Thank you, Mr. Speaker. During one discussion I had yesterday with a journalist, I said, if I dropped 100 wolves in Toronto tonight, by tomorrow morning they would all be killed because they would no longer be seen as beautiful wild animals. They would be seen as dangerous pests that must be destroyed because of public concern. There is a double standard that happens every time issues like this gets out of control. I consider the Globe and Mail issue to be incredibly biased. The fact is, there are 700,000 caribou in that area. There is in mainland Northwest Territories, not including the Arctic Islands, not including the wolf population within the treeline, between 9,000 and 10,000 wolves. The healthier the caribou herds are, and we have very healthy caribou herds, the population of wolves will always be healthy. The better we manage our caribou, the more wolves there will be. That is the way these things should be portrayed. The number of wolves that are harvested every year is about between 900 and 1,200 commercially sold to auctions down south. The fact is, there are thousands and thousands of people down south wearing leather belts, shoes, and coats. The only difference is, we do not cut the fur off. That is the only difference. People have a very hypocritical approach to issues like this. When they see fur, they are very quick to rise and condemn people who wear fur. They do not realize that the leather coats, leather belts and leather shoes they are wearing are the same thing as the skin of animals with the fur cut off. Thank you.

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Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Our resources are limited. We do have an ongoing dialogue with the Canadian government and other provinces, people who are interested and supportive of the fur industry to continue to make sure that people are aware of the enormous implications, particularly to northern people, aboriginal people, who do not have the option to be vegetarians, farmers or the option to look for jobs in other industries. There is a real issue here that people's traditional economies must be respected. You can take for granted the majority of southern people are ignorant of realities of life in the Northwest Territories and in the Arctic. There is a real need to educate, to have some ongoing dialogues and to continue to fight the animal rights activists and over-zealous enthusiasts who have very little information and an overabundance of self-righteousness. Thank you.

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Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I did speak with the writer from the Globe and Mail. After she wrote the article, she called up to ask me what I thought of the article and did I have a response? I thought it was a bit biased and unfair. If she had some commitment to try and keep a balanced approach, she would have called before the article went to print. We are in the mode of some damage control and I did not appreciate that very well and I told her in very blunt terms yesterday. There were a great many things said, all very blunt but civil. I do not know if she will print it since she was at the receiving end of most of the things that I had to say yesterday about this issue, but I do hope she recovers and prints it the way I told her because it would be a balanced article. It would be a full article that would provide an insight into the north and the reality here in the Northwest Territories, and get people to realize the hypocrisy with which they approach many of these issues from their southern point of view. Thank you.

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Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the information I have been given of the ten major leaseholders in this city is that, almost all of them, live down south, the owners of those lease facilities. Therefore, there is no benefit to northerners. These people might own the buildings but they actually live down south. That is part of my point, Mr. Speaker, is to ensure that people who live in the north benefit from contracts from this government. The Minister will assure that this is taken into consideration? Thank you.