Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am very pleased to have the opportunity to move this motion on climate change that we see before us here today. I think it's imperative that the government is shown to be a leader in developing changes for climate change, necessary measures to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and we should start by looking at our own operations. I know that the government has done some work in this regard, but this motion speaks to that.

I would like to commend the government on its actions with the pellet boiler that was installed at North Slave Correctional Centre last year. It is measures like this that we can be seen to lead by example. We need to look at alternative power sources and do whatever we can to ensure that we are looking at wind, hydro development and also bio fuels. We need to have a more proactive approach to development of these resources, Mr. Speaker.

We also can't second guess any opportunity to partner with industry to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, both in our communities, in our own operations, and around the territory. We have to do what we can, Mr.

Speaker, and we have to do our part. As a Member of the Legislative Assembly, we are trying to set that example, we are trying to lead by example and we also have to pave a path for the future for other generations that are going to come. We need to all be on the same page.

I know in my Member's statement earlier today, I talked of how things are changing here in the Northwest Territories. Winters aren't what they used to be, animals are coming here that never used to live in the territory and things are changing. We have to pay attention to that. We also need to find more resources to ensure that our wildlife can be counted properly, ensure that it can be looked after as a resource the way it should be. It's going to take money and it's going to take time and effort, Mr. Speaker.

This motion is a step in the right direction. I would like to thank my colleagues who spent a great deal of time and effort developing this, especially my colleague Mr. Miltenberger. Again, I look forward to the rest of my colleagues standing up and supporting this motion. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, also I would like to convey my strong support for this motion in terms of what the GNWT can do to help with this issue that has some global interest, some global speakers such as Al Gore.

Mr. Speaker, again, I recall a time when some elders spoke in my region and the elders talked about how they have seen changes in our lifetime in terms of the land, the way we live, how we read the weather, how we use the water, the type of animals that we see and the types of things that come about. Mr. Speaker, through no fault of any, we are living in a changing society and changing lifestyle. Even the elders are saying that, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, this motion speaks to how the GNWT can do its part in terms of managing the greenhouse gas emissions. Again, the elders have talked about the things we need to do, how we are to be responsible for our lives here. The elders talked about how we say everything is in relation to us. In some of our prayers, we say all our relations. I asked the elders, what is it they mean by all our relations? They have talked about that we have a relationship with the land, with the people. We have a relationship with the water, the air and the sun, things that grow on this land that we have, especially a relationship to them and that we owe it to them as people. So when we have prayers and we give thanks to the animals and give thanks to the water that we drink or the air that we breathe and things that help us survive as a nation of people and all northern people. In our prayers, we say all our relationships, because we have relationships that are given to us through our own ceremonies and our own private rituals. They always tell us to respect and honour. Sometimes we forget these things. Some things that we forget, we don't think it's going to be a problem because we don't think it's that great. It's only by observation and noticing different things on the land and paying real close attention to the elders that they take notice and we have to speak on their behalf because they are asking us to support them.

Climate change is going to affect the land and the water. It will make life harder for our people and the animals. We are going to be under a lot of pressure the next couple of years, Mr. Speaker, in terms of how we deal with this issue. This motion talks about the management of land and water and putting it right and getting it right by the people of the Northwest Territories. I am really concerned because of the recent development again by the government and the tar sands down in Alberta. There was little regard for us by our friends in Alberta, especially around Great Slave Lake. There are a lot of good people and this lake is really beneficial to a lot of people. We have to find a balance and I don't think we have a strong enough balance to find within this conditional agreement that is going to the Alberta tar sands project. I am scared because when we say enough is enough in terms of the quality and quantity of our water, I think sometimes we might be a little late on this issue here.

Mr. Speaker, this motion talks about the climate change and the warmer weather, the different types of snow we have this year and even the freezing up of different lakes that we have to be very careful. I would like to look at how this motion, more importantly how is the government going to help us deal with the issues in terms of forest fires, weather changes and how are they going to help us with some of our traditions along with our scientific knowledge and how we get things right for our people in the Northwest Territories. Will our children have a good life in the future once we are done here? Will they have a life they can depend on?

