Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, in looking back in Hansard from Friday, Unedited Hansard I see that there was a break in the recording and much of my comments that I made on Friday were not recorded. So I want to state again some of the things that I brought out on Friday.
I know that I probably won't remember all of them because I did not have a written text, however I want to restate how I arrived at my decisions and what I am looking at in this whole issue.
Mr. Chairman, when I ran for election to this government I went to the people of Hay River North and I set my principles, my standards and I told the people what I would do if elected, and they elected me to represent them in this Legislature. I do not take the trust that they have put in me lightly. I do not take decisions that I make in this House lightly, nor do I think any other Member in this House should take them lightly.
When I was approached to support who we were going to put in as Premier and who we were going to have sitting on the opposite side of the House as Ministers, I gave that some serious consideration and I also put a lot of thought into the Members sitting across, if they were honest, accountable, and were going to carry out the business of the Northwest Territories and control the public purse that best interests the people of the Northwest Territories.
In this House on Friday, Mr. Chairman, I was all prepared to vote on the recommendations that were put forward by the committee. It was mentioned by one Member across that maybe we should cool our heels, take a couple of days, listen to our constituents and maybe come back and see how we feel at that time.
I want to tell you, Mr. Chairman, that I did not sleep very good Friday night. I made it a point to go home to Hay River when I had not planned to go home this weekend, but I made it a point to go home because I thought it was extremely important that I went home and talked to as many of my constituents that I could and listened to their views and their concerns.
So Saturday and Sunday to me were spent in my constituency talking with people and every spare moment that I had on the phone this morning. I have to tell you, Mr. Chairman, not one person that I talked to encouraged me to change my position that I took on Friday. Not one. If there was one, I would accept the phone call now to correct me, but I know it will not come, because I never heard one, and I talked to a lot of people.
I slept a lot better last night because I am very comfortable with the position I have now and I am comfortable that the constituents that I represent are comfortable with the position I am taking. I have talked to constituents that are in government, I have talked to constituents in the private sector, I have talked to business people, I have talked to seniors, I have talked to retired individuals, I have talked to students, and I had one retired school teacher tell me, "I have just retired from teaching and I received a certificate for 30 years of excellence in teaching." She said, "My pension..." and I will not repeat how she compared her pension with the pension that Lynda Sorensen is getting, because it would not be acceptable in this House, but she made it very clear to me that her tax dollars are being expended in this House in this manner. She was not happy about it. I feel it incumbent upon me to relay that message here, because she is one person that helped elect me to this House.
I said on Friday that we are here to represent the people and that we are in charge of protecting the public purse; public money. Tax dollars that this government gets to expend on other people and on programs and services.
You would like me, or certain Members would like me to stand up and say, "Well, we threw a quarter of a million dollars away at one person, but that is okay. We are going to put guidelines in place so it does not happen again." It does not fly, Mr. Chairman. The guidelines were there. This leader did not follow those guidelines. Do I think he will do it next time? No, I do not. I have heard him say nothing that would change my mind.
I am prepared to go back to the electorate, to my constituents and face another election on my convictions, my standards, my honesty, and my accountability. I hope that every Member of this House, this side and that side, are prepared to do the same thing, because I can guarantee you we no longer have consensus government here. We no longer have a consensus on anything. We can face a vote of confidence in the Premier and go on from here. We can go for a year, but we will not have a consensus government for the rest of this term.
It is going to be an impossible situation. The public out there is speaking, and I hope that every Member here is well aware of the situation in front of us. It is how we expend public money, how we expend the public purse. People out there who are deeply in need of help, who are paying tax dollars and trusting us to do it right.
I look at the Members across and I respect the Members across. I respected them when I voted for them. I assumed at that time that they would do the right thing. I assume now that they will do the right thing, but the public is watching us. I for one am going to state right now, I am prepared to go to the polls on my decision, and my decision is to support the committee recommendation to its fullest. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.