Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you, colleagues. We have to break that cycle as leaders. I thought coming to this House, I was going to improve the life of the people in the communities I represent and not have to hear about a young friend of mine being buried at age 33, a young man who was a member of our band council, was involved in the community and was the radio operator at the airport, to see this young man on Friday and hear that he passed away on Sunday.

I ask for all of your support here today and the people across the north to hear this message: when are we going to change the lives of those people in the communities when it comes to alcohol and drugs which affect everybody in the community? We cannot continue to stand up and make statements every time an incident happens. We have to find a way to prevent these things from happening in our communities. I ask all my colleagues here today and the people out there in the other communities, we all have to work together to resolve this issue. It has affected me greatly in regard to issues I have been raising for the last three years and now have to stand up in this House and make this statement again.

Please, help those people that need the help the most, those people who are desperate, those people who are without jobs, without any hope in the communities of going anywhere because they are unemployed. They are on welfare. There is no hope of jobs being developed out there and they look at all the younger people whom we are putting through our school systems. What opportunity do we have to get a better life for them if there are no economic opportunities in our communities? We have to look at the communities as a part of an overall community of the Northwest Territories. We cannot look at one area where oh, there are diamonds in the ground, so let us go great guns over there. There is oil in the Beaufort; let us go crazy over there. Everything comes down to dollars and cents in this world, but what is the value of one person's life. With that, please, think about the people in those communities. Thank you.

--Applause