Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Justice. Mr. Speaker, on Monday, March 6th, in reply to a question by Mr. Lewis, the Minister of Justice said that the government had to visit the question as to whether the state is responsible for victims of crime. He indicated that that was a very difficult philosophical question to address. The question was whether or not, at the time he made that response to Mr. Lewis, he was aware that the previous Minister of Justice had signed, on behalf of the Government of the Northwest Territories, the statements of basic principles of justice for victims of crime.

Mr. Speaker, I was aware of that agreement. I was also aware that the federal government has entered into a great number of agreements, that they have long since left the scene, and have left this government holding the bag. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I am aware that the federal government is backing away from many of its obligations. And, as I said in my Member's statement today, I think that it is inexcusable, but I don't think that it is any excuse for this government to back away from its responsibilities. Just a supplementary to the same Minister, does this now indicate that the government is considering backing away from these basic principles that the government had previously signed?

Mr. Speaker, in the social envelope where Ministers of certain departments are involved in social issues and are committed to the community wellness strategy, there is a commitment to discuss issues like this with, for instance, the Minister of Health and Social Services, in deciding what are the priorities of the community in partnership with the communities and the social action oriented organizations that we are in consultation with, in order to set the stage on where the very rapidly dwindling resources of this government should go in the future.

We have lots of principles that we believe in. Members know that we are all committed 100 per cent to the principle of aboriginal languages and we have, after years of wrangling on it, decided to put it to legislation, making financial commitments. Even those principles are being eroded at this time by the federal government reducing their financial commitments to them. In the face of those, I have to tell the Member that all commitments made by this government will have to be reviewed, because I do not believe that we can live up to all the principle we laid before ourselves. We will be barely able, in the foreseeable future, to live up to commitments we have set ourselves in legislation and have committed to live up to. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I find it troubling that it would appear that all of our principles might be subject to question. I guess, for clarity's sake, there is one that I would like to know about for certain, and that is, Mr. Speaker, could the Minister advise if the government will also be re-examining our commitment to the principle of zero tolerance for violence.

Mr. Speaker, it has always been my view that the first and most fundamental initiative that we have taken with zero tolerance is the verbal, personal commitment made by each of us individually as elected official, as elected leaders, as people set in responsibility by the public -- that means every mayor, every counsellor in this territory, it means every chief, every band counsellor, every Metis leader, every president of a metis local and all the members, it means every elected person -- as this country should make the commitment. Once we have that basic tenet, we know by nature that a great number of offences will begin to drop, as the size of the public that have made the commitment starts to grow.

We have to build on that. It is up to the community organizations, the women's groups, the advocate groups, to tell us the community wellness strategy, where the priorities are in placing the dwindling available funds to do work in a social front, which includes the commitments we will make to zero tolerance. We have increasingly less money to do the work and it's up to this government, in partnership with these groups, to decide where our scarce dollars should go. Thank you.