Thank you, Mr. Bell. Supplementary, Mr. Braden.

Mr. Speaker, this is all very useful and a lot of it is very new information for me and for us. I am wondering with respect to some of these major shifts in priority and emphasis, is the policy that is on the book still valid? The Minister sounds like we are rewriting or recreating policy on the fly here. I have to ask, is it time we undertake a formal review of what has been going on and where we should be going in the future, Mr. Speaker?

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Bell.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Well, improving how we deliver service I think is something that

we should constantly strive to do and that is what we are doing. I think, if the Member looks at the Rare Nature Campaign, he will see that this is heads and tails above our past efforts. I think it is because we have stopped trying to do some of this stuff in house, recognizing that we don't have the expertise in this field and needed to go to a private firm to effectively deliver these types of programs.

I guess I would also indicate to the Member that, when we decided that these functions that we would still carry out would be parceled up in other areas of my department, we notified committee. I could certainly provide the Member with the same information. We are prepared to have that discussion. If the Member would like us to broaden that out to AOC, beyond the Governance and Economic Development committee, we would be prepared to do that. But I would urge the Member to sit down and speak with the factories, and talk with the factories about the change in our support for the various different programs, and talk about the success that we are having in building a brand in, the partnerships, the joint efforts with Diana Kroll, with the effort of Bryant Park, the Golden Globe Awards. It is very easy to point to specific concerns maybe with one company that a factory has over pricing of rough, but there are so many things that are working well. I think we need to focus on that. But I would urge the Member to sit down, meet and discuss these issues with the factories to get a better sense of what we are doing as a government. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Final supplementary, Mr. Braden.

Mr. Speaker, the National Diamond Strategy was something that I was proud to see this Legislature and this government play a role in, but with all the resources that the Minister talks about still having to invest in is...He, last fall, wrote a letter to significant diamond retailers and our partners in the rest of Canada and said we were withdrawing our involvement and support for the National Diamond Strategy because we did not have adequate resources. Could the Minister explain for the Assembly, where is the lack of resources, then, if we can do it in all these other areas? What have we abandoned? What have we left behind by saying that we are no longer going to play a leadership role in a National Diamond Strategy, Mr. Speaker?

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Bell.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am certainly happy that the Member was proud of that initiative. We still think that national initiative will make sense in the future. At this point, we have the only operating mines in the country, so we sat down and talked with our local industry about how we move forward, and just recognizing that we have limited resources, recognizing our participation in this National Diamond Strategy. It was probably taking one person almost full time to talk to the factories because that is what we have been doing, is consulting with industry about where we could best focus our efforts and our resources. They said to us, and they were unequivocal, if you really want to help us, let us work on branding. Let's build this Rare Nature Campaign and never mind some of these national strategies right now. Let's build up the brand name, develop and establish our brands. When we have done that and we have been successful in that, then we can talk about national initiatives and national campaigns which, I am sure, have merit. But at this point, our priority has to be around supporting and bolstering our local effort. So we were responsive and agreed with the local cutting and polishing factories that that had to be our first priority, supporting the secondary industry, and national initiatives are nice. We will get back there at some point. This was the priority that industry came forward with. That is what we are following. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Oral questions. The honourable Member for the Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The honourable Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The department works very closely with industry in oil and gas and mining, particularly through the two ASAP programs, one for mining and one for oil and gas, as well as the pipeline operator training course which also is aimed at ensuring that we have northerners trained for operating the pipeline once one is built in the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, what obligations in terms of having the oil and gas companies take on these apprentices who have already finished and are ready to go into the journeymen certification? What type of obligations, enforcements, working relationships do they have to take on these apprentices in our communities? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The department works to encourage companies to take on apprentices in these industries. If funding is provided through ASEP for training programs, those programs are aimed entirely and exclusively at northerners. There are typically jobs at the end of the training programs, and the

funding can be used to make sure that people are ready for taking on apprenticeships with a company. The pipeline operator training course; I know that I met with the group of representatives of the companies who are overseeing that course two weeks ago, and they were explaining to me some of the challenges that they're finding, not just with people not being job ready. They are finding people who are job ready, but in some cases they're finding that they can't find enough people who would otherwise be able to take the jobs on who could pass the screening, the drug screening in particular.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, through the information of AHRDA there are 80 students in the Sahtu that are being funded through this education program with AHRDA. He has hit a sore point in terms of helping our students take this type of training and apprenticeship programs. What type of enforcement, or what type of laws or policy, beyond the encouragement of helping our students get into these oil and gas training programs and having the industry to really look at the seriousness of putting our people back to work, and having a drug-free workforce for the future? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I know that in talking to folks at the pipeline operators training course, the company representatives were very concerned about ensuring that the young people understand that the only way that they're going to get a job is if they are completely drug free when they take a drug test for employment. I talked to the companies, and their representatives tell me that they meet in communities with people, they make sure that young people who are looking at jobs are aware of this requirement. The Department of Justice and the Department of Education, Culture and Employment are working collaboratively to ensure that kids in school are aware that any kind of involvement in drugs or alcohol can seriously hurt your chances of an opportunity to get a good job, and we will continue to work really hard to make sure that more people are aware of that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Oral questions. The honourable Member from Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I said earlier today in my Member's statement, I was concerned about this one-sided letter sent to the producers. I don't see anything in there for the NWT, and I just can't allow that. Let's put the facts on the table, Mr. Speaker. A signed copy of this letter was slid under the door of AOC that evening that the letter was to be faxed out to the producers. I'm even surprised that somebody knocked on our door to let us know it was there. What about the timing? The Alaska project was already history by that time that this letter came forward. So unless the Premier knows that there was another gas field that was in the foreseeable future, the Mackenzie gas project appeared to be the only game in town. So, Mr. Speaker, I'm hoping the Premier will take these questions seriously, without trying to create some type of distraction when he made light of Mr. Braden not being able to keep up with Cabinet. Mr. Speaker, did we put our people first? I don't know. What did this letter do for the people in the NWT, and where are the benefits spelled out, to the people of the NWT, in writing? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. There's a couple or three questions there. The Premier can handle one, or all three. The honourable Premier, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Member tabled this letter and I trust he read it, I don't know. But if he didn't, I'll take whatever time is necessary to explain it to him. This is one piece of a big project. He asked the question, where are the benefits for the northerners. Well, Mr. Speaker, I'll tell you, there are a lot of benefits for northerners. There are jobs and business opportunities as a result of all this development. Mr. Speaker, there are taxes to be generated from this development. Mr. Speaker, there is a $500 million socio-economic impact fund. Mr. Speaker, there are the potential legacy projects we're negotiating on, on convertible housing, and on hydro. Mr. Speaker, there are lots of benefits to northerners.

Mr. Speaker, the whole purpose of negotiations is to arrive at a compromise. If everybody took what Mr. Hawkins is suggesting and said, no, we're not going to compromise anything, we would not have socio-economic benefits; we could not have the $500 million; we could not have access and benefit agreements; we would not have employment and business opportunities. We would all win, in somebody's eyes, and Mr. Hawkins' eyes, maybe, I don't know. But that is not the way to do business. This is one piece out of the whole project. Mr. Speaker, there are tremendous benefits to be had by northerners. We all have to compromise. The federal government had to compromise. Imperial has to compromise. Aboriginal leaders have to compromise as they negotiate, and so do we, Mr. Speaker. We all work together on this. We've got a huge, tremendous project that is worth billions and billions of dollars for our people here. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.