Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, recognizing today is International Women's Day, I too would like to add some comment. I would like to reflect on this institution and those of every other elected office in the Northwest Territories and Canada.
Mr. Speaker, considering the significance and importance of women in elected office and in governments, I think it is especially fitting that one of the recipients from Yellowknife, Ms. Suzette Montreuil, was an opponent of mine, and a very formidable and a very worthy opponent, and she is indeed deserving of this recognition.
Having women represented at all levels of governance, I think, Mr. Speaker, is essential to the balance of decision making that we all undertake and the tone and the clarity of the work that we do. I think if we reflect back on our Youth Parliament last month, it seems to me that overwhelmingly, the number of representatives here from among the youth were young women. That gives me great hope that we will be seeing these young people, and others like them who follow their roles and their leadership, taking part in elected governments across the North.
I would like to take this opportunity to encourage women to consider, whenever the opportunity comes up, to run for elected office, whether it is at the school board level, municipal level, band council level, the territorial level, even the federal level, to bring that balance up to where it should be.
I guess in that light, Mr. Speaker, I am hoping and wondering if we will ever see the day when International Women's Day will not be needed because we will be able to see that it is a quaint idea, a throw-back to an age when women were not reflected in their rightful place in society, and that they indeed have the representation and the role they should have. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
-- Applause