Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question will be for the Premier responsible for the Personnel Secretariat. As I mentioned the other day, it has come to my attention that those of our civil servants who are working on the P3 projects are asked to sign a confidential agreement. The purpose, apparently, for the necessity for this agreement is simply to emphasize the necessity and importance of secrecy. As I mentioned the other day, the civil servants already signed an oath of secrecy. My question is, does the Premier agree that employees should now be required to sign a second oath of secrecy and one specifically related to the P3 initiative? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to return to oral questions.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the Members for unanimous consent to return to this item. Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the honourable Mr. Kakfwi, Minister of Wildlife. Mr. Speaker, my question is in relation to wildlife officers and in particular, the visibility of these officers in specific areas where they operate. Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Minister if wildlife officers have a requirement to do scheduled patrols in their specific areas? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I believe that each region plans with the wildlife officers within the region a schedule of activities, taking into account the type of activities and requirements that are perceived to be needed and how their roles and responsibilities would require them to travel and be present in

certain parts of their jurisdiction in different parts of the year. That is what I understand. There are patrols made and visits, trips made out on the land at different parts of the year. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I thank the Minister for that response. I understand that officers are required to do specific patrols at specific times of the year. My question is, I presume then, that specific times of the year would include harvesting times of caribou, for instance. Mr. Speaker, part of my question is that I believe visibility of officers at specific times of the year, particularly during heavy harvesting times would encourage good hunting practices. Therefore, I ask the Minister, would, in fact, this apply to harvesting of caribou?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, last fall, following some questions from the Member, I had given indications to the Inuvik regional office of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development to assure me that this fall they would make some effort to make sure they paid some attention, demonstrated presence and some monitoring capacity, during the caribou hunting season in that area to ensure that the government presence was felt and acknowledged, to ensure that there was no wastage of meat, and that good hunting and harvesting practices were adhered to. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it is obvious that in order for these wildlife officers to do their job and be visible out in the land, they have to have the proper equipment. My second supplementary, Mr. Speaker, is in regard to are the wildlife officers supplied with proper equipment to go out on the land and make themselves visible and do their job? Mr. Speaker, I ask this question in relation to the fact that wildlife equipment in Tuktoyaktuk last fall was heavily vandalized to the extent that some of it is no longer useful. I am not sure whether the officer has the equipment any more to actually go out on the land and do his job. I would like the Minister to confirm to the House that the officers, in fact, have the equipment to do the job. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I will give assurance to the Member that the wildlife officer will have the necessary equipment to carry out their job in that particular jurisdiction, and if they do not, then we shall try to move quickly to make sure they have the equipment that he says was damaged and vandalized last year. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Minister of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development in regard to a letter I wrote to the Minister regarding a tourism development officer position for the Mackenzie Delta. I think it is crucial that Mackenzie Delta gets their own tourism development officer because I feel that the individual we have in place at the present time is stretched to the limit where she has to cover some 13 communities in an area, especially in the Western Territory, which covers almost half the geographical area of the new Western Territory. It is not fair to that individual to try to do an adequate job with the resources she has, but also trying to do a sufficient job to serve all the residents of the Nunakput region, the Mackenzie Delta region, the Sahtu region, where she covers three jurisdictional areas, I think for her to do an adequate job, especially for the amount of traffic we do get in the Mackenzie Delta region. I would like to ask the Minister, has he taken into account the area that this individual has to cover and also the number of communities she has to serve?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Members will remember that in the amalgamation of the Department of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development from the previous three independent departments there was a considerable reduction in the budget. There was a total cut of something like $10 million, in fact, originally we were asked to cut $5 million, then we got an additional cut of $5 million after that. We reduced the number of staff that we had, mostly at the headquarters level, but what this resulted in is a smaller department with less resources to carry out the functions and the duties that we have set out.

Having said that, we have also continued to devolve and transfer the economic development officer positions from the regions to the communities, and from the community level of the department to specific agencies or organizations at the community level through community transfer initiatives. What we have is limited staff positions now within the department to carry out these economic development support functions, both at the Yellowknife level and also at the regional level. To look at transferring an existing position from the department to say, for instance, the Gwich'in Tribal Council at this time, is difficult to carry out. We have the Inuvialuit who would also be requiring such assistance, as well as a number of other organizations throughout the Northwest Territories, and we are unable to comply with such a request at this time. Thank you.