Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have been receiving a lot of concerns over the last couple of weeks in regard to purchasing land in the Mackenzie Delta. The homeowners in my constituency have been leasing property for their homes for many years now. This costs in the area of thousands, if not millions of dollars of rent for property that they have been occupying for their houses. The Gwich'in Inuvialuit have traditionally lived on and been there from time immemorial.
Initially it was the Federal Government's responsibility for paying the property taxes on behalf of Aboriginal people occupying Federal lands. Now that land claim agreements are in place, my constituents are still paying for land through leases only worth a couple of thousand dollars. I have recently been informed by the Minister, Municipal and Community Affairs in regard to this. The Minister openly admits that pricing is not for the land, but capital improvements. How much capital improvements are suppose to continue? As taxpayers, my constituency do not deem it necessary to pay full time engineers, surveyors, project officers, et cetera. to design gravel roads with a 30 km speed limit. The government has been running ineffectively for the past number of years, yet, the constituency continues to pay for leases of property for this inefficiency.
My constituents have been waiting since May for a reply as to why they cannot outright purchase the land their homes have been sitting on for decades. We will have a question for the Minister on this. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.