Bonjour, mes amis. Welcome back from your summer break. This will be the last session before the dissolution of the 14th Assembly. I wish to inform the House that I have received the following message from His Honour Deputy Commissioner of the Northwest Territories: "Dear, Mr. Speaker, I wish to advise that I recommend to the Legislative Assembly of the Northwest Territories the passage of Supplementary Appropriation Act, No. 4, 2002-2003, and Supplementary Appropriation Act, No. 2, 2003-2004, during the Sixth Session of the 14th Legislative Assembly. Yours Truly, Cal Mains, Deputy Commissioner."

The chair recognizes the Honourable Member for Frame Lake, Mr. Dent, Point of Order.

Point Of Order

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a Point of Order today because I believe that a Member may have misled the House. Mr. Speaker, while the statement that leads me to this conclusion happened some time ago, it was not until August 15th of this year that it became apparent that Members had been misled. This is the first occasion the House has been in session since then and, therefore, the first occasion I have had to raise the issue.

Mr. Speaker, I will set out the details now. On February 21, 2003, Minister Antoine was asked in Oral Question 68-14(6) about the status of revisions for the business incentive policy by Mrs. Groenewegen. According to Hansard, in return to that question he said, "I have to work with my colleagues on the other side and the direction to date is not to move forward at this point in time because of one area with regard to cost. We are saying that we could probably leave this for the time being and introduce a registry to gauge what the costs are to have this policy in place. So at this point in time, the decision is for us to not proceed..." Mr. Speaker, with this statement, the Minister clearly advised the House, and since he used the royal "we," the government would not proceed with implementation of revisions to BIP. As his department, RWED, is responsible for developing the revised BIP and he was the lead Minister on the file, Members have every reason to take his word that no changes would occur.

Then, Mr. Speaker, on August 15, 2003, the Minister held a press conference to announce that the BIP was being revised as originally set out. So, Mr. Speaker, the Minister told the House that the policy would not be changed in February, then announced that it would be changed in August when Members were not in session. Had the Minister told the Members in February that he was still considering implementing the changes, Members would have had an opportunity, either in the winter or the spring session, to debate the issue, but the Members understood that we had the Minister's word that no changes were forthcoming. The Minister had further opportunity in June to set the record straight when we had our spring session, but he again failed to notify Members that he was considering such changes. Following meetings with committee, the Minister knew there was considerable interest in this issue and a lot of opposition to the proposed changes.

Mr. Speaker, by the way the Minister has handled this issue, he has deprived Members of the opportunity to debate significant change to a very important government policy. His statement in February that the policy would not be changed left Members no opportunity to publicly question the government. By that statement and his actions on August 15th, I submit he has misled the House. I believe the Minister owes this House, at the very least, an apology and a commitment not to implement the new policy until we have debated it in this House.

If he won't do that, Mr. Speaker, he should resign. Thank you.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Dent. I am bringing forward your Point of Order. The Point of Order was long. I will take that under advisement and report back to the House at the earliest opportunity as well.

Colleagues, today is a special day in this House and I would like to draw your attention to the new uniforms worn by the Pages on duty today. I am pleased to see the beauty of our northern landscape and cultural diversity captured by two of our most talented artists and featured on the new Pages' uniforms. The artists who created the beautiful vests are Karen Wright-Fraser of Whispering Willows and Suzan Marie of Bush Tea Resources. The vests are made of black stroud to represent oil in the North. The bottoms of the vest are trimmed with bias tape and ric rac in blue representing the rivers and the lakes, green for the trees and red represents the bright northern berries. The white caribou hide represents northern diamonds. A circular patch of smoked caribou hide symbolizes the moon, the sun and the drum of the Dene and the Inuvialuit on the back of the vests. Our brilliant northern lights are captured by beads, ribbons and cording. The beads represent the Dene people, the ribbons represent the Metis and the black cording is intertwined with colourful cording to represent all the different peoples living together in harmony under our northern skies.

Item 2, Ministers' statements. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Handley.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to provide Members with a brief update of the government's fiscal situation.

