Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Again, I appreciate the Member's comments and suggestions. I know that the point that he brings up is one that we're very aware of. The number of visitors that we have coming in here and the Japanese tourists coming to the city are coming in fairly large numbers and we see them in here all the time. Those tours are put on through the Visitors' Centre and we do work in cooperation with the Visitors' Centre in working with those groups coming here. I think the suggestion that Mr. Braden is referring to what we could do here to maybe make them feel more welcome and maybe having a presentation, whether it's an audio tape about our building and some of the symbols that we have that are representative of the Northwest Territories would be something that would be very good to do. I think at the same time when we talk about something like this, we have to keep in mind the fact that we have 11 official languages in the Northwest Territories and it may be a good time to look at doing a presentation not only in Japanese, but in all our official languages as well...

---Applause

...and put something together that would make it a place for everybody to come and visit and make them feel a little bit more welcome. So I certainly appreciate the comments and, yes, I think that it's something that we should definitely look at and see where we can make some improvements in those areas that are not too big an expense. I think we certainly can find some areas to do that. So I will commit to look into some of those issues. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I was going to talk about the smoking area, but since I don't smoke it's not an issue for me anymore.

---Applause

I don't have my vehicle here all year, so I don't have parking issue. So that's not an issue with me.

---Laughter

Mr. Chairman, the comment that the Speaker made was in regard to page 2 of his presentation. The proposed reduction would have a noticeable impact on services provided to Members and the public-at-large. So I just want to know are we seeing the noticeable impacts right now. If we are, I haven't seen any. Is it something coming down the tubes that I should keep my eye out for or keep my glasses on in terms of some of the noticeable impacts that will be coming down the tubes that the Members would take notice on? Thank you.

Mahsi, Mr. Yakeleya. Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Although I don't think the Member has to sit on the edge of his chair to wait for something to hit him pretty hard and surprise him, there are some reductions that we did make that are going to affect all Members in how we operate in the Assembly. For example, the capital allowance for Members; we've made some decisions where we looked at the cost of a two-bedroom apartment and it was up to about $30,000. With the amount of available rental space in Yellowknife now, we think that the price has pretty well levelled out. So we decided to put the rent scale back to 2003-04 levels, I think it was, and that still allows for $27,000, which I think is still ample for a Member to get an apartment here in Yellowknife. There are even issues like the reduction in security out here after midnight, when Members can't get in from midnight until 6:00 in the morning; transcripts from committee meetings, if we don't think that they're an official meeting or that it's overly important that we have those meetings recorded, we've cut back on those services a little bit. But, all in all, I think that the cutbacks are fairly minor. So I don't have all the areas, but we do have them in here and I can certainly make those available to the Member. I don't think the Member has to worry about major cutbacks that are going to affect the Member in a big way; but if he wants the detail on all the areas where we have made some minor adjustments, we have the detail to give him that. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Speaker, in terms of being able to relax and not sit at the edge of the seat, the places that we are staying now in Yellowknife are really nice. I think we're okay. I'm speaking for myself, Mr. Chairman.

I wanted to talk about the Cultural Enhancement Commission and I think it was a really good move. In one of your documents, one of your goals is to include the promotion of the Legislature as a place of the people and the place of the people is here in the Northwest Territories. So I think you are following up that and I support that 100 percent.

I'm a little bit sceptical in terms of working on some of the issues that Mr. Braden indicated in terms of Japanese tourism, because of the conflict we may be in with other organizations in Yellowknife that are also vying for tourism with the Japanese. So I would be cautious in terms of that and where the money is coming from. So just a little caution there. I'm not opposed to this. I'm just being cautious in terms of what may happen or what may transpire.

For the Cultural Enhancement Commission, I look forward to the type of work that they're going to do in the Legislative Assembly and how this place is going to hopefully transform into a place that truly represents the culture and the values of the people in the Northwest Territories, especially the first people in the North; the aboriginal people. That has to really come out here. So I support that.

The issue of us as MLAs in our small communities and our constituencies, the demographics are so different that one region has an all-weather road and another region has fly-in for my community. Certain times of the year we can drive through the region on the winter road system. When we don't use the highways as the most economic means of travel, our budget seems to go up quite high. So I'm hoping that we can have some discussion in those areas in terms of looking at some of those numbers that would reflect the true cost of travel and doing our business in these communities that are higher than the southern parts of the Northwest Territories. I would appreciate a comment from the Speaker in terms of any type of consideration that has gone on within his department in that area. Thank you.

Mahsi, Mr. Yakeleya. Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. First I will speak a bit on the first comments that the Member had with doing something for the Japanese tourists in the building, and I just wanted to put the Member at ease that it wouldn't be a promotion for us trying to capture a tourist market, but they do come here anyway because of the Visitors' Centre and as part of their tour to the North. It would be something that would just be geared to making them aware that we appreciate the fact that they come here and having a little bit of a description about the building and some of our artefacts in their language, or that they could maybe put headphones and listen to that as they are going around the building. Again, it's an issue that has brought out some other important aspects about addressing that same issue with all peoples of the Northwest Territories and truly making them feel welcome when they come to the building as well.

