Mr. Speaker, the environment is very important to us, as is the economy. I think it's important that we ensure that the resources are there for us to meet the needs of all NWT residents in this regard. I'd like to also indicate to the Member that when we looked at the breadth of responsibility in this one department, RWED, and compared it to other jurisdictions, Mr. Speaker, British Columbia has six different departments to handle this breadth; in Alberta, it's seven; Saskatchewan has four; Manitoba has eight; Ontario has eight; Newfoundland has five. We were dealing with one department for all of these mandates and, quite honestly, we didn't feel we were effectively organized and were afraid that some balls would be dropped and some very important things would be missed, especially with the magnitude of development on our doorstep, Mr. Speaker. So that really was the prime motivation.
Let's also keep in mind that we're hopeful we'll have devolution in the next couple of years. We've got to be a devolution-ready organization. I don't think we're there yet. We have something now that will provide us the framework. I think there's a lot more work to do and I don't think it is going to get done adequately with one department handling the lion's share of that responsibility. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.