Later today, I will table the 2002-03 public accounts. I am pleased to note that this is the earliest the accounts have been completed meeting the target date recommended by the Auditor General. The accounts show a final operating deficit of $32.7 million, a significantly improved position compared to the forecast in February.

When I updated Members on our fiscal position in June, I noted that we faced considerable uncertainty with respect to population counts. Last week, Statistics Canada released revised population numbers for the period 1996 to 2003 which incorporate the 2001 census results and coverage studies. The numbers held some relatively good news for the Northwest Territories. The final NWT census net under-coverage rate was estimated at 8.11 percent. This final coverage estimate reflects a substantial improvement from the preliminary estimates released by Statistics Canada but is still below what we believe the actual undercount was.

The final coverage estimate of 8.11 percent was the result of considerable work between the GNWT Bureau of Statistics Canada and incorporated significant revisions to the Statistics Canada approach. While the result is still lower than our own estimate of 10 percent, and we continue to have concerns about some aspects of their approach, we are pleased that they did make some substantive changes to their coverage estimates. The Bureau of Statistics will now begin work with the federal agency on the 2006 census, to ensure that the same sorts of coverage problems are not repeated.

These new estimates will be used to calculate funding entitlements under the formula funding agreement with Canada. It is expected that the new estimates will result in a cumulative one-time positive adjustment to 2003-04 revenues of $35 million, which has lowered our deficit forecast.

In addition, Mr. Speaker, we have resolved, to our benefit, the issue of the calculation of our "tax effort factor" in the current formula funding agreement which expires in March 2004. This removes a major element of uncertainty from our short-term fiscal situation. However, the treatment of tax effort in the new formula financing agreement remains under negotiation and adds to our longer-term fiscal uncertainty.

The revenue gains we have achieved in 2003-04 have been partially offset by lower than expected corporate income tax revenues. We are undertaking research to determine the reasons for this as we expected better results given the level of economic activity and the anticipated profitability of corporate operations in the NWT.

On the expenditure side, we have achieved the $15 million short-term savings we targeted for 2003-04 without seriously impacting services to the public. Unfortunately, we were not able to constrain supplementary appropriation requirements as much as we wanted due to factors such as the severity of the forest fire season and the compensation increases to physicians. With our somewhat higher revenues, however, we are able to maintain our 2003-04 deficit forecast at $77 million.

Despite our improved short-term fiscal situation, Mr. Speaker, our medium to long-term fiscal outlook has not changed. Our revenue growth is being quickly outstripped by spending demands. Without significant spending reform, we are still looking at reaching the federally imposed debt limit of $300 million by the end of 2006-07.

As we said in the June session, there is no short-term or easy fix to this problem. We need to find creative solutions. The task teams we struck last winter to develop these solutions have continued their work over the course of the summer and will have options ready for consideration when the new government takes office in December. This will allow the 15th Legislative Assembly to factor some of these options into its agenda.

With appropriate funding from the federal government, I am confident that we can meet our fiscal challenges and still protect our ability to achieve critical objectives. The current negotiations for renewal of our formula financing agreement provide one of our best opportunities to secure adequate federal funding levels.

In May, I met with finance Minister John Manley to discuss the Prime Minister's commitment that the adequacy of our funding would be addressed. Over the summer, GNWT officials laid out our case in great detail with Finance Canada. I will be meeting with Minister Manley at the end of next week to review progress on these discussions.

Another key piece of our fiscal picture is the devolution of resource revenues along with a fair net fiscal benefit. It is essential that we make progress in these discussions and finalize a devolution arrangement as soon as possible. We cannot continue to hear the costs of development without access to the fiscal benefits.

Mr. Speaker, we all know the Northwest Territories' economy is vibrant and strong. The Premier's recent trip to North American business centres to promote the NWT has once again brought international recognition of our vast potential to the fore. NWT leaders are working together to promote and manage sustainable and responsible resource development. The federal government is starting to recognize the legitimacy of our issues and the quality of our plans and strategies. Although we still face many challenges, opportunities abound. If we continue to work together for the betterment of all NWT residents, we will make the NWT a success story politically, culturally, economically and socially. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Item 2, Ministers' statements. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Ootes.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise to inform the House that later today I will be tabling the Government of the Northwest Territories' response to the final report of the Special Committee on the Review of the Official Languages Act.

