Thank you, Ms. Lee. The Chair is of the understanding that you are withdrawing your point of privilege and you are rising now on a point of order, saying that the Member has made improper remarks, that the Member may have felt was imputing motive. If the House wishes to debate this, we can do so at this point in time. Are there any Members that want to speak on that?

The Chair recognizes the honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, and then Tu Nedhe. Mr. Krutko, to the point of order.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In regard to the point of order, I believe a person's name has to be mentioned in the context of who you are speaking about. I do not believe I heard any names mentioned. There is a process in place, I have been nayed, and I have nayed other Members of this House.

I think the object of it is that we do not offend other Members by using Members' names. I think that for me, it is pretty clear that we do not use titles or names of individuals in the context of a point of privilege. I did not hear any names being mentioned. Yes, there have been times when people have asked for unanimous consent and may not have gotten it. Myself, for one, have asked numerous times for unanimous consent and I have also nayed people who have asked for unanimous consent.

I feel that unless you promote motive by mentioning individuals, there is no point of order.

Thank you, Mr. Krutko. To the point of order. Any further debate? If there is no further debate on it, it is the Chair's prerogative and I will say to the honourable Member that is making his reply to the opening address to perhaps exercise a little caution in how you direct certain things, so that other Members do not take offense to it. The Chair will rule that there is no point of order. Mr. Nitah, continue your reply to the opening address.

Thank you, Mr. Nitah. Item 9, replies to opening address. The honourable Member for Yellowknife South, Mr. Bell. I just want to remind Members that if they have already made a reply to the opening address, they cannot do it twice. If you have not, Mr. Bell, you can respond.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I do not want to steer you astray. I do not believe that I have made a reply to the opening address, and I am getting a no, so I think I am okay.

I will try not to stray all over the place, Mr. Speaker. I will not take too much of the House's time, but I have been concerned, and Mr. Nitah has raised this issue, so I felt that I should weigh in on it, but I have certainly been concerned about the fact that I have not seen a willingness on the part of this government to be forthright about our financial situation, Mr. Speaker, in my opinion.

I think that this is a perfect example, when people point to our consensus system and talk about its failing and its problems, I do not necessarily think that it is in the system, Mr. Speaker. I think more to the point, it is in the way that we are running our system.

Now, we have heard from the Minister of Finance that he is prepared to come to the Ordinary Members committee and talk about our, a couple of weeks ago, $60 million deficit, now $100 million deficit, and we have talked about this in the House, so I believe I am safe in speaking to those numbers now, and talk to Members and get their support for certain mitigation measures.

Mr. Speaker, I think what is very clear in my opinion is that this is consensus when it is convenient. I say that because we have had numerous occasions in the past year where FMB, the seven of them, have sat around a little table and decided to vote yes to spend an additional $8 million, $20 million...I do not know how many million dollars on the correction facility, just as an example, and certainly Regular Members were not consulted.

I can tell you, had this side of the House been consulted, we would have said build the building with the money we have given you, but we were never asked, Mr. Speaker. That is just a specific example. So we have overspending problems that have simply arisen because FMB has decided to wield their power without coming to the other Members of this House and truly adhering to our consensus style and consensus system.

Mr. Speaker, almost two weeks I think we have been in session and no discussion from the Finance Minister about this deficit. We all know about it because we have been briefed continually, Mr. Speaker, but it has been very frustrating to have our constituents talk to us about the rosy future, the outlook that we have that we seem to put a nice brave face on when we are talking about our future.

Mr. Speaker, the Members on this side of the House know that is not reality. There are some good prospects, but you know, Mr. Speaker, we are trying to bail the ship with no buckets. We are sitting here with our hands scooping water madly as fast as we can and trying to put on a brave face. I have no idea why this government and this Finance Minister will not talk about it, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, we have gotten some of this information out, but it has taken us asking pointed questions. Mr. Dent here today, myself last week and again today, and that is certainly, Mr. Speaker, I do not think is transparent and forthright.

Mr. Speaker, I do not know why this is the case. It almost seems to me as if the government had sat down and decided that it is like we are on safari, and someone has suggested them to keep all their fingers and toes inside the vehicle so that the public and the Members on this side of the House do not get even more irate at the conduct that has been going on, and start to bite them off. Mr. Speaker, it is a bunker mentality. They dug in and now they are prepared to just wait until the storm is over, wait until session is out and then carry on and hope that they can weather that storm, Mr. Speaker.

