amendments. I have no further work that I would ask other Members to examine. Thank you.