Mr. Speaker, the Government of the Northwest Territories acknowledges the tremendous amount of time, effort and care that has gone into developing "One Land, Many Voices." This pivotal report of the special committee, which was two years in the making, was tabled in this Legislative Assembly during the March 2003 session.

We understand that at the heart of the special committee's report there is an abiding respect for the role that languages play in the lives of our citizens and of the value that languages contribute to our culture and society.

The Government of the Northwest Territories shares these views and goals of the special committee and is committed to ensuring that the findings of its report are implemented to the greatest extent possible and in the most expedient time frame.

The Government of the Northwest Territories' response outlines in detail the ways and means by which the government intends to action, both immediately and over time, the special committee's recommendations.

Mr. Speaker, as detailed in the Government of the Northwest Territories' response, it is our intention to give immediate effect to a number of the special committee's recommendations by way of a bill to amend the Official Languages Act that I would give notice of first reading this afternoon.

As recommended by the special committee, the bill defines the powers and duties of the Minister under the act. Through this bill, the government proposes to establish in legislation an aboriginal languages revitalization board with representatives from all official languages, aboriginal language communities, with a mandate to advise the Minister responsible on government and community efforts to maintain, promote and revitalize aboriginal languages.

This bill will concurrently establish in legislation an official languages board with representatives from all official language communities of the Northwest Territories to advise the Minister responsible on the administration and delivery of services by the Government of the Northwest Territories. Each board will be able to make recommendations to the Minister within its respective mandate.

Additionally, the bill will:

• • amend the preamble to the act to recognize the important role of language communities in preserving and developing their own languages;
• • recognize North Slavey, South Slavey, Inuvialuktun and Innuinaqtun in section 4 of the act and remove them from the interpretation section;
• • remove repealed sections of the act and correct spelling, terminology and translation errors;
• • include provisions requiring the government to respond to the annual report of the Official Languages Commissioner within 180 days of tabling the annual report;
• • include provisions for the recognition of the collective language rights of aboriginal people within their homelands;
• • include provisions for smaller scale evaluations every five years beginning in 2008; and finally,
• • the bill addresses the role of the Languages Commissioner.

Mr. Speaker, as the report of the special committee indicated, some of the proposed recommendations will take longer than the remaining term of this government to implement. For those findings that cannot be implemented during the balance of the

14th Assembly, this public response should be viewed as a strong recommendation for a course of action that may be undertaken by the government of the 15th Legislative Assembly.

Mr. Speaker, we know that languages are of untold value for individual and cultural identity and social well-being in maintaining the collective history of the Northwest Territories and in preserving cultural diversity. Once again, I refer back to the words of the special committee, "Languages are about our identity -- who we are and how we understand and interact with each other and the world around us."

I'm proud as a Member of this Assembly, Mr. Speaker, to be able to present the Government of the Northwest Territories a course of action designed to ensure that the voices of the people of the Northwest Territories are heard in whichever language they choose to speak for generations to come. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Item 2, Ministers' statements. The honourable Member for the Sahtu, Mr. Premier.

Thank you. Item 2, Ministers' statements. Item 3, Members' statements. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, over a year ago the Minister of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development released draft revisions to the business incentive policy. Since then, he's heard from Members of this Assembly and from the business community that not only do the revisions not fix the problems with the existing policy, but they create even more problems.

The Standing Committee on Accountability and Oversight has consistently asked for a cost-benefit analysis of the business incentive policy so Members can make a rational decision about what is really broken and how we should fix it. Without this information we can only guess at the possible consequences of the revised policy.

I and others were lead to believe that the Minister had understood this and had agreed not to proceed with the changes when he said in the House on February 21, 2003, and I quote, "We could probably leave this for the time being and introduce a registry to gauge what the costs are to have the policy in place. So at this point in time the decision is for us not to proceed, but to have a mechanism in place developed by Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development."

