Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Amongst the leaders who were at the December 5th meeting, there was agreement that we would work toward an agreement-in-principle for the end of March. I had those same discussions earlier this week with Minister Prentice. He again indicated a willingness to work with us on it. He realizes there are some outstanding issues bilaterally between ourselves and the federal government that have to be resolved. We are going through negotiations on those. There may be some issues to be resolved yet from the aboriginal leaders, but everybody is willing to work toward that end of March deadline.

There is nothing magical about it, but I do want to move this one step ahead. After 20 years, we need to move to an agreement-in-principle during the life of this government. I am going to continue to stay focussed on that one. Yes, I believe we have enough leader support right now to continue on with that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Final, short supplementary, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I think that it is the wish of all of us, to see that sort of movement by the end of March. Mr. Speaker, I am wondering, I understand the difficulty of coming with everybody agreeing to everything in the North, but on the basis of what he has gotten out of that December 5th meeting and understanding that lots of...

Do you have a question, Ms. Lee?

Thank you. ...that there is a communication problem and participation program, what measure is the Premier taking to communicate as much as possible step by step on what progress he is making? We, the Members on this side, are not even aware of step-by-step communication content. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Speaker, I will be glad to meet with the Members at any time to answer questions or meet in committee or whatever to give you the step-by-step, if you want it week by week, update on where we are at. With aboriginal leaders, our staff in the devolution office is doing the regional workshops as we speak. They met yesterday with the Tlicho. They met last week with the Sahtu and the South Slave Metis. So, Mr. Speaker, we are doing as much as we can here. Certainly, I will be ready to answer any questions and update people.

Mr. Speaker, just by way of update, the last discussion I had with Minister Prentice was focussed on having a meeting about March 10th as the next meeting on this with the Minister of DIAND. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Oral questions. The honourable Member for Great Slave, Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. The honourable Minister of Finance, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this issue was raised with the department as well as the Liquor Commission and, in fact, have become aware that these temporary licences are being used in that manner. So we have taken the necessary steps to ensure that this does not proceed. In fact, temporary licences will no longer be used as proof of identification when they go to our liquor establishments. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Supplementary, Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Just recently in this Assembly, we passed some very stringent controls on the sale and access to tobacco products; however, it seems that we have not got nearly those kind of controls or regulations on the sale of liquor. Arguably, liquor is a much more damaging and dangerous controlled substance than tobacco. What controls, Mr. Speaker, are in place to monitor the actions of liquor stores with regard to purchases by underage customers?

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Roland

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, on the side of the companies that contract with us for the sale of our liquor products, there are processes through our contracting arrangements to deal with that. The bigger issue, I guess, is in the existing Liquor Act there is no real penalty for anyone who would alter an identification piece that they would provide as proof of identification. That is one of the other areas that we have to look into. In fact, as we are in the rewrite of our Liquor Act now, that is something that we can look to incorporating and strengthening within that process. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Supplementary, Mr. Braden.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. What kind of conditions are in place with the contractors who operate our liquor stores, Mr. Speaker, to be aware of persons who are underage and attempting to purchase booze? Are there training programs? Are there monitors? Are we checking into this? What are the consequences for this? What are the consequences for stores, for liquor outlets, not being on their game when it comes to watching out for this kind of thing? Are there any consequences for those contractors, Mr. Speaker?

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the areas of training for staff within the stores is something that does happen. In discussions with the Liquor Commission, we have, in fact, requested that this be stepped up. As well, the requirement now is that not only if a person comes to the till and asks or goes to purchase a product, at that point it was up to the staff to request a piece of identification if they felt someone was under the age of 19. We have now requested that anybody who appears to be under the age of 25 will be requested to show identification. We are taking some of those steps at this time to try and reduce the risk of underage purchases happening. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Oral questions. The honourable Member for Tu Nedhe, Mr. Villeneuve.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would just like to ask some questions to the Minister responsible for the Housing Corporation about some of the seniors' programs, or seniors' programs that are just not available, I guess, and if you would consider making it a program for seniors; some kind of a program that is responsive and simple for seniors to use. Like maybe a seniors'

emergency hotline or something similar to that nature. Mr. Speaker, I am getting a lot of inquiries from seniors who just need a furnace repaired or a nozzle changed and they don't have plumbers in every community or electricians available immediately or any qualified maintenance people in the small remote centres that can do the job tomorrow, or today, or next week. Therefore, there are delays and they have to move in with family members. Is there any appetite for the Housing Corporation to develop a program where they can respond to a senior who owns their own home but doesn't qualify for any emergency repair program, the seniors' maintenance program? Are there any options for seniors to use in the Housing Corporation list of programs that they have that they can alleviate all these small, minor problems, Mr. Speaker? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Villeneuve. The honourable Minister responsible for the Housing Corporation, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, the Housing Corporation has been reviewing its programs and its services. As I have told Members in committee, we are simplifying the programs to make it much easier for everybody to apply for assistance on home repairs or remediation. We are going to have one program so it's very simple for everybody to be able to apply. That will be the first step, because we have such a list of different programs that people didn't understand it. Second is we want to work more closely with the local housing organizations, who are responsible for public housing units, for them to be able to assist, or work, or facilitate repairs on homeownership units, where people have their own unit.

Mr. Speaker, I don't know if we could ever get it down to a few days in small, remote communities because every situation is a little different. We don't want to put a woodstove, for example, in a house that isn't designed for it. It could be a firetrap if we do that. So some of them will take a little bit longer and every situation is different. Where we can, we will respond quickly where we need to. It may take a bit longer for safety reasons or other reasons. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Supplementary, Mr. Villeneuve.