Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yesterday, I met with the chair of the governance council. We discussed the issue that has been raised in this House by members of the industry with my office. I did ask the chair to make sure that, this week, during the governance council meetings, they review the situation that has been brought to their attention by the franchise operators. I was informed that it is on the agenda for their discussions this week. So the governance council will be considering it. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, these franchises that have brought forward this concern wouldn't need a new category or be screaming for different rates if the rates were fairly spread across the board which, what I am saying is, basically, if we had safety practices, procedures and policies out there organized by these sort of bad businesses, then they wouldn't need a new category that fairly represents what they do. What is the Minister doing to help promote safety policies and safe practices in the workplace? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The WCB does have a safety program. They have a regular follow-up with employers who have poor safety records. They do work with those employers to try and make sure

that they have programs in place to bring down the incidents of unsafe work practices. That is something that is taking place right now. Also, the WCB does have a program in place to reward those businesses that have a good safety record. I understand, though, that the program right now is focussed on larger employers and would hit right now those employers who are slightly above the amount of payment that we are seeing from the franchise operators. I believe that the governance council is going to take a look at that issue this week, as well. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Final supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Minister pointing out that the reward program, yes, it actually is exempt to almost all of those franchises that we are talking about. They are exempt from that, I think, except for one. It really doesn't affect most of them. Mr. Speaker, can this Minister tell me today if anyone was ever fined, or has WCB worked towards removing someone's business licence or whatnot because they have demonstrated clear, bad safety practices that, yet again, their rates are reflective on the good businesses that have good safety operations? Have they ever pulled a licence, or what dramatic steps have they ever done? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am not sure that the WCB can pull a business licence. I guess they could consider cancelling the coverage and that would, in effect, put many businesses out of business. I don't know if they have done that. I do know that the WCB has gone to court; has taken employers to court for unsafe work practices. I would suspect that they will continue to do that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Oral questions. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The honourable Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs, Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we were advised in the spring of this past year that the requirement for passports was going to be an issue. We were advised by the host society. We were also advised by the international committee that all countries should ensure that athletes and the mission staff have passports. We were also advised by the United States government that they may be proposing or that there was consideration of increasing the security requirements. They could not ensure that anybody that didn't have a passport would get across the border. We, then, in turn, or the Sport North Federation who is responsible for delivering and managing the Arctic Winter Games programs for the Northwest Territories, advised all of the sports groups, the organizations and the communities. That information was out there for a considerable amount of time. The regional recreational officers all knew about it. The community recreation people also knew that there was going to be this requirement. For the most part, it was followed. We did not allow anybody that took part in the territorial trials to participate unless they had their applications filed. That went very well. We have had 336 participants that took part and 200 and some of these are athletes. There is some concern that there were a small few who are not receiving their passports on time. We are trying to work around it. We are trying to find an alternative by using a birth certificate or a government ID. We still have not received confirmation that the border will let us use this documentation, but we are working on that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Supplementary, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in hindsight, is there anything that the government could have done to be a little more proactive about this? Obviously, passports are a government-issued document. Birth certificates are a government-issued document. Certainly, there are ways, everyone knows, where passports and the issuance of them can be expedited on behalf of dignitaries and elected officials. On a government-to-government basis, especially for the departments such as our own department of vital statistics, was there nothing this government could have done to be more proactive to ensure that these young people wanting to compete could have had passports? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Mr. McLeod.

Mr. Speaker, I'm not sure what else we could have done. The Sport North Federation did work with the RCMP, the retailers, photographers. We advised our RDOs, our recreation development officers. The community recreation officers

knew of the situation, they knew there were requirements. They helped fill in the applications. We also directed people that did not have the sufficient funding, to go through the kids funding program where they could have gotten assistance, or received assistance. So I'm not sure what else we could have done that would have been different. This is not the first time that there was a requirement for passports. Sport North has dealt with the passport issue when there was an Arctic Winter Games hosted in Greenland, for example. So it's something that's been required before and we've done, I think, everything that we could do to cover all the angles on this issue. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final supplementary, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think we need to send a message to those athletes who wanted to participate but were precluded from doing so because of bureaucratic-type barriers and obstacles that were put in front of them. Mr. Speaker, I need to tell the kids in my community something about how this government feels about how things went, and to the parents and to other people here, and I don't know what to offer them as a solution. But I think this is a distinct case where the rules changed in the middle of the game, and I think that that sends a very bad message to our youth. I want a clear answer from the Minister right now, are athletes going to be going to the Arctic Winter Games after all this around passports? Are there athletes in the NWT going to the Arctic Winter Games without passports? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Mr. McLeod.

Mr. Speaker, I can't confirm that at this point. We know that there are some athletes that have applied...Everybody has applied for their passport, but there are some athletes that the passport office has sent back their application and is requesting more information. I don't have a firm number on that as of yet. We are working on that. We know that it hasn't restricted the number of athletes from applying or taking part. This year in our regional trials, we've had 1,300 athletes take part. That's 200 more athletes than we did in 2004. We had five more communities take part this time around than we did before. We had smaller communities getting involved. I think there's a lot of things we could point to that are showing that the Arctic Winter Games are becoming increasingly popular. But as to if there are any youth or athletes travelling to Alaska without a passport, I'd have to confirm that later. We don't have that information as of yet. We are hoping that we're going to have all our athletes and all our mission staff with passports when they leave here. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Oral questions. The honourable Member from Kam Lake, Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, a year ago there was much discussion in this House on the government's handling and consequential loss of $11 million, or thereabouts, in dealing with the secondary diamond industry here in Yellowknife; the failure of a couple of factories. There was much discussion at that time about government support; what was in place, how we were looking at the industry, and how we could support that industry. At that time, the Minister committed to going about a cost-benefit analysis of the industry so that Members of this House could see how much money the government has invested in the secondary industry; how much benefit that industry brings to the local economy of the Northwest Territories. Mr. Speaker, my first question for the Minister would be whether or not that report that his department concluded in October would be available for public viewing. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. The honourable Minister responsible for Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. Bell.