Mr. Speaker, imagine everyone's shock when the Minister announced in the middle of the summer, while most Members were in their constituency or away on holiday, that the revised business incentive policy would be coming into force on October 15, 2003. As one of my constituents asked, what has happened to consensus government?

Mr. Speaker, Hay River businesses are worried about the caps that the Minister is planning to have in place in less than two weeks time. To take the construction industry as an example, there are a lot of projects out there that cost more than $1 million. So if a general contractor is able to get a large project, once they've accounted for the first million dollars with northern labour what incentive is there for them to hire local sub-trades for the rest of the project? People have also told me that their businesses will be badly hurt if the policy no longer applies to boards, agencies and municipal governments.

Mr. Speaker, how can the Minister know, without having looked at the costs and benefits of the existing policy, what consequences his changes will have for Northwest Territories businesses? How can he go ahead with this when he knows that there are serious concerns out there that have not been addressed?

Mr. Speaker, at the appropriate time I will be directing questions to the Minister and ask him to do the responsible thing, which is to delay any changes to the business incentive policy until his department has the facts and has done something to address the concerns raised by the Members of this House and by the public. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

---Applause

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Item 3, Members' statements. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, Miramar Con Mine recently announced that they would close underground operations at one of the oldest operating mines in North America. Con is located in my constituency, Mr. Speaker.

The closure of Con Mine will have an impact on us all. Of course, the biggest impact will be felt in Yellowknife where significantly fewer dollars will flow into the local economy. However, if a significant number of laid off miners were to leave the North, the Government of the Northwest Territories transfer payments would suffer. That would have an impact on everyone in the Territories.

Mr. Speaker, our Statistics Bureau tells us that the salaries lost with these nearly 200 jobs disappearing will be $15 million a year. On top of that, Miramar has been spending an additional $24 million a year, much of that with northern firms.

Mr. Speaker, we hope that many of the affected workers will be able to find other jobs in Yellowknife, but if none of them could the Statistics Bureau estimates the closure would result in up to 350 direct and indirect job losses. So the potential loss to our transfer payments is staggering. We have to do our best to help these residents stay in the North.

Mr. Speaker, on top of losing their jobs, some 25 families may no longer have a place for their homes with the closure of the trailer camps on the mine site. They will face having to relocate or lose their homes just after they lose their jobs. The problem is made worse because there may not be enough vacant mobile home lots in town to move the mobile homes that are currently at the Con Mine trailer park. For many of the homes, relocation may not even be possible because of changes in the building code since they were installed that make them uneconomic to bring them up to current code, as is required when mobile homes are relocated.

So, Mr. Speaker, on behalf of those residents, this government must continue to try to help to work out a deal between Miramar, the Government of the Northwest Territories and the City of Yellowknife to let the residents purchase the land and stay where they are. My constituents in the Con Mine trailer camp have been working for years to try and work out a reasonable solution. The Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs, Vince Steen, has worked on behalf of the Con camp residents and was instrumental in bringing the management of Con Mine back to negotiations. I'd also like to recognize the efforts of Premier Kakfwi. Since the announcement of the closure, he has coordinated and chaired several meetings of Ministers and has brought the mayor, mine management and union officials together with Members of his Cabinet and senior staff to focus on the most important of people involved in this crisis: the affected Miramar employees, in particular the residents of the trailer parks.

Mr. Speaker, the City of Yellowknife has been a partner in discussions about the potential transfer of the land to the residents for quite some time. In spite of the upcoming election and the new council that will be elected, I hope the city will continue to work diligently to assist the residents of Con camp to keep their homes. Time is of the essence.

I also urge the Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation to consider assisting residents of Con as he did the residents of the Husky Trailer Park in Inuvik. Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to conclude my statement.

Thank you. The honourable Member is seeking unanimous consent to conclude his Member's statement. Are there any nays? There are no nays. You may conclude your statement, Mr. Dent.

Thank you, honourable colleagues. Mr. Speaker, it would be important to encourage the employees of Miramar Con Mine to try to remain in the Northwest Territories. Many are skilled trades people, and Minister Ootes and the Department of Education, Culture and Employment and Human Resources Development Canada are working together to find other opportunities for those that would like to work here in the North. Many of my constituents who have been affected have lived in the North for a long time and contribute to this town in many ways.

