Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, today I would like to report on the recent conference of elected community leaders held in Hay River to discuss the various self-government initiatives that are underway in the NWT.
Presentations to the conference outlined how constitutional development and aboriginal rights could result in new types of government at the community, regional, tribal and territorial levels. Conference delegates also heard about how self-government has been negotiated and implemented in Newfoundland, British Columbia, and the Yukon. The approaches taken by the Labrador Inuit, the Nisga'a Tribal Council in B.C., and Yukon First Nations were quite different from each other, and different from what is happening here.
The success of those different approaches demonstrates that while there is more than one way to implement self-government, we are all working towards the same thing. By working together we can bring more authority to our communities.
Mr. Speaker, self-government will also mean more powers and responsibility for aboriginal governments as the inherent right to self-government is implemented here in the Northwest Territories. This includes more control for aboriginal people over such things as education, health, social services, language and culture.
Conference delegates agreed that while these changes might make our system of governance look very different from the way it is now, most of the programs and services that are delivered in our communities today will still be needed tomorrow. Community governments will still have a big role to play in delivering them.
Mr. Speaker, the Premier, the Minister of Finance, and the Minister of RWED made presentations to the delegates. They outlined how the government's plan is to work with the Aboriginal Nations to advance aboriginal rights negotiations in all regions of the NWT and to work towards developing a new constitution.
Conference delegates were assured that as we engage in these processes, we will make sure that the result is an effective and workable system of government - a system that can deliver affordable programs to all residents. One of the priorities my department has set to make this happen is to bring proposals forward to make municipal programs work better, to be more effective, to be more efficient, and to bring more authority to the local level. To do this we are moving ahead with the municipal finance review and the municipal legislation review.
These two initiatives were also discussed at the Community Leaders' Conference. They should be seen as complementary to self-government and not as an alternative process. They are intended to provide more authority to community governments and to allow for more flexible, equitable, and transparent arrangements between the central government and community governments.
Mr. Speaker, while self-government may take those processes much further in some communities or regions, we will be moving ahead with legislative and financial reform, because the people want to have more authority at the local level. They want to have decisions made closer to home. They want to be making those decisions themselves.
At the end of the three days, delegates to the conference concluded that they need to be better informed as progress is made on the establishment of self-government authorities. Procedures need to be in place to provide this information and the department will attempt to address this issue. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.