Ms. Lee spoke of our government spending like drunken sailors, Mr. Speaker, and I believe that is when she was of the impression that we had a $60 million deficit. Mr. Speaker, if we were a little tipsy at $60 million, certainly we are bombed now, and this Minister has yet to stand up and talk to the public about the severity of this issue. I recognize that he is prepared to come before AOC and get us to all buy in and support all of the tough decisions that need to be made, but all I can say for consensus government is that when it was time to break out the chequebook and start spending like mad, nobody asked the Members on this side of the House. That, Mr. Speaker, speaks to the true failing of consensus government. It is not in the system, it is in how the actors are playing. Thank you.

-- Applause

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Item 9, replies to the opening address. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have not replied to the opening address yet, I can assure you. I would like to talk on the same topic that Mr. Nitah and Mr. Bell have referred to. I think it is an important one, and that is how our government functions.

Mr. Speaker, it is interesting that last week the Regular Members were joking about we treat them like mushrooms, we keep them in the dark, we announce things in the House without going back to the committee and sharing the information with them first.

Mr. Speaker, over the last couple of weeks we have purposely changed and let's be more open with the committees. We will take things to the committees. I want to work that way, I want to share it with the committee so they are not surprised when things are brought to the House. We do not want Members to be mushrooms, we do not want them either to be thistles in our side. At the same time, we want to work with the Members and work with committees.

I made a commitment to the chairs of the standing committees that I am open to sharing information with them, I want to share information with them. I have shared as much as I have at this point and want to continue with that.

Mr. Speaker, we cannot have it both ways. Either we will work together as Cabinet and FMB and the committee structure and then bring things to the House or we will work it some other way. We cannot on the one hand criticize the government for not taking things to the committee and surprising you here, and then at the same time stand in here and criticize the government for not bringing things here but waiting to take it to the committee. Which way do we want it?

It is one or the other. It cannot be both or we will always be criticizing each other. I am very prepared, Mr. Speaker, to bring all the information I can bring forward on our fiscal situation. It is not as doom and gloom as some Members would think it is. I do not think there is any plot of going back to some of the efforts from the 13th Assembly. Nothing like that has to happen.

Mr. Speaker, I also want to talk about the need for us to respect the budgeting process. We have a budgeting process that deals with the development of the main estimates and taking those through this Legislative Assembly. Mr. Speaker, it is not my place as the Minister of Finance to start leaking all kinds of information, to begin to make commitments here and to talk about next year's budget. There is a process for that.

We have been through the business planning process, we have heard from the Regular Members and from the committees. We have an opportunity to review the main estimates. We will hear more advice at that time in the committees and then we have the opportunity to debate the budget estimates, the main estimates, in the House here. That is our final opportunity with our main estimates for next year.

Mr. Speaker, any information on what will be in the budget for next year or what will not be in the budget for next year is something that will be determined through that process. It certainly is not my place, I repeat, for me to stand as Minister of Finance and begin to arbitrarily make decisions without consulting with all of the Members. I do respect that process. I think if all of us respected it then we could have a consensus system that works very well.

Mr. Speaker, I want to say that I have a lot of confidence in the system we have. I think if everyone has a willingness to work together then this can be an excellent form of government for our small Territory with a very small population. Mr. Speaker, I certainly do not feel that the system of government here has completely fallen apart at all. I think by working together we can achieve a lot for the people in the Northwest Territories, whether we are talking about social programs or economic programs or whatever it may be. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Item 9, replies to the opening address. The honourable Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We do have an interesting system of government here in the Northwest Territories. It is very interesting today that we seem to have dueling replies to the opening address, which lends to the uniqueness of our government.

It goes to say that even when you have a Finance Minister who can reply to an opening address, which is again very unique, that is something we should accept and every Member in this House has the opportunity to speak to the government's plans. It is interesting, Mr. Speaker, when it comes to the democracy side of our institution here in the Northwest Territories that when, as we heard Mr. Bell say, "consensus when it is convenient" because when it comes to critical votes, we seem to have a locking of positions, right or wrong on this issue, we are going to do this way, and we are going to convince a couple of other Members to do that and we will happily roll along.

