Thank you for that explanation, Mr. Minister. I just want to say for the record that, according to statistics, a large majority of people who are in jails in the Northwest Territories are aboriginal people and the main reason they are in jail are for crimes related to misuse of alcohol and alcohol-related problems. Court documents in the communities are proof of this. The majority of the people who, as a result, are incarcerated are aboriginal people. We know that there are lots of social problems out there and, as a result, here in the Legislative Assembly we have passed legislation against societal violence.
Through the laws of this Legislature, we try to solve some of the problems in society and I'm sure people who are incarcerated are not all very bad people. In fact, I probably have a lot of relatives in there right now and so do a lot of people in here. Knowing these people, they have concerns and they would like to see some changes. They are part of society; they will always return to society after they do their time. This allows them to vote and they have an opportunity to vote for the people who will best serve them. Based on that, I have no reason to oppose this bill.
Like I said at the beginning of my comments, I will be supporting this bill and supporting the idea that inmates who are serving less than two years have the right to vote. Thank you.