I don't see the contradiction because it's not the Caribou Outfitters Association that is requesting the judicial review, it's some individual parties. I'm not going to get into it, Mr. Chairman, but clearly we don't have to grind all industry support to a halt, and we're not.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Ms. Lee.

Okay. So then let me just give the Minister an opportunity to explain exactly what is he doing for those who are not suing the government.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Minister.

Mr. Chairman, as I just indicated to one question a minute ago, we are working with the Barren-Ground Caribou Outfitters Association to help them and assist them in putting together a presentation that they will take to the Wekeezhii Board. We're also working with the association to talk about some potential scenarios for aid and assistance for the industry generally. Then, individually, as we always have in the past and will continue in future, we work with individual businesses in the areas of business planning, business relief, marketing, Mr. Chairman. We continue to do that.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Ms. Lee.

Thank you. On that, I had asked questions in the House about the interest I had in learning more about what the involvement of the Minister was in preparing for the ENR's changes to tags and such, but I realize that I don't want to go there because I don't want to jeopardize the government's position, understanding that they are in litigation and we have to stay out of that process. However, outside of that, would the Minister be coming to us with information on exactly what he will be providing to those who are not in litigation and those that the Minister, in the outfitter's industry, who is...You know, the Minister keeps mentioning compensation package or assistance or some kind of assistance and I don't think it's fair to raise expectations out there and to make it look as though the government can do a lot in terms of compensation but not be able to. So I think that the Minister should be more clear about the extent of assistance we're giving out, especially in light of...I'd like to ask, I don't know if he can clarify at the moment and I'd like to ask the Minister for a commitment to come to the Members about what plans he has for that industry.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Minister.

Sure, Mr. Chairman. To be very, very clear, I haven't talked about compensation and won't talk about compensation; we're talking about assistance to the industry, individual assistance. We're talking about marketing assistance, not compensation, Mr. Chairman. So I'm prepared to come before committee and talk about the work that we're doing with the Barren-Ground Caribou Outfitters Association. As I've indicated earlier, I'm sure that organization would be happy to share a copy of the presentation to go to Wekeezhii. Members will see it as it goes to Wekeezhii, and we can talk about the other assistance and programming that we currently have on offer and are providing to the outfitters. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Ms. Lee.

I've already stated my position on how, I mean, you know, helping with the presentation, that's fine, but I don't think that could be flogged as a proactive or substantial involvement in assisting the industry. Now the Minister stated that the department is interested in helping with marketing. Now, I don't know how to pose this question without talking about the tag issue but if we have an industry that's suffering, what exactly does he mean by marketing assistance? Does that involve any money? What is that exactly that the Minister is doing with this industry that's in a little bit of an uproar over, you know, litigation and reduction in tags? Could he be more specific about what exactly marketing assistance is?

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Minister.

Mr. Chairman, of course, it depends. The work that we do with individual business, it depends on their business plan, where they propose to market, the show that they intend to go to, where they want to sell their hunts. So the nature of the marketing support can differ by businesses. We do have core marketing support though the Tourism 2010 Strategy for the industry and certainly I'd be prepared to come to committee and we could bring the president, I'm sure, who'd be interested in talking about the marketing that the organization, that the industry has done as a whole, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Ms. Lee.

Thank you. I've had regular discussions with the president of the association before this issue and during and I'd certainly be interested in hearing how we do marketing assistance for a business that has to substantially reduce their operation. But anyway, I'll leave it at that because, you know, we've been going back and forth on that.