Mr. Speaker, we have heard information from this side of the House from Regular Members more times than not through the media. I believe coming down here for this session, hearing something about a $60 million deficit. So again, Mr. Speaker, when the Power Corporation board was removed, it was through the media that many of us Members found out.

I just so happened to be reading my e-mail on the computer and reading the transcripts of the previous nights news and I get a phone call from a reporter saying, "What do you think about the removal of the Power Corporation?" or the direction to withdraw. I am sitting in Inuvik thinking, what are you talking about? I am not sure of this, I am just reading some news now and I have some concerns with the stepping in of Cabinet.

Mr. Speaker, unfortunately we do seem to have a theme here that is of concern to a lot of Members. It is of concern to Cabinet I am sure when we seem to be going all over the place and nobody is paddling in the same direction.

Mr. Speaker, I have said in this House before that I would gladly pat the back of the Premier and others if at times they told me what we were up to and I might be able to help paddle the boat in the same direction. It is not until we are heading down Niagara Falls, it seems, that all of a sudden the cry out for help comes out. Paddle the other way! We are going the wrong way! Stroke!

Mr. Speaker, this is a concern to me as a Member that has come from the 13th Assembly to see what we have been through, and in this Assembly to see what we are going through now. We have been through a number of these and unfortunately it seems, I do not know if ourselves have taken lightly the environment that we operate under. If in fact what we are doing here is for the better good of the people of the Northwest Territories. Is it truly the situation that we are doing that?

There are times when things get heated that we become quite animated here in pursuing a particular situation and I am as guilty as everyone else when it comes to those situations. There are times when emotions get the best of me and even though I want to paddle in the same direction we are going in a circle. It might mirror again the floor of this House. Even when we seem to be working together, some of us end up back in the same place wondering how come we are back in the same place, we have not made any further distance.

Mr. Speaker, there have been many things that I have grown concerned about in this Assembly, whether it is housing concerns, programs for seniors, whether it is income support for single parents or whether it is government accountability. We do have a system. A system in place that is recognized as unique across Canada. We have only one other jurisdiction that has followed our system and that is in Nunavut. They have just started out. They have not had a call for non-confidence yet, not that I have paid particular attention to that, but unfortunately, we have had, and seem to continue to run into that problem here.

Again, the unique part of this, Mr. Speaker, is the ability that we have as Members of this House to be able to raise specific constituency issues without having to run it through a party whip to say this is my concern. Can I address it today? Can I have one of the ten questions that we will have today to address this issue for my constituency? That is not necessary in our form. We are recognized and we are all given the opportunity to be able to address those concerns from our constituency.

I am one that is very happy. When I travelled to other jurisdictions and met with other parliamentarians and we discuss the systems we are in, I have a lot of other parliamentarians from across Canada saying "You know, that is a pretty good system. We should have something like that" because they feel they do not have the ability to address the party that is holding office, because it is clearly a majority position and if they do not like what is happening, they will just move on and get on with business and all that is left for the official opposition, so to speak, in provinces is to make a lot of noise and be very aggressive.

I have watched our colleagues from the Yukon and their system. A small Assembly and a small territory. I must say, I am very glad we do not operate like that. We have a good system of government.

Yes, sometimes that brings to bear difficulties, because we, as Regular Members, when we have a feeling on this side of the House that something is not right, we can address it with our government, and we can push them to be accountable. When they do not want to give all the information, we, as long as we have the majority of Members of this House, we can put a motion out and we can have the issue addressed, as we have just had with the special audit done by the Auditor General.

Again, that goes to show that we, as Members of this Assembly, can hold ourselves accountable. That is the beauty of the system, to a certain degree, and it is also almost a curse on itself is that we are to hold ourselves accountable.

If we, as the Members of this Assembly have taken an oath to the people of the Northwest Territories, cannot follow our own rules or will not stand up and recognize the fact that our rules were broken and take the next step, then we have a problem. Then the system starts to fall in on itself. But, if we are people who can manage to speak well in this House, we can deflect quite well as well. We can change the subject. We can move to another issue and not deal with the fundamental issue.

