Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Ootes.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I believe the Member, in all likelihood, means transportation, food costs, fuel costs and so forth. I should state, Mr. Speaker, for those who might not be familiar, we do pay for accommodation and we do pay for fuel, so individuals are not impacted in that fashion. Certainly as I stated earlier in my reply, we will be sensitive to those that are out there on income support. We also will look at, if there are dramatic increases, to immediately do that, but on an annual basis or on a regular basis, I think is best. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Item 6, oral questions. The honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Krutko.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We have been talking about the hydro potential within the system for several months now since they did the hydro generation study. We have recently had discussions with the people in the South Slave, particularly with the South Slave Metis, with the Salt River First Nations and some of the Akaitcho chiefs. I also attended and gave a presentation at the Dene chiefs meeting at which the Gwich'in were well represented, along with everybody else, a couple of weeks ago in Fort Providence.

I have also sent a letter out to all of the leaders indicating that I am ready and prepared to meet with aboriginal leaders to discuss the concept of hydro power, the pros and cons of doing it. I have an invitation, as I speak, to go to a number of assemblies, including the Dene Assembly, the South Slave Metis again, the Fort Smith Metis and so on. I expect to discuss this concept over the summer.

I want to point out, Mr. Speaker, that this is not at a proposal stage. This is simply a concept we are looking at. It has tremendous potential. It has tremendous environmental advantages for us. I think it has many positive sides in terms of the bigger picture of protecting our environment. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Supplementary, Mr. Krutko.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, that is well and good, but the people who are downstream from all these developments are the ones who are going to feel the impacts associated with those developments, from our experience with the Bennett Dam in BC. I would like to ask the Minister, when will you start considering looking at the implications in regards to the residents of the Northwest Territories with respect to the wildlife activities, and also the aboriginal rights relating to water and the management of those waters?

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

Mr. Speaker, I have to comment on the use of the word "dams". The Member has brought it up in his question. I have never talked about building dams. We are talking about building flow of the river turbines, or hydro projects. Mr. Speaker, the Member earlier on made reference to me saying that we were going to build three dams on the Mackenzie River. I have checked the transcripts of all of the interviews I have done recently and I have never used the word or referred to building dams. I am not talking about dams.

CBC, I notice, have used the word dams fairly liberally. What we are talking about is flow of the river. It might back water up as high as the traditional high water mark, but we are not talking about dams like the Bennett River Dam and the Hoover Dam and those sorts of things. That is not what we are talking about at all. We need to clarify that.

This summer, as we go around, I want to talk to people about the pros and cons of harnessing some of our hydro potential. We have huge potential. I intend to do that over the summer, listen to what people are saying. Developing the hydro potential will go nowhere without aboriginal leadership support on it. As we get support from the leadership in general for the concept of hydro projects, then we will start to go into the communities and talk to people at that level about this. We will not go there without the concurrence of the aboriginal leadership. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Handley. Supplementary, Mr. Krutko.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as we all know, the Minister has two roles here. One is looking at the economics of the project and also the environmental and wildlife protection. I would like to ask the Minister, who is doing the work on this project? Who is looking specifically at the environmental impacts of these projects?

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the whole reason for looking at hydro potential is because it is known to be the cleanest source of energy anywhere in the world. It is clean. It goes on for generations. It does not have any emissions like fossil fuels do.

My reason for looking at it is that I believe we need, over the long term, Mr. Speaker, to get our communities off fossil fuels and off diesel fuel and on to either gas as a cleaner fuel or, better yet, on to hydro potential. That is the cleanest thing we can do for our environment.

Mr. Speaker, we have not gotten into any detailed studies of the environmental impact of hydro projects because we are not at that stage yet. We are just talking about the concept. If, as I said earlier, aboriginal leaders are agreeable to it, then we will begin to work on the environmental impact of each of the many possible projects if we keep proceeding with this.

Mr. Speaker, really, when someone knocks at your door with an opportunity, you have to open the door and look at whether or not that is a friend, whether it is someone bearing a gift or an offer or whatever it might be. You cannot just cower in the corner, afraid to peek out the window because it might scare you and might be dangerous. You have to get out there and try it.

These things are long term. We have to open them up. We have to be open to new ideas. Let us have a look at it. If it is deemed to be something that is not worthwhile by aboriginal leaders, then we will not do it. This is long term. We are not talking about building dams next year. We are talking about a long-term project that I think, environmentally I believe, is the right direction to go. The detailed studies will be done if people agree with me. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Handley. Final supplementary, Mr. Krutko.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, with these major projects we are looking at in regard to pipelines, hydro developments and other mega projects, I think the door has been swung wide open in regard to all of these initiatives. I feel it is critical that we get the support of the people whose lifestyles depend on the harvesting activities that take place and ensure the protection of the food sources and of the environment.

When will we speak to the ground roots people on this issue? Not the political leaders, but people who live in our communities who depend on the wildlife as their traditional food source.

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

Mr. Speaker, I agree with the Member. We do realize that we have to have the support of the aboriginal people, but we have to look at this very responsibly. The first step, and we are in the first step now, is to look at the concept, discuss it with the aboriginal leaders and if they agree with us, then we go to communities.

Mr. Speaker, I cannot go into the communities and start discussing this without having the aboriginal leaders onside. If I do that, then I am going to be interfering in their leadership. I am convinced we should get the aboriginal leaders to agree with us and then go into the communities. I am ready and prepared to do that this summer if the leaders invite us to do that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Item 6, oral questions. The honourable Member for Yellowknife South, Mr. Bell.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is for the Minister of Health and Social Services and it follows my statement on youth access to tobacco. Someone mentioned to me that as far as inspection, we have someone who comes up from Alberta. I believe it is a federal inspector, someone we borrow a few times a year, Mr. Speaker, to look at whether or not merchants are selling tobacco to minors.

I am wondering, do we have someone in the GNWT inspect our merchants and see if they are selling tobacco to minors the same way we do for drinking establishments?

Thank you, Mr. Bell. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Health and Social Services, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Member is right. This is a federal jurisdiction enforcement right now. Our Territory is served by someone who travels out of Alberta. I believe the Member's question was are there any local authorities to report an incident if there was an observation of tobacco being sold to minors, and I do believe that it would be possible to report this to the RCMP, but the enforcement under the tobacco legislation is a federal jurisdiction and monitored from Edmonton. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Minister. Supplementary, Mr. Bell.

Thank you. So selling tobacco to minors does not violate any territorial legislation and that is why, in fact, we do not have anyone in the territorial government to do the inspection. Is that correct? Thank you.