I just want to spend a last minute talking about the arts and crafts issue and under traditional economies I looked for a Minister's statement on how we could better improve the arts and crafts industry of the North. The Minister mentioned earlier about Member Groenewegen talking about how difficult it is to buy arts and crafts in communities and I was part of that discussion, too. We talked about that a year ago, but to this day you can't go to Aklavik and go down to Aklavik fur shop. In Fort Providence you go to the inn and you could ask to have access there. In Fort Simpson you have to chase around the guy to open the shop there; I've never been able to go in there. I think maybe the best crafts you can get are in Enterprise at Winnie's shop, but, you know, traffic, regular highway traffic. Over the last two or three weeks I've been watching the marketing campaign we have, Look Up North -- it's very impressive -- and I'm just wondering if the people who did decide to come up, why is it that with all the money we spend we can't, even those of us who can go to communities and want to buy things, can't. Yet, the paradoxical part of it is when we were in Simpson for the NWT Games, we had ladies coming up to us with their goods wanting to sell them to us. Everywhere we go, people want to sell them to us. Diamonds are good, oil and gas is good, great. Diversification of industry is so important. Website is not the biggest issue. I mean, we could sell things on e-Bay. What is the government doing? Where is the government going to make sure that in every community people could go and buy these crafts? Right now, we're getting into such exclusive markets that unless you get somebody custom making for you, we can't get jackets made or buy jackets or, I don't know. I'd like to ask the Minister about, in all of his work with the computer database and the people working in Yellowknife, PYs under the arts and crafts section, all the promotional campaigns, what improvement have we made as a government since last year, that we had the same discussion, about how we could support the arts and crafts makers to make their things and be able to sell them? Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Minister.

Mr. Chairman, I think we now have the successful arts and fine crafts database and although the Member makes the point about e-Bay and any of us could go on e-Bay, I think many of these artisans need the help in developing this sort of an online resource which we've provided. I think the other point I would make is that it's not solely targeted at individuals going on who would purchase goods. The idea is to have retailers go and look and see our list of artisans, see the product that they can provide and then provide them the conduit to talk to those people and to talk about the level of supply that they could provide. If you're a retailer, you're going to want to know that there's going to be a consistent supply; you're going to want to know how many jackets or pairs of slippers can be produced in a month. If you're going to make commitments and decide that you're going to sell this in your retail outfit, you're going to need to know that there's a consistent supply. So it will take some time for retailers to get familiar with this and decide that they want to carry more of these arts and crafts in their shops, but we're hopeful that that can continue to build.

As I mentioned, we decided some time ago, as a government, to get out of the business of directly selling and competing with some of the retailers, some of the art galleries, so this is what we are doing to support individually those artisans. We don't think that everybody has the technical capability to set up a similar operation online and/or use e-Bay effectively, so this is something that we think we can do.

In addition to that, I would point out, Mr. Chairman, we're much closer to having this branding and promotional program rolled out which will help brand our goods and help differentiate them from some of the other goods for sale out there. That can be successful in ensuring people

recognize and know that this is genuine NWT handicrafts. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. I don't have anybody else on the list for...Okay, I've got Mrs. Groenewegen, then Mr. Yakeleya, then I'll go back to Ms. Lee. Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to sort of jump in here where Ms. Lee left off with respect to the arts and crafts sector. I think we have to talk to the artisans themselves and find some creative ways to market this stuff. It is true, it varies by community. On a day when somebody comes up to you and actually has a nice quality article to sell, it's just a happy lucky day for you, you know, if you can afford it. I have to tell you, these folks need some mentoring, and they need some support, too, because a lot of them are great artists and not such great businesspeople. I can tell you some examples of where sometimes people need money for something and they end up selling their stuff, they don't have a venue to sell it, they're selling it on their own, and they end up selling it for far less than what it's actually worth. There are all kinds of scenarios that evolve. The reason why I say I think we should talk to the artisans themselves...I have to tell you something else, buying something in a store or an art gallery isn't nearly as interesting as buying it from the person who made it. I know we have this little thing in Hay River on Saturdays in the summertime -- it's called the Fisherman's Wharf -- but anybody can show up there and go into a little kiosk and sell anything that they've made. Maybe we need to create venues like that where if you go to assemblies, inevitably somebody's got a table set up and people can bring their stuff, but it's all very informal and it's all very just kind of spontaneous; it's not something that we planned for. I think there are activities that take place in the Northwest Territories where there would be people around that would be in the market to buy things and people who could supply them and I think we need to look for more opportunities to match that up.

I'll give you an example. There was a lady from Deline who made a beautiful beaver skin coat and she brought it down to Hay River the other day, all the way from Deline on the winter road, and wanted to go back with supplies, but she needed to sell this coat in order to do this. Well, it's kind of hard to walk around Hay River and find the person that should buy this coat. I tried to help her out, but inevitably I think she might have practically given the thing away just to get some money to buy groceries to put in the truck to go back to Deline with. There's not always a lot of planning and maybe the concept of operating it like a business in the sense that you put some money away for another day, it's very...It's set up in such a way that I feel that sometimes the people who are in the arts and crafts business actually don't realize what they should do for their product. I just think the government needs to spend more time talking to the folks that make these things and try to find venues...and they don't always feel really happy either about putting them in a store where the price gets marked up double. I mean I'm not saying anything against people who try to retail this stuff, but it doesn't make people feel really good either.