As I said earlier, Mr. Speaker, I have concerns that in some places, not only in the Northwest Territories but in Canada now, there are reports of the consensus style of government is being debated. Well, I guess we are now, to a certain degree. I must say, as I first listened to the broadcast, I was thinking I have to say something about this, and I backed off and said no, because if I do, that might just increase the discussion that is taking place. But I do not hear anybody in this House saying change our style of government, not clearly.

I have heard people say review what we are doing. The ultimate review happens, Mr. Speaker, when we all go back for election. If the people of the Northwest Territories do not like the system we are in, then it can be an issue. It can be an issue from their constituencies. It was raised to a certain degree during the election of this Assembly, but it was not a concern for the rest of the Northwest Territories. That is why we are still in this system.

I would have great fear, Mr. Speaker, if we fall into a political system, we will definitely be have's and have not's in certain areas in the Northwest Territories, because the party that can run the best campaign will put most people in, and where will that be located? Well, it is just natural that it fit in the larger centres in the Northwest Territories, because the ability to convince voters en masse takes place when you can get to their doors, in their TVs, on the radios, and knock on their doors.

Mr. Speaker, that is something that we must look at and hold unique in the Northwest Territories. We have to hold this style of government and continue to work with it. And yes, there will be times when government credibility will be called on. Yes, there will be times when we will have heated debate with one another as to the merits of our concern raised for the day. And yes, we will be told to get off of it and get on another issue because this is personal and petty.

Well, I think you will find that in the party form of government, as I have watched our federal government on TV and see how they go about things. It looks like that is all it is, about personalities, as to who can get the biggest bite and who can make the biggest noise.

I think we have accomplished things here around this table, and it is not without difficulty, without a bit of pain. But it is important that we recognize in this style of government that we are independents here. We can vote based on our independence of those people who put us here. That is why it is also a concern to me, Mr. Speaker, that when we come to certain decisions in this House, we also operate by what we hear as convention, and again, that is similar to a partisan system, but here in the Northwest Territories, we work by convention on a certain number of issues. One of the things is when a committee makes a report, a recommendation to government, convention usually says that the Cabinet will sit on their hands and let the Regular Members decide. Judging from that, they will decide if they in fact want to move on the recommendation or if they just feel that it is not important enough, they can put it aside. That is their prerogative, and we accept that on this side of the House.

Mr. Speaker, it is of concern to me that when it is convenient, they say no, this time it is an important matter. We are going to vote this way. The optics changes quite a bit.

It has already been reported that a previous motion, a committee recommendation, let's put it clearly, a committee recommendation was defeated on the calling for the Premier's resignation, and yes, it was done so. But I almost point out to people that this time around, the numbers have grown and the concern remains.

So while we discuss what we are doing here in the Northwest Territories, where we want to go, potentially, there is another year in our term. Let's see where Members go, but Members will have an opportunity to speak to where they want to go in a few minutes.

I look forward to hearing what some of the Members will say, unless they have been given the word to say mum and nothing else. I would encourage Members to speak about the motion that will come up later. I think it is critical of us as a government to hold things in a way that would be credible to the Northwest Territories and the people of the Northwest Territories, that they would get all sides of the story, that they would see what has been done and they would understand that when you come to this table, we are not just going to the coffee shop to discuss a few issues and we can change our mind automatically. There has to be some discussion and debate about how government flows and where it moves.

I heard the other day a reference to the Javaroma Tribal Council. Is that what we are becoming here in the Northwest Territories, that level? Well, maybe to a certain degree, we do and we will have to wear that.

Mr. Speaker, it is times like this when we look at ourselves, we look at the work we are getting done, and we have to decide, are we making progress? I recall the first days of this government. When we got into office, we were concerned about the debt wall, something I really stood up and questioned much about in this House. We were very fortunate that we got one-time investments, as we were told.

I heard the other day in the House the Finance Minister talked about our good investment practices. Mr. Speaker, when we started to begin with, I believe the Finance Minister started out as well saying that we started out, we were looking at a debt wall that was months away, so obviously we had no money to invest. It came to us. Not because of good planning but because of luck, as we have heard.

