Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wrote my Members' statement about 5 o'clock this morning, I had my lap top there and I must admit it was a lot more interesting then. I have amended it somewhat.
I was elected by and am accountable to the people of Hay River/Enterprise and the Corridor. In turn, on behalf of my constituents, along with my colleagues, elected a Premier and Cabinet who are accountable to the Ordinary Members and the people of the Northwest Territories.
Yesterday, in the Premier's Sessional Address we heard much about working together with the ordinary members, then much discussion took place in committees as a whole about the changes to the capital budget. We were told by more than one member of Cabinet that, perhaps, communication was faulty and was not what it should have been with the Ordinary MLAs, but "we are very busy, we need to let managers manage, and they won't have their hands tied."
Mr. Speaker, I submit to you that a member of this house finding out on the street, after the fact, that a significant project in their community has been deleted from the capital budget is worse than faulty communication. I would remind the members of Cabinet in FMB that each and every member of this House got here by winning the confidence and respect of their communities and constituents and is entitled to the respect of that position.
The new Members that were elected to this House a year ago who now constitute most of the Ordinary Members, gave up jobs, positions in their community and all the comforts of home, to come here and serve their own constituents in a meaningful way.
We may be new to this level of politics and we are on a fast learning curve, but, I assure you, we are not stupid. MLAs are not the community leaders, mayors, chiefs, that Minister Thompson referred to taking direction from yesterday. We are not the advisors to the Premier who sit on the panel on the economy and we are not a special interest group to be consulted with at the pleasure of Cabinet.
We are your peers, who respectfully chose you, the more experienced members to hold positions of departmental leadership. We are told continually that, in terms of involvement, we have far more input into decisions that we would have had in previous governments, and agreed, the capital budget is not a huge amount of this government's budget. However, I am more concerned with the fundamental principals of the role of ordinary members.
Mr. Speaker, seeking unanimous consent to conclude my statement.