Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. I, too, want to acknowledge Saturday's news from our partners in the federal government, Mr. Speaker. A veritable hurricane, as Eastern Canada has experienced with the weather, of investment and spending here in the NWT and across the North, Mr. Speaker. We've seen $55 million going to each of our sister territories, the Yukon and Nunavut; $85 million being invested in aboriginal training across Canada; here in the NWT, of course, $65 million for roads, $15 million for municipalities, and I couldn't catch up with some of the other good news that I believe was announced in Rankin Inlet yesterday about the expansion of the telecommunications and the broadband system on a pan-territorial basis. So this is great news.
I would also like to acknowledge the work of Cabinet. Premier Kakfwi's message, I was convinced early on, was the right one and that I was very pleased to see our Ministers, along with the Premier, stick with a consistent message. It was taken up by mayors and chiefs, by a business coalition and by my colleagues here. Just about all of us in the room took our turn going to Ottawa, walking the hallways and the corridors there to impress our message upon the federal government.
Quite frankly, Mr. Speaker, after some two years of doing this and really getting only a trickle of response, I was ready to give up on our message. But my faith, indeed, has been restored.
I would turn to one other aspect of this which, as Mr. Handley pointed out, and Ms. Lee has also indicated, when we put our collective hearts and minds and backs into something that we all believe in, Mr. Speaker, we're going to get results. Can we do the same thing with other equally significant and important things on our agenda, Mr. Speaker, like family violence, like housing, like the social conditions that need so much attention? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
---Applause