Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Under this new shop will come or perhaps will stay, depending on your perspective, Madam Chair, the responsibility for cleanup and working with other environmental regulators and agencies, especially in the federal government, to see what can be done to seek a final remedy for the many abandoned and contaminated mine sites that are there in the Northwest Territories. I wanted to ask the Minister in the budget proposed, what specific allocations are in place for addressing contaminated mine sites in the fiscal year 2005-06? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Bell.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The Member is right that that remains on our side of the department. Our environmental protection division both intervenes in environmental assessments, but also is involved in negotiations around cleanup of contamination of sites, specifically they are working on Giant Mine currently with the federal government. In terms of identifying money for cleanup, we believe that the cleanup of these sites are federal responsibilities and, therefore, have not identified cleanup money specifically in this budget. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I was of the understanding that at least on the Giant site, if not on others, as far as the responsibility for surface cleanup and contamination, that there was a shared responsibility and this was the kind of approach we were taking. With the federal government, we were trying to establish what proportion of responsibility each government was going to undertake. So based on that assumption or understanding, that is why I had asked in this coming fiscal year, had any allocation been proposed for the cleanup of the mine sites?

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Bell.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I hope the Member can appreciate we are in negotiations with the federal government around that very issue regarding Giant. There has always been some debate about surface responsibility. We know one thing clearly, that the federal government is responsible for anything related to waters on the surface and we are having an ongoing discussion around other issues. Of course, we don't budget based on hypothetical negotiations on where those might arrive, so we don't have figures in this budget. I don't want to get into too much detail around the specifics of our negotiating positions, vis-...-vis the federal government in this case. The Member is correct; we are sitting down, we are negotiating and we are attempting to move forward with a cleanup plan. Thank you, Madam Chairperson.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Braden.

Madam Chairperson, does the Minister anticipate that in the coming fiscal year we will have something agreed upon and tangible that we can look at, so we can at least finalize the Giant matter? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Bell.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. I am certainly optimistic that we can move forward in that regard. I have talked to the department around this issue a number of times. It is of highest priority in my opinion. I indicated yesterday that the deputy minister, Peter Vician, has been involved in numerous negotiation sessions and meetings with the federal government; those are ongoing. I assure the Member that we are doing as much as we possibly can to see this cleanup go forward. Thank you, Madam Chairperson.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Braden.

Related to that, Madam Chairperson, is the cleanup of the Con Mine site which is, I understand, still in the hands of the regulatory agencies to work out a plan and how it is going to be done. We also have the Colomac Mine site. It comes to mind, Madam Chairperson, as one that is a significant hazard.

I didn't want to infer that my interests stop only at the Giant Mine site. There are others in the territory. The federal government has indicated that it has put a significant amount of money in the hands of the federal environmental cleanup people and indicated that it is ready to put money to work in the North. I am hopeful, I'm optimistic that we are going to arrive at an agreement on how to go about this, but that federal money, Madam Chairperson, I don't think is going to be on the table waiting for us to get our plans together. There will be a finite time that we can tap this.

Are we also looking at those other environmental situations and are we mindful of the time limitations that there probably are on this money? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Bell.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. As the Member knows, we believe a key component of the Northern Strategy could be related to contaminated sites and cleanup. We think that this is critical to deal with now. We are cognizant of the fact that $3.5 billion dollars, I believe, has been identified by the federal government over 10 years. We want to ensure that we are able to take advantage of those monies within the Northwest Territories, because we know that there is much more cleanup to be done across the country than that $3.5 billion will allow for.

That is a priority and we are trying to move the agenda forward. The Colomac cleanup currently underway is entirely federal, I believe, Madam Chairperson, and I am not really sure of the status of that. I know that there are some steps being taken.

The ANR plan, the abandonment and restoration plan currently being developed at the Con Mine site, MACA is involved with this. There is a lease with the city, but the Member is correct, our EPS does sit on the working group reviewing that ANR plan. We continue to stay engaged on a number of these files and will continue to push the

federal government. I think you will see some additional focus on this through the Northern Strategy. Thank you, Madam Chairperson.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. The Minister mentioned the Northern Strategy and I guess I am a little curious about where that piece of work comes in. I was of the understanding that where the environmental cleanup allocation had been put aside for the northern mines was contingent on putting together plans that everybody could agree. That is fine, we are working on that, but now we have to factor in the Northern Strategy.

It's a continual revision and re-visitation of plans and strategies here. When are we going to stop and get the job done? I would like the Minister to clarify just what is our expectation or our obligation to pin ourselves down to get a Northern Strategy before we get some of these mines cleaned up? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Bell.

Well, Madam Chairperson, the Northern Strategy, I believe, will be much broader than that specific initiative. I think that we are going to have some discussion around this framework and talk about what our priorities are. I look forward to that discussion with committee.

Our sense is that this should be a comprehensive plan for dealing with Northern Canada. We think that this is one of the initiatives, potentially, that can be plugged in here.

The federal government really has the responsibility for the cleanup of these contaminated sites. There are monies identified in the budget. It is important that we keep our contaminated sites agenda on their radar. I think we are effectively doing that and that is one of the key priorities was Giant. We are in continual discussion with the federal government and I think we are certainly closer to a potential solution there than we have ever been. I wouldn't suggest that we need new strategies, new studies or waiting for new strategies and new studies in terms of cleaning up contaminated sites, especially the Giant site with the ongoing negotiations.

Things are not on hold waiting for strategies and studies. We are moving forward on these, but some of these initiatives and issues end up on parallel tracks. Thank you, Madam Chairperson.

Thank you, Minister Bell. General comments. Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. I just want to ask a few questions around the energy side of things. I know with the department splitting up, with ENR and ITI, there is an energy component on the ITI side as well as ENR side. I know we are on ENR now, but this is all relevant, I do believe.

Under ITI, the energy component there actually looks at hydro power. Given that the Power Corporation's recent endeavours to start up the Bear and the Taltson and work they are doing there, I am just wondering if the Minister can give us kind of an overview of what the government's role in energy and energy management is, given the fact that now we have got the Power Corporation, we have the Arctic Energy Alliance, we have an energy section in ENR, we also have an energy section in ITI. Thank you, Madam Chairperson.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Bell.

Thank you, Madam Chairperson. Yes, with the split of the department, I don't know if I am over simplifying this and we are looking here to make sure that this is correct, but my understanding is really that the supply side of issues will remain the responsibility of ITI. We are developing the energy policy unit that will help to provide us some guidance in terms of the initiative and issues that we have to come to grips with there.

Much of the demand side work, and I think the work that Arctic Energy Alliance has done in the past, I believe that the funding for that Arctic Energy Alliance, the base funding that used to come from RWED will come from ENR now, to help us deal with conservation measures and demand side issues. We do have energy conservation programs that remain in ENR and will be delivered by environmental protection.

That is essentially how we have rationalized this and I can talk about some of the energy conservation programs that have been undertaken in the past and those types of programs will continue going forward. Typically it is a breakout of demand versus supply side issues between the two departments. Thank you, Madam Chairperson.