Now, if the Finance Minister has that ability to turn luck around and steer it directly towards us, let's hope that he is got one more thing in his bag of miracles, I guess we could say, because we are all of a sudden being told once again we are facing a serious situation. We have one more year in our mandate. The answers that echoed in this forum a couple of years back, well, we have a few months we think the federal government will be able to come to us and they will give us some dollars, they will provide us the necessary funds to be able to continue offering programs and services.

I believe the first discussion, it was a matter of months. Then as the next session came around I asked the question again about where are we now with our fiscal situation. What was I told? Well, it is no longer a number of months, it could be six months, maybe a year off.

Well the last answer when asking the question about where is the money for our proposals that were out there, I think the last response we had was, not in the life of this Assembly.

The NRRD Strategy it was called, Non-Renewable Resource Development Strategy. $230 million, we were working hard to have the federal government recognize the need for that and we could move ahead. What happened to that? Well, it is collecting dust someplace, somebody using it as a door stop or a fan or something, because we have not got it. You got one downpayment as we were told in this Assembly.

Now we went back and we started working on another proposal to the federal government because we were told by the federal government, here is another plan that we are working on, we can get this. We can get this money and we can make a difference, but put your proposal in and we will see what we can do. Maybe this one, I do not know, the trend has been going zero down, no payments for a year. Maybe that is the plan we are working on.

We do not have any more dollars from that as far as I am aware. That might be it. I just heard a colleague tell me maybe the plan fits under the "no payments until 2004." That could be it. Maybe we have fallen into that category.

Mr. Speaker, we do not have something we can show the people of the Territories for all the effort we have been told about going to the federal government. So when I hear Members in this House say, "Hang on people, do not overreact here, do not throw the baby out with the bath water so to speak," there is some hope yet. We are doing so much work with the federal government that we can make a difference. Well, the proof is in the pudding, and we have no pudding. I am afraid we are running out of time and somebody is going to come take the pot we had to cook in it.

Yet we can stand up and say, hang on, we can make this work. It can happen. Mr. Speaker, I can probably find ways of continuing this song and try to break a record or something in this House. I will save that. I think this has just got me warmed up for my next job that I have here today, which is seeing where Members of this Assembly stand on credibility as the Government of the Northwest Territories. Are we willing to put people first or are we going to stand here and stand for ourselves because we are worried about 12 months of pay or a pension? Opportunity knocks and that is what we have here. We have an opportunity to restore credibility to the Government of the Northwest Territories. With that I will close. Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Item 9, replies to the opening address. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Item 9, replies to opening address. The honourable Member for Range Lake, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I had originally planned on doing a reply to opening address, but I decided not to do it because I wanted us to get on with our agenda today, but now that we are in this, I really do want to comment and add to the debate that is going on in this House. I will try to make my comments relatively short.

Mr. Speaker, I do believe what we are talking about here is very relevant. It is in fact a reply to the opening address that Minister Antoine stated in this House back in February 19th. In the sessional statement, he stated that our constituents also ask that we give them an open and accountable government, so it is very relevant that we are talking about how, in fact, accountable we are.

Mr. Speaker, it is no secret that, given what has been happening in this House for a little while, and actually in the collective three years that I have been here, I have given a lot of thought about exactly what sort of government system we have and whether or not it is working as best as it should, and whether or not there is any room for us to improve.

I must be honest, Mr. Speaker, I have not figured that one out and I think if I did, I would be elsewhere writing a book or something. What I do know, Mr. Speaker, is that whatever we have here is not working. I have no doubt in my mind that we have to review this and try to find a way to improve it.

Mr. Speaker, I must also say that I do not really know exactly what consensus government is, but having heard from those who want to speak about it, how I understand the consensus government is that you have a group of people, leaders, they gather around with a common purpose, a mutual objective with the public interest in mind, that discuss important issues of the day on behalf of the people that they serve or they represent.

At the end of the discussions, there has to be a consensus as to where that group should be heading to. Mr. Speaker, if that is the definition of a consensus, or if that is a functional purpose of a consensus government, I can tell you that is not happening in this House.

Mr. Speaker, in the last three years, I do not know of any important issue or anything that we have agreed on. Mr. Speaker, I do not know if 19 of us could agree that this room is round, or if the sky out there is dark today.

