Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just a few comments on that. I certainly recognize the Member's concern with respect to the Plebiscite Act in comparison to the Legislative Assembly Act in the way the question could be put forth. It's not that the process is difficult, from my understanding.
There could be many things done. I mean, we could simply amend the Plebiscite Act within the next couple of weeks to make it consistent with the Elections Act, and I believe it's a small amendment, so it's not too hard to do.
But, Mr. Chairman, one thing I want to bring forth is that it states in the committee report, "talked about extensively in all regions". Although talked about extensively in all regions, the raising of the legal drinking age was not supported by the witnesses who appeared before the standing committee. I believe that there were quite a few. I read many of the reports on the public hearings, and there were comments alluding to supporting raising the drinking age, and I believe the best and fairest approach to it would be to allow the people to decide. That's why I feel that the cheapest, most cost-effective and economical way would be to look at the form of a plebiscite, a question, along with your ballot for election.
With regard to saying that this responsibility is going to be given a little bit more to the Executive Council, we are recommending that they look at this and see if there's a way that it can be done. I find that this issue comes up time and time again, and I think it's something that the new Assembly, because they are going to be looking at rewriting liquor laws in the next Assembly after spending extensive consultation throughout the Northwest Territories over the past year, are going to look at what they should put in the new liquor laws. I think that, in order to address that, this is one way of giving them a direction.
This committee report is very vague. With all due respect, there are no recommendations. It's basically a report on the report that the government presented. I find that I was somewhat disappointed in reading that report because it was really vague in giving direction to the government. What do we want in our liquor laws that we want developed? We have an archaic liquor law system. How do we want to shape it? This is a form of shaping it. We sit here every day, and many times when we sit here we always say that the biggest problem in the Northwest Territories is alcohol and drug abuse. Until we, as leaders, offer some guidance as to how we are going to deal with alcohol, then I can't see it getting any better.
I mean, sure, a few campaigns do provide public education. It's something that we've got to deal with. But at the same time, I think that if we want to change laws which will affect people then I believe that we have to certainly go out and ask the people if they want the laws changed. I think that this is the fairest, most effective, cheapest way of finding out whether or not the people of the Northwest Territories want to raise the drinking age legally from 19 to 21.
So with that, Mr. Chairman, I certainly hope that Members take that into consideration when they vote on this motion, not placing MLAs in the position of having to make a decision on something like this, that it's the people of the Northwest Territories that will decide this, and the easiest way to decide this is to see a plebiscite question during the territorial election. Thank you.