Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, today I wanted to talk a little bit about an issue that's starting to get quite a bit of attention and a lot of discussion both among members of the public and Members of this House, and that is the NWT recreation and sport board recommendations report, and specifically the recommendation to establish and create an NWT rec and sport board, to slot this extra layer of governance, if you will, Mr. Speaker, over and above some of the existing partner organizations like the Aboriginal Sports Circle and the Sport North Federation. It's getting a lot of debate. There seems to be a lot of concern. But one thing I will say, Mr. Speaker, is I think that intuitively all of us recognize that sports participation and opportunities in our smallest communities are not what they are in our larger communities.

We have to be very careful, and I think there's a danger here, that this issue can become very divisive. I think it's important for us to first look at the problems and try to identify and better quantify those problems. Do we have discrepancies in the areas of funding or program availability? Is it facilities, Mr. Speaker, or is it about the volunteer core and the volunteer base? I think it's important to fully document these issues.

Another question we have to ask is, are all small communities or large communities equal across the Territories, or are there pockets of participation, pockets of success, and possibly best practices that we can look at and build from? I think there are. I think if you look at something like the success that a community like Rae-Edzo has had in indoor soccer, obviously something is going right in that community and something is being very successful. I think we need to look at examples like that and build from them.

I think the real issue, Mr. Speaker, is not so much more governance, more bureaucracy; it's more money. I think what we've got is a small number of organizations fighting and scratching and clawing for the very few, meager dollars that they can get their hands on, and I think that's the real problem. The way in which we fund sport in the Northwest Territories, Mr. Speaker, pales in comparison to many of the other areas, many of the other files that we have, and I think it's time that was changed, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to conclude my statement.