Thank you, Madam Chair. I am likely repeating some of the areas Mr. Steen has touched base on, but they are important areas. One area that I am very concerned about is the need for job creation. We have been very, very fortunate here to have the diamond activity at a time when there is tremendous down-turn in the economies, not of our own creation, but just the circumstances we are in. It is really a great godsend to us that we have had the exploration work and the diamond activity -- yes, it is only in the west - but I see some activity starting to happen over in the Keewatin in the exploration end and on the arctic islands as well.

As we know, we need to kick start jobs and we have always struggled traditionally trying to do it through tourism and some of the other areas such as forestry, fisheries, and so forth. Yes, they are extremely important and we need to have programs for those areas, but in general terms, mining can be a big salvation for us all. It can provide a multitude of jobs. As we all know, the construction is 1,000 people of which a lot are northerners, and the operational phase is 600 initially and 800 when fully operational. There are spin-off jobs from that of an equal amount, hopefully.

The area I am concerned about, though, is the regulatory process and the environment in which we are trying to attract mining. I think that is important because it relates to solving some of our problems. Yes, I understand we have to do it in the right way, but we also are sitting here saying we have to solve our social problems. We have no mechanism to do that by because the only way we can get more money is by having people work. The federal government, as we know, is going to continue to downsize the amount of money we are getting from them.

I am very concerned that we address the whole issue of the approval process. We cannot make it impossible for mines to establish. For example, had this been a mine that was not as lucrative as diamond mining, I do not think we would have a mine if the same regulatory process and approval process had been followed. It cost $100 million upwards and time devotion by the mining people to get to this stage. We are fortunate, certainly in the diamond area, it is that lucrative. We need to encourage that. Had this been the Drybones Bay where the diamonds are, perhaps, not as many in a pipe or, perhaps, not of the same value, we could still possibly have a mine there, but they could never get through this whole process.

I am glad to see the Premier address the fact that they want to concentrate on three initiatives. I, personally, am getting to be of the opinion that there are way too many programs that this government is tackling, some of self-creation such as community empowerment. I am not sure that has a lot of financial benefit at this particular time. It is a well meaning idea, but it is making us concentrate on a program at a time when we have some very important areas like job creation, like social problems, like division on our table. It is important to, perhaps, put some of those on the back burner.

Just going back to the need for job creation, the road to resources idea is very good if we could get X number of dollars to start building some roads to the communities -- from here to Coppermine, yes, I understand it has to be approved with the people that own that land and have an inherent right on that land. That all is very good because it provides job creation and, at the same time, it opens up the territory for potential mineral development along the way.

Those are my main comments, Madam Chair.