Thank you, Madam Chairperson. Madam Chairperson, I will direct my general comments to a couple of items that I will expand on when we reach the program summary of the particular activities. Specifically, I would like to address the question of interpreters provided by the Legislative Assembly in this building and the service they provide us as Members. Madam Chairperson, I am not sure whether the government has really addressed the situation on the question of if, in fact, we are benefiting from contracting out our requirement for interpreters. To some degree the question is going to have to be answered as to what happens to some of these interpreters, in particular those Inuktitut interpreters when division comes. Are they going to have an opportunity to move on to Nunavut? I do not see the west being in a situation where we would require them although, there is going to be a need for interpreters for the different languages that are left in the west. In particular, I am talking about the interpreters that translate for the Nunavut MLAs at this time.
The other question I will be addressing is constituency assistants' salaries. Madam Chairperson, as we attempted to point out in the past to the Management and Services Board, as a Member who has four separate communities to administer and represent, it is very hard. I do not think it is realistic to expect the Member to divide this particular one into four separate pieces so that every community has a representative that I could contact. I do not think there would be enough money left after dividing it into four. In fact, five is what is required because of the time spent in Yellowknife, that there is enough funding there to actually allow a Member to act and to operate efficiently. By comparison, Madam Chairperson, communities that have or Members that have only one specific community to represent, it is very easy to, from my perspective anyway, be able to attend meetings and functions within that particular community which is, in fact, your overall responsibility right there in one particular community of the riding. Therefore, there is an advantage to some degree where Members represent only one community. Mind you, the communities are larger but in a sense you can be available to attend meetings or have your assistant attend the meetings in your absence. By comparison, it would seem that you could use the whole salary for one constituency assistant. I do not think we have been very successful in the past in addressing this particular issue and it does not just apply to my ridings. There are many ridings that represent more than one community. I feel this particular shortage should have been addressed at some point. Even if you take constituency assistants' salaries as a whole and apply it to one individual, they are not paid very much in comparison to the amount of services that are required of them. I will be bringing up those particular concerns, Madam Chairperson, when we reach the activity summary of the Office of the Clerk. Thank you.