I think the Member is referring to constituency budgets a lot there, and that was taken into consideration when they put the constituency budgets together. Some of them are quite a bit different. I think Mr. Pokiak has probably got the highest one because of the geographical area that he covers, or maybe it's Mr. Yakeleya that has the largest one, I can't quite remember. But I know that it's an issue that has been brought to the attention of the board a couple of times now, that should be looked at again.

We are in the process of establishing an independent commission to look at Members' compensation and benefits, and that will be one of the issues that they will be looking at. So as far as what we're doing from our office, we're going to put those issues to an independent commission to look at and make recommendations back to the Assembly. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to tell the Speaker, Mr. Chairman, that the services by the Legislative Assembly have been really good for me. Just

a comment to say that I appreciate the services that his department offers to me. I'm satisfied and that's why I say I don't see any noticeable impacts. Just a comment to give your staff a pat on the shoulder to say they are doing a good job, they are doing their best in helping us out as new MLAs and to let them know that I appreciate them. Thank you.

Mahsi, Mr. Yakeleya. Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I have a quick comment with regard to the Page program. It's a huge opportunity for our students from the regions to come to the capital for probably a week at a time, maybe two weeks at a time, to get involved in the Legislative Assembly. But I had an experience where I ended up paying for some of the costs like places for them to stay. It's coming out of my budget, then there's always that inequity where Yellowknife MLAs have Pages but they are not paying anything. So I would just like the Speaker to comment on that.

Mahsi, Mr. Menicoche. Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I know that this was an issue that came up in the 14th Legislative Assembly. As a matter of fact, I was one of the ones, as a Regular Member in the 14th Legislative Assembly, that pushed to have some kind of a program put in place and supported by the Legislative Assembly to bring Pages here to experience a week or two weeks of session. I think it's a very important program that we have. I know that in the 14th Assembly we did come up with a bit of a policy where the Legislative Assembly pays for two Pages per Member per session to come over here, and they pay the travel expenses to bring the Pages over. However, for the rest of the costs, the Member is still responsible for meals and for accommodations and then the Pages also get paid for the time that they put in here. So it is a very good program. It may be an area, as well, if Members put that down with the commission as an area that they would like to have reviewed again of whether it should be supported more by the Assembly, I'm sure that this independent commission would probably be more than willing to have a look at that as well. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I'll just end on this note that I don't think the commission has anything to do with the Page program. I think it has to do with the office and that they should pay for meals and accommodations. I don't know why it's coming out of my budget. Thank you.

Mahsi, Mr. Menicoche. Any further general comments? Mr. Zoe.

Mahsi, Mr. Zoe. Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I don't know if the Member wants to pursue the parking issue and the Cultural Enhancement Commission issue further. I know I've given kind of where we're heading with that area and it's something that we want to promote and we want to do in this Assembly. We realize the importance of it.

As far as the Pages program is concerned, again, that's certainly an area where maybe the independent commission that we're going to be looking at may be an area that they can look at. Not necessarily at the Pages program itself, but that they could take that into consideration and look at Members' budgets where the Member's constituency budget may be able to be bumped up, for example, to cover that type of a program or the Member could also put a request in to the Board of Management to have that looked at. We would have to

bring it up and see where we could find the money and do it. I know that the program is a very important program for everybody across the Territories, and it is costly to bring kids to Yellowknife to partake in that Pages program. I was probably one of the luckier ones, coming from Hay River, as far as travelling; probably one of the lower expenses travelling. I know for some Members from the north it would be very expensive to bring Pages down here. I am sure if the Member was to bring that issue and make it an issue to the Board of Management, we would look at it again. So I would encourage the Member to maybe look at that. He definitely made some good points that he is bringing up.

As far as the languages in the House, that is an area that we don't use a lot. We do have a budget for languages, the use of official languages in the Assembly here. It is not hard to get interpreters here to use the official languages. All that we do is we ask that the Member let us know ahead of time what day he wants to use his official language in the House, and we would bring interpreters in for that. So there is no set schedule but, if we do receive a request from a Member saying that he wants to use his official language in the House on that particular date, arrangements can be made for that.

The Speaker's program, again, the Member brings out some good points; all those things about the Speaker going around and making presentations at schools, or speaking, or putting on mock parliaments are all good suggestions. The Assembly used to do that a lot more in the schools. I think we have taken a step beyond that now where in our Youth Parliament we bring in kids. It is talked about at the schools quite a bit, and kids are picked from the schools to come here and take part in the Youth Parliament. Again, that has proved to be a very successful program and one that the students really look forward to coming and taking part in.

On other programs of what the Speaker can do to promote the Assembly and government, I know that we are working right now on doing a possible Mace tour of all the NWT communities, where the Speaker would go along with the Mace and explain what the Mace means, the symbolic meaning of the Mace and how it was created and made. There is an awful lot of history in it, and it is very much representative of the whole Territories. I think that would be a good program to take part in.

I am certainly open to go into schools and talking about the Assembly and the role and promoting this government. I think it is a big part of what the Speaker's job should be. I look forward to areas like that where I can take part in those events. Any suggestions that the Members have, we are certainly open to them. Thank you, Mr. Chair.