Thank you, Madam Chairperson. There are different agencies that are involved in the search and rescue responsibilities. I have already stated the fact that MACA's role is to provide training and the other things that I have said. There is also the RCMP. The RCMP is the first public agency to be contacted to start a search. We all know that the community on their own, as Mr. Evaloarjuk said, starts a search because they go ahead and organize themselves. There is also the Canadian Forces whose primary responsibility is for air search and rescue and marine responses on coastal waters. I will ask my deputy minister to elaborate on this as she knows more about this with the details. Thank you, Madam Chairperson.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. Madam Chairperson, as the Minister has indicated, there are a number of agencies who work together when there is a search and rescue situation in effect in a community. The other group that is worth mentioning are the Rangers which I think the Member has also alluded to. The Rangers can also be used for search and rescue. There is a formal arrangement that is established in the Department of National Defence policy for military assistance to civil authorities. It is under that National Defence policy that Rangers assistance can be accessed for search and rescues.

There are local search and rescue committees established in many communities which include representatives of all of these groups. Our role, again, is to provide training for those local teams and to establish search and rescue as a component of their local emergency response plan. It is very much the local search and rescue committees that would make decisions about what should happen in a search and rescue situation. MACA's role would be to provide any additional assistance or perhaps help with coordination, for example, in terms of contacting the Department of National Defence on behalf of a local search and rescue committee that required some additional assistance or contacting the coast guard or Canadian Forces if there was a rescue for air search and rescue on coastal waters.

The role we play is one of training support and then coordination in an actual situation. Thank you, Madam Chairperson.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. The regional superintendents in each region are the point of contact for this. We do have a senior staff at the territorial level who does all the training. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. My question is in regard to an issue that was raised yesterday by Mr. Miltenberger and also by Mr. Henry a while back. Madam Chairperson, every week it seems we hear about some adventurer who is doing something more ridiculous than the next person trying to break records and what not: going to the North Pole by bicycle, up the Mackenzie River in a rubber raft, hot air balloons trying to travel around the world or sail boat racers going around one ocean to the next. It seems to me they have absolutely no regard for which country or which jurisdiction has to pay to save them when they get lost or something happens. Yesterday the response to Mr. Miltenberger's question was that we do not make people post

bonds if they are trying to reach the North Pole or anything like that.

I believe it does not matter who winds up searching for these people, whether it is the RCMP, the Armed Forces, community people or the Rangers; it is we, as tax payers in general, who are paying for this. It is time for the people like this to start paying their own way. I would ask whether the Minister would undertake to again contact RWED and the Department of Justice and attempt to ensure that some type of bond or something is put in place so that people who take unnecessary risks like this have to actually pay for their own emergency services and getting rescued.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. Actually, this has been brought forward to me orally by the elders when I was visiting the High Arctic because that is where all these tourists go to or people trying to get to the North Pole. I have heard comments made by our elders and also skilled hunters saying that we are having problems with our young people who do not have enough skills, getting lost on the land. Now we have these people coming up with ski suits and stuff, trying to get to the North Pole. I will definitely work with the other two departments to try to deal with this issue. It is becoming a problem, but we do not want to stop these people. I understand what the Member is saying. We want to promote tourism into our communities and into our areas because it is a beautiful country. This concern has already been brought forward orally in the communities. Thank you, Madam Chairperson.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. Obviously, we would not want to detract from our tourism industry. It is a very young industry. It does employ a lot of people and bring a lot of dollars to the north, but I believe we have to ensure that there are not people out there who are taking unnecessary risks and not ensuring that they take some responsibility for their actions. With that, Madam Chairperson, I have no other questions, but I just wanted to make that point. Of course, we do not want to detract from our tourism industry but to ensure that people who are taking unnecessary risks are actually taking responsibility. Thank you.

Yes, thank you, Madam Chairperson. In relation to what Mark Evaloarjuk, my colleague, my friend and Mr. Steen were referring to, the 24-hour wait, which I think was initially introduced down south, not in the north of 60 area. Our environment is much different. We have no highways in this area. We have no trees whereby we can find a shelter or use wood for fuel and so on. There are times down south where people may wander off in the city and not report home that they are out somewhere or there are times where people run away down south. However, in the Arctic, in a small community there is no place to run away to except the tundra. When a person files a missing person report in a small community, we have to ensure that person is taken seriously by the community as always, by the RCMP, by other parties in the area of search and rescue.

It is time to introduce a new search and rescue program in north of 60. When a person files a missing person report, we all know that person is serious. When a person goes out, there are times when people talk about a buddy system, two snow machines going out together. The hunter who is going out reports or tells a family member or a friend, or anyone for that matter in the community which direction that person is going, indicating at what time that person is coming back. We all know, as Mr. Steen indicated, that when we wait for half a day, we only have two or three hours of daylight in the dead of winter, December, January and February. We should start looking very seriously at introducing the kind of search and rescue program that is tailored to this part of this country because initially what we go by now, according to RCMP, is the program that was introduced down south, not in the north. We need a search and rescue program made in the north, for the north. Will the Minister talk to her colleague, in this case the Minister for Justice, about the possibility of introducing a new way of doing things. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. I would like to thank the Member for his suggestions and I will be looking into it. We all know that young people need skills and they have to be educated. That is part of the training we do, educate the public. One of the suggestions that was made by my father, who is unilingual, an 80-year old hunter, he suggested, and this is something that I will be looking to do, is to develop courses on the GPS, Global Positioning System, because there have been cases already where the young people not knowing the land, come home after they have been searched for, by using the little gadget and walking into town, but there are so few of them that know this. It is a very technical computer gadget that if it is learned, anybody can find their way home. These are some suggestions that have come forward. I just have not had a chance to talk to my department yet on that, but we will do what the Member is suggesting. Thank you, Madam Chairperson.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. What does need education in this area is the system that provides training and search and rescue, having public in the community level educated in the precautions they have to take. Secondly, Madam Chairperson, if a person depends upon GPS for travel,

technology I do not know in the tundra, a man-made gadget, there could be something wrong with that thing, regardless of new technology; we have to ensure that we have search and rescue made by the communities, by this jurisdiction and for this jurisdiction, for the communities. That is what I was saying. Thank you, Madam Chairperson.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. Yes, I understand where the Member is coming from, but what I am saying is that we can use the technology today and blend the two cultures together to make something effective that the young people understand. Most of these young people who are coming can use technology today. I will take the suggestion from the Member and deal with it. Thank you.

Thank you, I thank the honourable Minister for that. In my area, we have what we would call, a group of people who are capable, competent in looking for a lost person in the tundra, a community rescue committee. I do not know who funded this organization or group of people, but I am wondering if the Minister is aware of what we call a community rescue committee. If yes, who provides funding for this body because this body needs funding in order to have gasoline and other provisions in the event of search and rescue in the tundra. Thank you.