In closing, Mr. Speaker, we bought some bottled water and the bottled water was bottled in Chicago, California and the last bottle of water we bought was in B.C. We got to a point now where we are getting water from Chicago, California and B.C. I think it was in the newspaper saying the best water is tap water. Here in the Northwest Territories, it's mind boggling that when I was 10 or 12 years old in Tulita, they said we are going to buy bottled water in the future. At 10 or 12 years old, you go down to the Bear River, even the old dirty Mackenzie water makes really good coffee in the morning and great tea in the morning. I never ever thought that at this day and age in the Territories, we would buy bottled water in Chicago, California or B.C. Our tap water is really good. Yet are we not telling our people to drink tap water? We certainly encourage them to go to the stores and say it's okay to buy bottled water.

So climate change really means a lot. I really wanted to say that I hope this government does something with this motion in terms of helping our children. Thank you.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. To the motion. The honourable Member for Thebacha, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, for the vast majority of Canadians and people of the world, the debate about whether climate change is happening is over. We are moving into the more constructive discussion of what do we do in the short term to anticipate and adapt to the changes that are coming in the longer term, mitigating how we do business and how we live to cut back on our emissions.

Mr. Speaker, the Northwest Territories, the North in general, has been identified as a barometer for climate change. The canary in the mineshaft is another characterization. We know that 77 percent of our

emissions now come from business, industry and commercial interests. We have an obligation to make sure that we do our share as citizens of the North, of Canada and of the world, to mitigate the impact we are having on the rising temperatures as a result of the greenhouse gas emissions.

At some point, there will be an Energy Strategy that will be put before this House that has been in the works for the last almost six years now and there we have to hope that we can speak aggressively on how we are going to do that.

Mr. Speaker, this forum is a forum where we pass laws and make public policy. The discussion in this House of late has been that we need better tools and to do a better job of how we balance resource development, environmental change and protection. This motion helps give us some direction as we look to the future and the setting of the public policy as to how we are going to move forward so we can have a healthy environment, healthy people, a sustainable economy and a sustainable society.

I would encourage all the Members to support this. I would like to thank everybody for their interest and I look forward to this motion being passed. Thank you.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. To the motion. The honourable Member for Great Slave, Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I, too, stand in support of the motion of the principle of this Assembly doing what we can and what we should and in fact reaching out to set the tone and show as much leadership as we can. Really, Mr. Speaker, on behalf of our children and the future generations of northerners, the decisions that we make today are more and more having such long-term impact that we really have to look at what we're doing through the eyes of the generations yet to come, and this is very much that kind of work, Mr. Speaker. There are so many, many aspects, as my colleagues have touched on and I know others will, but there are a couple of measures, you know, in terms of what can we do, what can this government do to make an impact on climate change, on greenhouse gas, which we are to some extent already engaged in, Mr. Speaker. The first one is the development of large-scale, or at least relevant to the Northwest Territories, Mr. Speaker, large-scale hydro as the alternative to diesel generation for electrical, for heating and for industrialization. Mr. Speaker, we are already well underway to expanding the Taltson hydro regime to the south of the lake to supplying diamond mines to the north, to potentially adding new sources of energy for heat, alternate sources of energy for heat in Fort Smith. Mr. Speaker, there's talk also of potentially another mine starting in that area. They also will need energy. So these things all come into play that make so much sense for us to engage in the Taltson project. We just this afternoon talked about the viability of the Great Bear project as a source of power for the proposed Mackenzie gas pipeline. All of these things, Mr. Speaker, are the things that will not only make good economic sense today, but will be the kind of legacy projects that I know our descendants will hopefully look back and thank us for doing what we're doing.

Mr. Speaker, I think another very, very accessible way that we have to make a big difference on greenhouse gas emissions from our communities is the capture of excess heat from the diesel, and in some communities the gas engines that make our electrical power. Mr. Speaker, when you burn a litre of diesel fuel to make electrical power, you're only getting about 35 to 40 percent efficiency. The rest of it largely goes up the stack in heat and gases in the environment and by tapping the cooling systems that these engines need and putting that heat in circulation in buildings and manufacturing facilities, water treatment plants, perhaps swimming pools -- swimming pools are kind of a popular thing around here these days -- we can save enormous amounts of fuel and, consequently, cost and, of course, the impact on the environment.