Mr. Speaker, all residents of Yellowknife will be affected by the closure of Con Mine. As part of Yellowknife's heritage, economy and skyline, the closure of the mine will be felt by all of us. However, I believe that if we continue working together and focus on what is possible, it can reduce the negative effects of this closure and help affected employees continue with their contribution to the North. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Item 3, Members' statements. The honourable Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'd like to raise an issue that comes around about this time of year, every year almost. As long as I've been a Member of this Assembly it comes out. This time of year brings about many changes; changes in the colour of our environment from green to red to yellow and soon to white as the snow covers the ground. But, Mr. Speaker, along with that it seems that an annual mailing or seniors that go into the income support offices to apply for seniors' fuel subsidies get their application forms and have to fill them out.

Mr. Speaker, it's been brought to my attention that these forms have become increasingly more difficult to fill out and understood by many of the seniors who own their own homes. If you're not a high school graduate or have a degree in something or another, it's difficult to go through these forms.

Mr. Speaker, I have had an opportunity to review these forms with seniors and, indeed, it would take quite a bit of effort to go through the whole process to make sure you qualify. In fact, they've been signing the documents to say that if you have not put the accurate information down you're liable. Mr. Speaker, not only do seniors in small communities find this a concern, it's almost like an insult that we're not taking their word for granted. Now there are cases, Mr. Speaker, that probably brought this to the department so that they had to address it in these forms, but, Mr. Speaker, I think we've gone too far. We've made it too difficult for seniors to go through these forms to qualify for the fuel subsidy.

So, Mr. Speaker, I have questions for the appropriate Minister, but I'd like them to consider that they look at why they're doing these forms and making it even more difficult. Is it in fact so that they can save more money? So that they don't have to give more funds out to seniors who own their own homes? That it's so difficult that they feel like it's not worth going through the hassle? Or is it just because they're trying to curb some misuse of those funds? I'll have a question for the appropriate Minister. Thank you.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Item 3, Members' statements. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mr. Delorey.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, every year the residents of Hay River, and in particular the residents of Old Town and West Channel, find themselves at the mercy of Mother Nature and faced with the question of how will all the ice and water caused by spring breakup find its way out to Great Slave Lake without damaging their homes and properties?

It is not easy, Mr. Speaker, to predict what events will unfold and what actions residents should take to protect themselves and their property. Equal uncertainties are faced by town administrators and what actions they should take. Over the past several years the town has taken a number of steps to guard against flooding, at a considerable expense to the town, I might add. However, Mother Nature is, as I have stated, unpredictable and the power of the water and the ice tends to take its own course and make up its own mind as to what time of day or night the big push will come.

Mr. Speaker, this past spring the big push happened on April 30th. Unfortunately, the safeguards put in place by the town were not sufficient to protect all properties. On that date, Mr. Speaker, I was in Fort Providence on standing committee business when I received a call that I should come home as my constituents were phoning for me. I made arrangements and arrived home at 1:00 a.m. on May 1st and was shocked to see the amount of water and ice over roads and covering residents' properties. I was also informed that all residents of West Channel had been evacuated from their homes.

It became very apparent to me, Mr. Speaker, that the residents would be suffering financial losses and would be seeking some sort of compensation. I put a request in to the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs to come to Hay River and witness the situation. Mr. Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to thank Minister Steen and our Premier, Stephen Kakfwi, who came to Hay River and had a look through my riding and Hay River Reserve.

Unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, I hadn't invited them strictly for a site-seeing tour. I had them there knowing that I was going to be approaching them for some sort of funding. All summer I have waited and told my constituents that the Minister was looking at some sort of package and that I was looking forward to some positive outcomes.

On September 9th I received a letter from Minister Steen that none of the claims fit into any of their programs. So they would not be compensating anyone.

Sorry, Mr. Delorey, your time for your Member's statement is over. Mr. Delorey.

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

The honourable Member is seeking unanimous consent to continue his Member's statement. Are there any nays? There are no nays, Mr. Delorey. You may conclude your statement.