Thank you, Mr. Premier. Supplementary, Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I hope that by the status of this issue, the Premier was talking about the Giant Mine pension issue. Mr. Speaker, publicity is an important way to bring pressure to bear on the federal government. Will the Premier commit to raising the issue of the Giant Mine pensions again with the Minister responsible for DIAND? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. The honourable Premier, Mr. Kakfwi.

Yes, Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I will find a way to bring it again to the attention of the Minister and contact the office of our Member of Parliament as well, Ethel Blondin-Andrew.

Thank you, Mr. Premier. Supplementary, Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Premier's response. Mr. Speaker, on March 21st, the Premier said that this government will continue to urge the federal government to be vigilant on regulating private pension plans and amend its pension and labour legislation. Could the Premier tell us if this government followed through on this commitment, and if they have not, will they again commit to following through on it?

Thank you, Mr. Dent. The honourable Premier, Mr. Kakfwi.

Yes, we will continue to follow up on that commitment we have made. Thank you.

Item 6, oral questions. The honourable Member for Great Slave, Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Further to the Giant Mine issue, Mr. Speaker, I would like to pose a question to the Minister responsible for Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development. We have seen in the past few weeks the department's failure to live up to the Giant Mine clean-up fund. Just today, Mr. Speaker, the department has again pulled the rug out from under the northern program in its failure to live up to commitments to fund the Protected Areas Strategy. What impact will this cut have on our ability to sustain this very vital project? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The honourable Minister for Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, I heard Jim Moore, the assistant deputy minister for the Northern Affairs section of DIAND, on the radio this morning talking about the inability of that department to honour their commitments with regards to the Protected Areas Strategy. I understand that the amount was not $700,000 or $750,000, but actually about $350,000. That is of concern to us as a government, because we are also committed to implementing the Protected Areas Strategy. It does have an impact because we are doing this jointly, and DIAND has the largest share to carry.

That is of concern. It does mean that our share of the Protected Areas Strategy this year is about $220,000 plus a PY, and it raises a question of do we keep on going here without our partner being on-side with us? We have not had an EDA since 1996. That is of big concern to me. I heard David Nutter talking the week before about the slowdown and the lack of money on Giant Mine clean-up and Colomac clean-up. That is of big concern to us because, as Ms. Lee pointed out earlier, there are a lot of dollars worth of clean-up to be done there. These are big issues for us.

The pensioners' fund is another one. There is a whole list of things that DIAND has not lived up to their obligations on. It really does, Mr. Speaker, go to DIAND's ability to be able to do their job if they get a northern affairs section. I do not know if they have the capacity anymore, given the magnitude of the problems. Nor do they have the vision or the commitment to do this. I have serious concerns that DIAND, as the department responsible in the northern affairs program in particular, that the staff in there are not able to keep up with the growth and the opportunities here.

While we have Ministers and political leaders who are excited and very optimistic, I am not sure that the bureaucracy will be able to keep up. That is just another reason why we have to keep pushing away at each of these issues. We have to keep working together in terms of devolution. I do not see any other course except to keep hammering away and to negotiate all of these things, from EDA to protected areas, mine clean-up, pensioners funds, all of them. We just have to keep pushing away as Northerners. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Supplementary, Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I certainly support the Minister's objective of hammering away on these, but it does seem to illustrate something, and I am wondering if the Minister would agree that what we have here is a rather unsettling trend that is going on in Ottawa in regard to some fairly substantive programs. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. The honourable Minister responsible for Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am not sure if it is a trend, but certainly I think it is an indication that within the bureaucracy in Ottawa, they have not yet realized the magnitude of the opportunities in front of us here. They have not geared up their department to be able to meet these. I do not know if it is a trend, but it is certainly a situation that is not a good sign for us. I think it is again, all the more reason why we have to work to make sure that Northerners are making those decisions, not some individuals working in Ottawa. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Supplementary, Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. At least the two programs that we are looking at here, the Giant Mine legacy and the clean-up and the Protected Areas Strategy and the miners' pension situation. These are substantive issues that have been on the books for a long time. I am very concerned that the federal government is losing ground. What steps can the Minister take to bring concerted pressure on Ottawa to live up to, as I say, some very substantive and long-living problems?

Thank you, Mr. Braden. The honourable Minister for Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think, looking at the big picture, the direction that we have taken, that the Premier has taken, and that Cabinet is on in terms of the Intergovernmental Forum, the meetings with the Ministers in Ottawa and so on, is the right approach. When it comes down to more specific programs, like economic development, the fact that we do not have an economic development agreement, then I think the document the panel tabled last week on the economic strategy was the right direction.

We will get Northerners working together. We will keep using that document to continue to negotiate on an EDA, on the Protected Areas Strategy. We intend to follow that up. I intend to write to the Minister responsible for DIAND and remind him that we agreed to continue the interim resource management agreement funding at their request and we need them to honour their commitments.

Our money is just as scarce and hard to come by as is the federal government's. We need them to live up to their commitments in the same way that we are doing ours, even though it means some cutbacks. We will keep on following up on the pensioner fund and the mine clean-up. Our people are negotiating regularly in terms of our need to define what is our responsibility and what is their responsibility. We are ready, even with our tight budget, to honour our commitments and we honour DIAND to do the same thing on each of these areas. We are looking at the broad picture, but also at with dealing with each one of them individually and specifically. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Final supplementary, Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I certainly would like to think that Ottawa is not singling the Northwest Territories out. Mr. Speaker, can the Minister advise whether our northern neighbours are also seeing a similar trend in this area? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, in my discussions with both of our northern neighbours, they are facing the same kind of situation. They have the same sort of frustrations we have. We will certainly continue to work with them. In fact, there is a meeting set for this fall to deal with this very specific situation. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.