Mr. Speaker, I think it is high time that we get out of this collective denial that this consensus government is the be all and end all, and that it is serving the people of the Northwest Territories.

I do not want to be seen as somebody who is an advocate of party politics either. I want to make that very clear. I think that I cannot imagine what worse life than a backbencher in a party system, or a junior member in an opposition party, with all due respect to all the parliamentarians around the world who possess that kind of office, because I know that I serve better some of the issues that my constituents bring to me and that on occasion, I have been able to address their personal issues and personal situations because I am an independent Member in a consensus government.

That does not say that our system that we have here, this consensus system, is a model for all and that it is serving and that it should be maintained at all costs. I further say, Mr. Speaker, that as far as I can see, what we have here is a 19 party system, so we already have a party system, in my opinion. We have 19 party leaders here. We all represent our own platform. We ran on it and we got elected on it. I do not know what...each one of us had a platform when we ran. So we came in here as 19 parties, and we form a coalition -- a very loose coalition -- in this House.

Mr. Speaker, what I see is we have a coalition of Cabinet versus non-Cabinet. Maybe we have a coalition of Yellowknife and the rest, although Yellowknife Members never, I do not think, got together to talk about moving as a Yellowknife Cabinet, or Yellowknife coalition. I also see that by virtue of so many issues we discuss, we have a loose coalition of rural and urban, or some sort of a group...I do not know.

Cabinet Members, the coalition of seven party leaders, obviously need three more party leaders to pass anything. So once in a while, they grab three from the rest of us and then they can pass things. That is the reality of what is going on here.

We do not have a consensus government and we do not have a consent on anything. The biggest question, the most important question we have to ask is how are we serving the public.

Mr. Speaker, I would argue that anybody who thinks that there is anything wrong with the system when we have gone through two leadership questions in one year, they have to rethink that answer.

Mr. Speaker, I do not believe I have given a consent to any budget. Well, I do not think there was a consensus reached about our spending priorities or our social priorities. I do not remember that. To say that is a complete and utter denial. All I have ever been able to do is okay, maybe a small consent.

Let's look at how we are serving the public interest. What are the big issues we have had to deal with in this House that perhaps we could have done better if we had a government that had a mandate and they had enough power to move on this agenda. The energy policy, it has taken us three years. We still do not have it. We have the future of health care which, if we ever discussed it, it boils into a rural or urban issue. We have a Kyoto agreement that we have not had a discussion on, and we are on the verge of doing but we still do not have. We have the biggest disaster, environmental disaster sitting right underneath Yellowknife. I mean, it is like top ten in the world agenda as the contaminated sites. Have we had a discussion on that? Of course not, because that is, like, a Yellowknife issue.

Mr. Speaker, a transportation strategy, we have not had an agreement on where we build the road. We have not had an agreement on do we go where the traffic is? Do we go where there should be more jobs created? Should we build the road first? Should we go to the diamond mines? We have never had that discussion here.

If we have a consensus government, where is the discussion on how we are spending the money? What are the priorities? The best we can show to the people is that the Cabinet coalition goes in there, they have their little try at consensus building. I am sure they have seven party leaders proposing their seven party platforms, and we come down to the lowest common denominator, or whatever they can agree on. Then we have 11 party leaders get into a coalition on the other side and we talk about that, about what we think, and of course, 11 of us come from all different places with our own platform and we are our own respective leaders of our own party, so the only way we can get anything pushed is if we can get a coalition together as a party leader.

I could go on, Mr. Speaker, on and on about the issues we have not been able to agree on. Tourism issues -- we could not agree on that. Addictions facilities, can we agree on where the facility should go, or whether there should be a little treatment centre in every community or it should be in Yellowknife? Education...anyway, I do not want to say that this is the fault of Cabinet. I think that Cabinet or this Assembly as a whole has tried, and God knows every one of us here has worked really hard to push those.

But to say that these 19 people come in here with the best intentions and they are making judgments on the basis of their personal beliefs, personal judgment, their local issues, whatever...the best thing we bring to the floor, to say that 19 of us could actually sit here or sit in another room or at a retreat or wherever, and that we could actually discuss in a substantive way, and discuss it long enough and hard enough to come up with a decision that leads to the needs of the general, mutual and public interest, is a complete denial. That is not happening here and I do not see it. The only loser in this game is the public. That is how I see it, Mr. Speaker.

