Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Could the Minister indicate whether it was necessary or is necessary to have the concurrence of the Interim Commissioner for these longer term commitments? Has that been obtained? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is for Minister Kakfwi, Minister of RWED, in regard to diamonds. Sometime ago the territorial government initiated meetings with the federal Minister of Finance and the federal Minister of DIAND. The results of those meetings were the formation of a diamond task force. I wonder if the Minister could bring us up-to-date as to what is happening on the part of that task force in regard to advancing a diamond sorting, valuating facility here in Yellowknife? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, the task force had a meeting planned for the latter part of, I believe January 9th in Ottawa, which is the time the ice storm had just occurred in the Ottawa/Montreal area. Consequently, the members of the task force, I believe, were not able to convene a meeting. In any case, we have expressed our disappointment with the federal Ministers because the task force has had at least from the federal side, the federal officials who were assigned to this task force appeared to have had their full brakes on as far as trying to expedite any business that should have taken place by the task force. We had originally agreed with Minister Martin, Minister Jane Stewart, to have an interim report to Ministers, that is Minister Todd and myself, to Minister Martin and Stewart by the middle of December, an initial report from this task force. Unfortunately, some of the federal officials decided that it was not a high priority and found reasons to reschedule meetings and basically slowed down any attempts to convene with some quick successive meetings to carry on the business that the task force was set up to do. It has been disappointing. We had hoped that some value will come of the task force and the reasons that we originally asked for it to be set up. The deputy minister, Joe Handley, is on tour with the Premier right now in South America and will be back on Saturday. I expect to meet with him to discuss the merits of continuing with this task force and exactly how much resources we should put to it, considering that federal members of the task force have indicated they thought an interim report of the task force was not possible at least until mid-March at the earliest. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Ministers had an opportunity to meet with the Minister of Northern Affairs, yesterday, and I wonder if the Minister was able to put forward to the Minister, the disappointment of this government in the task force if they emphasized the need to address this issue on an urgent basis? Time is shooting away on us and we have to address this very, very quickly. I wonder if the Minister could tell us whether he was able to be emphatic with the Minister about this issue? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Cabinet met with Minister Jane Stewart, yesterday morning. We had a very brief time. Diamonds, specifically was not on the agenda. We used up the time available to us to speak about the Royal Commission report, the issue of division, the difficulties and some of the issues outstanding in regard to division. I spoke generically about the importance of the mining industry, the mining sector to the economy of the north and to Yellowknife, in particular. I suggested to her that as Minister responsible for Minerals, Lands and Waters in the Northwest Territories that she has a direct obligation to do something specifically, to assist existing operating mines to continue to operate during what we hope is a short-term drop in the price of gold. We did not engage in the issue of diamonds since it is contentious and the federal government has yet to make decisions. Actually, nothing much has changed since the last couple of months and so we have decided not to raise the issue since it would not be of any immediate consequence to us. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Yellowknife Diamond Task Force had difficulty arranging a meeting with the Minister on this particular subject. They encountered extreme difficulties in trying to arrange some time with her. I am not sure whether they succeeded. This is an important issue to us all here in the north. She is in charge of resource development. Would the Minister tells us if he and his counterparts will seek another meeting with his federal counterparts to address this important issue? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, it is our intention to continue working as much as we can with the federal government and with BHP to ensure that two things happen. One, a valuation facility, a sorting facility be located off-site in one of the communities in the Northwest Territories. We hope to resolve that one way or the other and get a clear definitive answer within the next month. Secondly, we have indicated that we would like to be assured that the private sector should have assurances that they can have access to rough diamonds here in the Northwest Territories which give us an opportunity to look at and explore the options of developing diamond cutting and the manufacturing industry. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It seems that there is a tremendously good cooperative process between the Minister and industry. I wonder if he could tell us, and he mentioned that he hopes to have some indication of what will happen by month end, I believe, could he tell us if he will address this whole issue with the Minister of Northern Affairs in the next short while, say the next 60 days? Because there is another diamond mine coming on stream, we need to address this issue, Mr. Speaker. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, all the different options for continued lobbying and action will be considered by this government. The Premier will be back, as I say, on Saturday. It is my intention to request that Cabinet consider a course of action over the next month or so that should conclude our efforts of over the last two years to come up with some definite answers to the two objectives that I outlined earlier. Thank you.