Thank you, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to reply. It has been quite a while now since the opening address was delivered in this House and a lot of things have happened in this House during that item. I had a copy of it so I could read and respond to it specifically, but I seemed to have misplaced it among all the other papers that we accumulate here during a session.
A lot of things have happened and one of the things that I wanted to take this opportunity to do was to say a few words of thank you to former Commissioner Norris. I was in the former Legislature that selected Mr. Norris to be the first aboriginal Commissioner and was really pleased when he did get that nomination. I think I was pretty outspoken in insisting that Commissioners do come from the Northwest Territories. Charles Camsell was born in the Northwest Territories prior to Commissioner Norris' appointment, but that shouldn't have been the end of it. We had many good Commissioners after it and Commissioner Norris takes his place in history for the things he has done.
I think he made a valuable contribution to the Northwest Territories and I wish him well in the pursuits he will be undertaking. I wrote him a letter to say these things to him and to tell him that I wished him well in whatever ventures he pursues. Not only that, I look forward to working with him in other areas as our paths cross.
A couple of things I was involved with on behalf of the people of the Northwest Territories, not necessarily just Yellowknife and the people I represent -- and what is good for us is sometimes not always good for others and what is good for others doesn't always benefit us directly -- including my visits to Europe this past summer to assist the now Minister of Renewable Resources, the Honourable Silas Arngna'naaq in the lobby of the European parliament with relationship to their stand on Canadian furs and methods of trapping.
They had points, but not always well-informed points, as we found out when we were in places like Belgium, the Netherlands, and Denmark. Those countries, as an example, Madam Speaker, depend quite a lot on fur. In the Netherlands, for example, 15,000 jobs are associated with fur, with the raising of fur in the Netherlands. And that comes from an unusual source. A lot of the monies that are associated are subsidiaries to the fur industry. One of those is the fishermen. We are well aware that the Netherlands is on the coast and depends quite a lot on the ocean for the exportation of fish. They catch a lot of fish and they process these fish Not all the fish they catch are top quality -- tails, heads, fins, scales, and stuff are all sold to the fur industry to provide food for foxes and mink. Their reply to that when I asked what about the 15,000 people, fishermen for whom it's an extra income? They said they'll just have to find something else to do.
How asinine can an attitude be. That's a proper word; it's in the dictionary. Sorry, I won't use it again. How silly can they be, Madam Speaker, to fight Canadians by cutting off the importation of furs because of humaneness and they don't worry about how it affects our economy. They don't even worry about how it affects their economy. When you try to point these things out to them, they say well that's different. They kill half a million muskrats a year; we've pointed this out to them. What do they do with them? They burn them out of their dens, they drown them, they beat them with clubs, they use leghold traps.
But that's different, Madam Speaker, because over in the Netherlands, muskrats are pests. Over here they're not pests you know. They feel we treat our muskrats a little more humanely but, because the muskrat over there is a pest, they think they can do anything they want with the poor little critter. I explained to them that we eat muskrats, we eat beaver. They said oh, you can't possibly do that. Yes, we do. You see how ill-informed they are. The point I was trying to make is that European parliament is ill-informed with it comes to this particular issue of the fur lobby.
I understand that we have another Member going over shortly to continue this lobby and I hope that he comes back with information that yes, they've been able to reconsider their position. On the leghold traps, we pointed out to them that we are moving with great strides to a more humane method of trapping. For many years Canadians have been leaders in trying to develop a trap that was more humane. Connibear, for example, in the 30's was already developing the famous Connibear trap which is quick kill. If we draw the line between humaneness and the fact that we do have to take an animal's life in order to benefit from you know that we try to do that as humanely as possible. We've always done that but we make no bones about the fact that we do hunt, we do trap and we do this as part of our economy.
The economy of the north benefits some $12 million from the fur industry, as I started to say earlier on. Although it doesn't affect us directly in my riding, it did in the past. When I was growing up in Fort Smith, I recall the lifestyle that people had related to trapping. They would go out in the fall and stay there for many months catching furs and processing meat and stuff like that. A lot of pride went into that. That's gone now, Madam Speaker, in some parts and it's unfortunate because it's a lost way of life, it's a lost set of values, and it's contributing to some of the social problems that we do face here today. Life has changed greatly and those are some of the contributing factors to it. We try to point this out to the Europeans and they don't seem to want to listen.
Mining is the lifeblood of Yellowknife and it's nice to see over the past two years the upsurge in exploration in the mining industry that has put a lot of dollars back into our economy here; much-needed dollars. Mining dollars are new money. Money that's coming fresh and is circulated around the north through jobs and through the purchase of supplies, services, and equipment. The diamond industry, for example, here in Yellowknife has been quite beneficial to us in many ways. The lumber yards are preparing, just as an example, Madam Speaker, boxes to put core samples in to. I've seen truckloads and truckloads of those going out to the airport to be sent to the exploration areas; that all translates into jobs.
New gold discoveries have been made in the last few months here that are exciting. Miramar Con Mine, for example, has done some more exploration work in areas that they previously thought were unproductive. They have found good reserves there that would put a few more years to the life of that mine. Royal Oak has shown a profit this year, up substantially from previous years. It's good to see that Discovery Mine at Giauque, a little bit northeast of us here, a mine that was in operation in the 1950s and early 1960s, shut down because the cost of gold recovery was more than the value of the gold, $32 an ounce. It's gone up considerably now, Madam Speaker, so there's new works taking place there. It's good to see that that's going back into production.
The pursuit of those precious base metals still continues and that's good to see because, as I said, it's good for business and that's what keeps our economy going. As a result of it, the population of our city has increased dramatically and I'm proud to say that the riding that I represent has almost doubled in its size since the last boundaries review. Now it's time to look at that again to redistribute some of the population within the constituencies in the city. People have moved up here, built homes, moved their families here. It's put a strain on our schools. We have built a school in that area to take up the newcomers. It's almost filled to capacity already. New businesses have established themselves. Wal-Mart has moved in now to service the city and surrounding areas. I was there on Monday to the official opening of Wal-Mart and I said it was good to see that now Yellowknife has become the south where people always go to do their shopping. In the old days, people would get on a plane and fly south to Edmonton to do their shopping at some of the malls there. Well, I see now that some of the communities from the north are coming to the city here and not going as far as Edmonton any more. That's good for the north because the money stays here.
Sam Yurkiw, a well-known businessman in this community has expanded his business in our area. He's built an addition on to the car wash, a valuable part of our business. There's been two little businesses associated with that; a small corner store run by a couple and the gas station that goes along with it. It's amazing to see the amount of growth in our area.
One of the things that I have been pursuing in this House over the past year, Madam Speaker, on behalf of the Council for the Disabled and of the Canadian National Institute for the Blind, has been the introduction of a donor card on the back of driver's licences. I've pursued this matter now for a couple of years from previous Ministers and had I stayed as Minister of Transportation, it may have been accomplished by this time. I want to say that this is a an area that I want to continue to pursue. I think there are many misunderstandings about it. One of the things that I've found out is that it is a valuable and appreciated act by one human being to another. It's one way of saying that life is valuable and in the event that something happens to me, someone else can benefit from it. Eyes, for example, the operation is so easy to do. The operation that is required to remove the corneal lens can be done in this hospital contrary to what has been said. It is...