For me, the accountability question comes to, on what basis do we, each 19 of us have, each one of us make our decisions about these important issues? I have a position on the energy policy, transportation, whatever. As hard as I try, it is not, and you know, I am working like a party leader here, but I do not have a party leadership convention. I do not have a policy convention. All I could do is call different people. I try to read everything I can, but I am only one person. So where is the link between each 19 of us say and to extend on and to vote on and what the people out there are thinking? I am not knocking the job that each Member here is trying to do. We are trying to represent our constituents in the best way that we can, but I do believe we have to find a system where the views of the people that we serve can be better reflected in the way we stand on issues. That is really, really important, because otherwise, we are just an isolated vessel in here, talking in the best way we know how, but it may be totally out of touch with what the people out there are thinking.

I have been asked a lot, because I said on other occasions that we have a very, well, I do not know if we have a completely dysfunctional system, but I do know, without any doubt, that whatever we have here is not a consensus government. What I think is we are part of a party politics of 19 members, except that we have sometimes the worst part of each system. In consensus government, if you cannot agree on something that is of public interest, then you get to agree on the least contentious basis.

In party politics, God knows that there are a lot of problems with party politics. But one thing that is good about party politics that we do not have here is that whoever gets into a party, they can govern. They can govern for the period of time that they have. Then they are held accountable at the end of their mandate, whenever that may be, whether it is set or it is by the Premier. In parliamentary systems, Premiers or Prime Ministers could call an election. In the system in the U.S., they know that they are going to go into an election every four years. Another good thing about party politics that is not here is that before the government is formed, people out there know what the government stands for. Even if, you know, they do not live up to those expectations, at least any respectable party will have a publication out there that tells the people where they stand as a government, not as an individual member.

What we have here, we do not know that. We form a consensus government on the basis of a coalition of seven party leaders. They get together. They work out an agenda after six months. They try to explain to the other 11 of them. I tell you, I know that some Members here think that we do not get consulted enough. We would like to be a part of the thing. Sometimes I think I am just consulted too much. Like, Cabinet Members cannot move anywhere because they have to ask 11 of us all the time. But then, I do not have a say on... I cannot delete an item in the budget. I cannot say no, I do not think Kyoto is the first thing. I want more money for Stanton. I mean, I cannot do that. I cannot say, as a party leader, that is what I will fight for in the next election and I cannot ask that this party to be accountable on that.

I think I have made... I do not even know how long I have talked. I am sorry. I think that it is irresponsible for politicians, or members of any group such as this which is a Legislature, to say let's just bury our heads in the sand and say this is consensus. This is consensus and this is the way to be, and we are unique, and look at the party politics. It is horrible. Let's just move on with it and let's just pretend that this works, and let's just keep on going with our collective denial that this is what is working. I think for those who think that this is the best system that the NWT deserves, then let them stand up and defend it. If anybody else who does not agree with that, then we should, I think we deserve it, I think the people deserve it to have a really serious discussion about how we could improve the system, not necessarily to lead to the party politics, but maybe we could be totally creative and ingenious and come up with some kind of hybrid that would combine the consensus system and party politics that would minimize some of the down side of both systems and make the system that we have better.

Another thing I did not mention is the fact that the double-edged sword of individual power, the power of an individual Member in consensus government, can be put to such a good use and I have days here where I go wow, I made a difference, this one person.

I know that my power and my ability to do the job is only as great or as limited as my own beliefs, my own backgrounds, my own shortcomings and my own positives. I think that at some point, people have to ask, is that good enough? I think that is a very relevant question that should be asked.

I am going to close there and I do hope that we will discuss this again sometime soon. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Item 9, replies to opening address. The honourable Member for Great Slave, Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This is the first time in the life of this Assembly that I have used this opportunity. I had not anticipated doing it today, but on the topic of this significance and with so many of my colleagues, who have taken advantage of it or seen the need to talk about it, I thought I should get up too, and at least I would not be conspicuous by my absence.

