Mr. Speaker, this year the Department of Transportation will spend over $17 million to complete a large number of needed improvements to our highways. The department tries to find the proper balance between improving safety and level of service and extending the life of the system. At the same time, creating business, employment training and job opportunities for Northerners is a priority.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to present a brief summary of the larger jobs the department has undertaken. In the South Slave area, construction on the replacement of the West Channel bridge in Hay River will begin later this fall. The project is scheduled for completion in the new fiscal year. The department has completed 33 kilometres of chipseal overlay on the Mackenzie Highway north of the Alberta-NWT Border and a 10 kilometre chipseal overlay on Highway 5 near Buffalo Junction.

In the North Slave area, reconstruction and paving of Highway 3 between Rae-Edzo and Yellowknife began this year. Two projects will result in very noticeable improvements to 17 of the last 90 kilometres of this highway. At the Rae-Edzo end, safety will be enhanced by improving the grade and reducing the number of curves in a 12.5 kilometre section of the highway from 24 to six. This section of the road will be open to traffic by the end of this year's construction season. Application of a chipseal surface will complete this project next summer. At the Yellowknife end of Highway 3, a project to rebuild and pave 4.5 kilometres near the airport will be finished in the next few weeks. Finally, a major safety improvement to a short section of the Ingraham Trail with one of the highest accident occurrence rates on the highway system is underway. The project will be complete this year and will reduce the steepness of the grade and replace the three existing curves on the 2.5 kilometre section with a single, less severe, curve.

In the Sahtu, area, winter road improvements will continue this year. Permanent bridges will be complete at Canyon and Vermillion Creeks and a new bridge started at the Ochre River. A number of grade improvements will also be completed this winter in continuing efforts to extend the operating window of this important transportation connection to Sahtu communities.

In the Mackenzie Delta, the Dempster Highway celebrated its 20th Anniversary on August 18. A new gravel surface was applied to 34 kilometres of the highway between the Yukon boarder and the Peal River, and, 35 kilometres of the highway between Fort McPherson and Tsiigehtchic were reconstructed and widened. The amount of dust free surface on the Dempster Highway increased from 30 to 106 kilometres. Mr. Speaker, I drove this highway from Inuvik to Eagle Plains last weekend and I am proud to say that the condition of the Dempster Highway in the NWT is now considerably better than that in the Yukon.

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Mr. Speaker, our job is not done. In fact, we have a long ways to go. Our transportation goals can only be achieved if new money is found to invest in transportation infrastructure. It is with that in mind, Mr. Speaker, that I look forward to attending a meeting of all of Canada's Transportation Minister's at the end of September. While there, I will continue to lobby hard for the federal government to commit, in its next budget, long term funding for a national highway system. I will also call for an equitable method of allocating federal funding to smaller jurisdictions such as the Northwest Territories.

Mr. Speaker, I want to assure the Members today that the Department of Transportation takes its responsibility for the safety of the highway system very seriously. While the department may not have the resources to do all of the work that we would like it to do, or to do the work as quickly as the travelling public might wish, we are making significant progress. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

--Applause