So I have a lot of ideas about the arts and crafts business in the Northwest Territories and I really support these people, that they have a very unique gift and unique products and, like I said, I think it would mean so much more to people who are buying them if they bought them directly from them. I'll probably get e-mails now from people in the retail sector. But even a venue set up where people could work on their product in a place people could come, would come on a certain day, even if it was only one day a month or one day a week, where people could come and they'd have a place to work; like a sewing centre in the community, like they have in Nunavut, they have the print shops. If you go to the community for something, you can go there, people are working there, they're making them but at the same time you can buy one. If you go to Dene Fur Clouds in Fort Providence, the people are working there, they're creating product, but you can buy it. Maybe some funding for sewing centres in the communities where people have a place where they could get together, they could socialize, they could make things and then there would be an opportunity for marketing, as well, but some kind of support so that they don't end up kind of getting less than what the real market value for their product should be.

Those are just a few of my ideas on supporting the arts and crafts. I have ideas, but I think we need to hear from the folks that are in the business. I think you would find if you did survey and consult with them, that sometimes they just feel that it's discouraging that they aren't able to get more and have avenues to market their product through. Thank you.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Comment, Mr. Minister.

I certainly agree with the Member. I think there's huge potential here and it is going to be about being creative. I think it's also going to be driven by communities, in my opinion. I look to the work that Mr. Pokiak has done, the Ulukhaktok print shop and the work to try to get that off the ground, there's consideration of that underway right now. I agree that we need to do more in the area of mentoring and coaching some of the people who produce these crafts and are not necessarily that skilled at business and understanding how to retail these goods. That's why I disagree with the point that these people could find their way to e-Bay to sell the goods. I think this database was set up, we have our staff in the department working with the artisans to coach and mentor them to understand where the markets might be, to help make the contacts between themselves and those who might be interested in selling. I agree that there is something to that personal sales approach. We want to try to foster that and support that. We're also helping these members with the e-commerce transactions which maybe seem a little overwhelming for some people. We are producing, every three months we're producing a newsletter that features various artisans. So there are a number of things underway.

I think the branding work, I'll come back to that, is critical. We have raw materials programs to help people get set up with moose, caribou, seal hides, with quills, with birch bark basket making materials, sewing materials, painting supplies. There's a schedule in the BDF that people can apply for to get money to get them the raw materials they need so that they can turn around and produce the goods and sell them. Without that, we know some people have a hard time finding the money to get started in the business. So there are a number of things we're doing, but I certainly agree with the Member that we can do more. This is an exciting area that could really see some additional support, some additional expansion, and government can play a key role here. We want to work

with communities to make more of this happen. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. I've got next on the list, Mr. Yakeleya and then Ms. Lee. Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'd like to ask the Minister has this department anytime considered looking at each region as a unique product to sell? I know our region is known for, of course Mrs. Groenewegen talked about this lady doing a lot of work on a jacket that she has and she might have given at a discount price. I know our region in the Sahtu is also known for some of its moose skin boats and drum making, such as the area around Fort Providence is the rabbit fur products, and McPherson is in the canvas bag making department. Tlicho is, of course, beadwork and that. I know we're asking these specific regions to market a unique product in the Northwest Territories that's I think the best in the world. With the amount of work that's going into it and the quality of the work, we have to maintain the quality of the work that's going into our products and not slip on that level of quality.

I know Mrs. Groenewegen talked about that jacket. I know the type of quality that has gone into that type of jacket, and having a product like that be shown around the world, I think that says a lot about our people, our talents and our skills. The amount of work that goes into producing these types of products is very unique. It's our way of life. A long time ago, these jackets that were made were made for us. Somewhere down the line, we started to sell for other people and people would say, well, how much is your jacket? How much are your moccasins? How much are your gloves? It's priceless. It's priceless. But a jacket like, you know what you could buy it for, these jackets.