Mr. Speaker, this was indeed one of the compelling reasons for me to run as a candidate. I would like to think it is one of the reasons that I got elected, because I believe that the consensus government was not working well, that it needed reform, and that it needed to be changed. It was not, Mr. Speaker, a rejection of the consensus system.

It has been easy for some of my colleagues here to label me a party politics guy. I am not. I am probably going to have to keep saying that over and over and over and I hope it catches. I do believe that the system that we have, at least the system that we envision, Mr. Speaker, is indeed the right one for the Northwest Territories.

I lived in the Yukon from 1976 to 1986, Mr. Speaker, and those were the years in which partisan politics were introduced in our sister territory to the west. I did not like what had happened in the time that I lived there. I found it, Mr. Speaker, to be a divisive and a polarizing influence on what was already quite a small and I will use the word fragile, multi-layered northern society. It is not unlike the one here in the Northwest Territories.

I think we must take some steps, Mr. Speaker, to avoid going down that path. The way that I would like to see consensus government returning to, Mr. Speaker, because I have been told by Members who had experience in the previous Assembly here, but going back three and four assemblies, perhaps they had it right then. They had mechanisms, they had ways between the various committees and mechanisms of the Assembly of the day to get together and work out their issues, hammer out their differences and be able to come forward and move issues and make progress on things.

I said it a couple days ago and I would like to follow through. I think over the past three Assemblies, Mr. Speaker, we have engineered out, we have organized and chartered that kind of capacity, that collaborative kind of capacity is gone now. What is missing is something that I think I would like to go further than some of my colleagues who have said that they would like to be -- who said that consensus government can work through the committee system. We have to go even further than that. I would like to be involved, Mr. Speaker, in the exploration stage of issues where we can actually work together on designing the solutions, defining the issues, and bringing many more voices into this kind of thing than really what we have today, which is essentially the departments, the Ministers and Cabinet. A committee system today is really restricted to but one, I think, essential power, Mr. Speaker, and that is the power of veto. We do not like something, we will tell the Minister. We will tell Cabinet and it is probably gone, but in the stages leading up to that, we really do not have a consistent and I think a meaningful way of making a difference and helping to move issues along. We have become much like any other parliament or Legislature in the rest of Canada, where there is government elected with a mandate for the people, which I think is kind of a handy thing, and an opposition. There are big gaps and big secrets between them.

We do not need to do that, Mr. Speaker. It is interesting to reflect here that this whole notion, this whole dark, ugly notion of party politics may have crept up upon us, and if we are not careful, it just may overtake. Let's do the math. Let's look at the numbers. We are seven people in our Executive Council or Cabinet. How many people have indicated, Mr. Speaker, that they voted for or would vote for a motion to remove the Premier, and really, Mr. Speaker, it is a move of confidence against the government. There are seven on this side. Four of us, myself included, have said we believe the stability and the institution of continuing our government. We have an interesting dynamic here, Mr. Speaker, seven, seven, and four. Are we going to allow this to overtake, at least the next year of this Assembly? Are we going to allow it to set the tone, to become the model for future Assemblies? I sure hope not.

I am a proponent of reform, of consensus, Mr. Speaker, not its rejection. I will say it again and again and again, I am not for party politics. I do have some plans about how I believe we could improve the system of consensus government and how, Mr. Speaker, we could give the vote a much more direct say in the leadership and the mandate of a government.

I would much prefer though, Mr. Speaker, to pick myself the time and place and venue in which I will release those plans, those ideas, those proposals, and I would only ask that you stay tuned.

Meanwhile, Mr. Speaker, to conclude my reply to the opening address, I would like to say to my constituents that they can count on me to continue the promise and the pledge that I made to them when they accepted me as their MLA, and that is that I am going to continue to represent their best interests to the very best of my ability, issue by issue, to try to make the right decisions on behalf of the constituents of Great Slave. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Item 9, replies to opening address. The honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Krutko.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to make a second reply to opening address.

-- Laughter

The honourable Member is seeking...do you wish to refer to a specific rule to do that, Mr. Krutko?

Mr. Speaker, I am asking unanimous consent of the House to be able to make another reply to the opening address. I know I have already done so, but if the support is there, I would like to be able to do so.

Thank you. Would that perhaps be Rule 41(1), Mr. Krutko?

-- Laughter

Yes, Mr. Speaker.