Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this being Friday, I would like to take a light hearted approach to my Member's statement today and speak about the IRC or the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation Native Hockey Tournament that was held in Inuvik in the previous weekend. Mr. Speaker, there were a number of teams from communities from the Western Arctic region: Holman, Paulatuk, Sachs, Inuvik, Tuktoyaktuk, Fort McPherson and Aklavik. In the A division, the victors were Northwind, out of Inuvik and BeauDel Posse also out of Inuvik. and third place was EGT, that's Eddie Gruben's Transport out of Tuktoyaktuk. In B division the winners were Tuktoyaktuk, Fort McPherson came in second and Wietzel Solar Bears out of Inuvik came in third. Sadly, Mr. Speaker, I would like to say that the Inuvik Old Dogs of this year weren't able to defend their championship, Mr. Speaker. The old legs and lungs were not quite able to hold back the tide of the youthful, energetic opposition.

I must say, Mr. Speaker, we didn't go down with out a fight. Mind you we didn't fight, we were unable to, but we were able to put up a good rush and in our first game we tied 2-2 against Holman; in the second game, we tied 3-3 and, unfortunately, in our third game, the youthful crew from Fort McPherson beat us 4-3 in a very close game that went back and forth. So I must hand it to the Old Dogs, we went out, we tried and, unfortunately, our legs and lungs weren't there this year. Our team leader said that in training camp this summer, we are going to get back to work and lose some pounds and try to pick up some speed. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

--Applause