Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I certainly would rely on the Member’s support when we started looking at these types of a strategy. However, Mr. Speaker, I need to remind the Members, and remind the people in the Northwest Territories, that we need to continue investing down the Mackenzie Valley in terms of all our infrastructure and sometime we need to go back to the very basics of looking at the regions that do not have any type of all-weather road into the communities. However, I will keep that in mind when we come to that discussion when we have our regular meetings with committee in terms of putting together our plans and our strategies for the North.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Oral questions. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I wrote the Minister of MACA some time ago about my concerns about our lack of disclosure laws and consumer protection laws. The Minister wrote me back yesterday and I want to first thank the Minister for agreeing with me, because it’s quite obvious that the Minister denial training program hasn’t taken full effect yet because he did agree with a Member without a big study of saying no, no, nothing’s wrong. I see the Premier looking now.

---Laughter

Wait a minute; he’s going to recall the letter. But in the letter, Mr. Speaker, the Minister of MACA pointed out that they’re well aware of this concern about the lack of disclosure and consumer protection and they’re currently working on it, taking note of the fact that when someone buys a house or a car, they’re typically the largest purchase that a person will ever make in their lifetime, yet they seem to have the smallest amount of protection. So when the Minister says he’s working on this and they’re well aware of this problem, what do they know and what are they actually really doing by action? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. The honourable Minister responsible for Municipal and Community Affairs, Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m not sure if I was part of the Ministerial denial program that existed. I must have been bypassed by that. Mr. Speaker, there’s a number of areas that need to be improved in the area of consumer protection and we are looking at how we can provide better services, improve our services and improve our resources. The Real Estate Agents Licensing Act does have a statutory provision for disclosure that only applies to the salespeople and the agents. It doesn’t trickle down to the private sales. We need to improve in that area. We have to look at how we can do that. It’s going to require new legislation and will require new resources. We have to be able to identify that. That needs to be discussed with our colleagues here in the House as we set our priorities, if that’s an area we want to look at and invest in. We also need to look at the consumer mediation services. We also need to look at the additional demands being placed on us to increase our forms again. So there are a number of different areas and this is one of them that we have committed to looking at. We, however, have to see it as a priority from this government. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Well, Mr. Speaker, again, if you buy a house, it’s probably the largest purchase you’ll ever make. But if you find out, later on, the foundation’s cracked, it’s full of mould, and you’ve been sold a song that it’s the best house in the world and all of a sudden you find out that, you know, no one will ever want to buy your house again and the fact

that you can’t get insurance, you may run into trouble even getting a mortgage. Mr. Speaker, there’s no protection for these large purchases and that could break a hard-working family. So would the Minister agree that this is an important issue that could cripple a hard-working family, and would he tell me when they plan to move forward on this huge issue? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. First of all, we’ll have to have discussions on priorities of this new government. This is an issue that we’d like to see further discussion on. We’re not sure how much priority we can place on it. We haven’t received any complaints in this area about this full disclosure issue. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Well, if the Minister would like, I could provide him, too, as soon as we go upstairs, my couple of constituents. But the fact is, it isn’t so much that as we should be making sure we’re protecting our constituents. If this isn’t a priority, I don’t know what one is, Mr. Speaker, especially when he knows how difficult it can be. So the fact is, can the Minister bring back, before February, some kind of discussion paper to correct this problem, this lack of protection that we have for our consumers out there? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Obviously, this is a priority for the Member and I think we’ve heard the same radio, CBC Radio report and we can probably contact those people that spoke. Our office has not had any complaints along full disclosure. I’d certainly be willing to sit down and have more discussion with the Member. We need to hear from the Members of this House where the priorities are in terms of investment. This is going to require new legislation, new investment, new resources, and an ability to police it. So we need to have that all packaged so that the Members could understand it and see what it’s going to cost. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Well, no one’s suggesting we have to reinvent the new wheel. This type of law exists all over Canada, all over the U.S., so I’m not sure what we’re going to sort of reinvent. The fact is, this Minister could agree to a discussion paper before February so that we can fully address this issue and build it into the priorities. So would the Minister agree to commit to building a discussion paper so that we can look at the fullness of the issue and how it can possibly be implemented in this term? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think we already agreed that we need to have further discussions. Mr. Speaker, I should point out that we are having discussions with other jurisdictions. We are talking with our federal and provincial counterparts, discussions on some of the Canadian Motor Vehicle Arbitration Plan and the Consumer Measures Committee and others to see how we can move forward on this, to see what other jurisdictions are doing, and I’ll be glad to start looking and bringing something forward for committee to consider. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to continue to ask some more questions about the Diamond Jenness Secondary School in Hay River. Maybe this time I’ll direct my questions to the Minister responsible for Public Works. We have a lot of capital infrastructure as a government and there’s kind of an alarming trend I’m seeing here which I don’t like. When we have a building, we are the stewards of that building. We are required, like any homeowner or anybody who owns anything, to maintain that. Now, if we’re not going to be tearing down the Diamond Jenness Secondary School and we’re going to be renovating it, why are we letting it go so far into disrepair? I mean, the roof is leaking, the pipes are inappropriate, there’s rust in the water. I mean, there’s so many things wrong with it. Why are we letting it go so far? Some of these are not big ticket items to fix. Why can’t we do more maintenance on it? Do we have enough PWS tradespeople and resources in Hay River at the current time to maintain and keep in good repair the buildings that we have there? Thank you.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The honourable Minister responsible for Public Works and Services, Mr. Michael McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we did do a technical review and identified a number of areas that there are deficiencies on this infrastructure piece in Hay River. We’ve scoped out the project; we’ve put a price tag in 2006 dollars at $22.5 million. That information has been passed on to the Department of Education. This is a fairly old building. It was built in 1972. There has been a number of renovations since then. The latest one was in 1995 where we replaced the roof and did some work in the student service area and home economics room and resource centre. So we’re doing ongoing maintenance of the facility; however, it needs a serious retrofit and we’ve made those recommendations to the department and are waiting for their response. Thank you.

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

Mr. Speaker, my question is, do we have enough staff and enough resources in Hay River to try and maintain this building so that it does not deteriorate further and fall into further disrepair? If we’re going to do a retrofit on it, wouldn’t it make sense to try and stop damage from getting worse, from deterioration occurring? I mean, that’s kind of how I think. We’re supposed to be stewards of these resources that we have. That would make sense. Take the hospital, for example. They have a dedicated maintenance staff. There’s at least three or four people at the hospital who are dedicated to maintenance only. Who’s responsible for maintaining the high school and would it be worth looking at a dedicated maintenance person in that school? I mean, obviously the janitors can’t do the maintenance, the teachers can’t do it, so who’s going to do it? Thank you.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Mr. McLeod.