So those are two ready things, Mr. Speaker, that our governments are already engaged in. If anything, we should be more aggressive, more ready to take on the debt that we know we have to incur to get these things started. But, Mr. Speaker, we should be very confident and very secure in the knowledge that in the long run this is the right thing to do. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Braden. To the motion. The honourable Member for Tu Nedhe, Mr. Villeneuve.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I also rise in full support of the climate change motion just for the various reasons that a lot of Members here have expressed. Also, because it is our most pressing domestic and global environmental challenge to date, I think, like my friend Mr. Miltenberger stated, that time for debate has long since gone and we have to deal with the actual climate change as it's occurring today. I have to commend this government with this greenhouse strategy that was just put together. I think it addresses a lot of the challenges here that we face in the North to address climate change.

Maybe to just put this into perspective from northerners, Mr. Speaker, our problems with greenhouse gas emissions and water treatment and everything are really pale in comparison to a lot of the countries in other parts of the world, and even in North America, with the challenges that they face with climate change and their sustainable water supply. So I think it really is a time for us to really sit back and think of how lucky we are that we actually do have some heads that are coming together and are actually putting together a plan that we can address this in a timely manner and we have resources at our disposal. I think half of the rest of the world would really want to be in our shoes in addressing this issue the way we do.

Just some quick notes on the global climate change now that we're facing today, they're not really that great because in some places like Inuvik I know earlier this year they really liked the warmer weather. So some people are really inviting the global changes and don't think it's such a bad thing, but on the flipside we really have to think of other places further down south that are drying up and the water is depleting and that's all due because of small rises in the global temperature. Pretty soon here, if we get all the balmy weather and the extended summer growing season, I'm sure we would welcome climate change. But it's that very point, Mr. Speaker, that we all have to take

note of the fact that because it is doing some people some good and some people not so good, that we have different challenges in front of us. I think we all have to embrace the fact that over the long term we're all going to suffer. That's why we're addressing it here today, because what we do here today is going to make changes 100 years from now, it's not going to make any difference tomorrow or next year.

I think the onus is pretty much on the GNWT and the Yukon territorial government, the Nunavut government to really champion a cause of this nature because we're comprised of 80 percent of the total circumpolar region, globally speaking. So we are really the barometer and the thermometer of the global change and we have to make sure that we always keep our eyes on that thermometer.

With that, again, I can't offer enough support for a motion like this and enough support for maybe our government and our people in this country to really embrace the fact that we do have resources and we have the know-how to work with global change and make it work for us.

With that I offer my full support of this motion and the other motions that are coming forward today. Thank you.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Villeneuve. To the motion. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I also would like to speak in favour of the motion. I think that though we need to say that it is a call to action, it's not enough to be just a clich‚ that we're going to save the planet and do our part, we need to do something. We need some real activity on the part of this government, we need to lead by example, and, as I said in my Member's statement today, we're in a position to set policy and legislation. I've got to tell you, I drive around in a big gas-guzzling, exhaust-spewing vehicle, but if it was illegal to do so, I'd probably stop. I mean you can't spill a litre of oil on the ground, it's illegal. You can't smoke in public, it's illegal. But you can sure drive a vehicle that pumps the CO2 out into the atmosphere. So I say we have an opportunity, as leaders, to set new standards.

In my lifetime, so many things have become politically incorrect and I think we should make it politically incorrect to be wasteful and to do things that are excessive and hard on our environment that we live in. I think it would be safe to say that the majority of people here, even in this room, and maybe across this country, are from the baby boomer generation, which will be remembered as the generation of excessive consumption of all things. Maybe as people in leadership now, we should be showing that we can have a different legacy by speaking out on this and doing something, as Mr. Yakeleya said, to improve the fortunes of future generations and to do concrete things to make a difference.

Alternate energy sources is a very important thing to invest money in up front. So I just ask today for this government to prove that there is a will to make a change and we need to do that in order to encourage other jurisdictions to do the same thing. Today when we were raising issues of climate change and preservation of our environment, I bet I heard 10 times from the other side of the House the Crown, the Crown, the Crown. So are we in jurisdictional never land? Are we in like a twilight zone? We have no jurisdiction? Who has the jurisdiction to protect our environment here in the North if not us? So Ms. Lee said we should bow our collective heads today. I don't know exactly what that meant, but I think we should bow our collective heads and pray that somebody has jurisdictional authority and the Northwest Territories to stand up and be counted and say we need to protect our land and our water. Thank you.

---Applause

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. To the motion. The honourable Member from Range Lake, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'd like to speak just briefly in support of this motion. I would like to thank the Members that are sponsoring and seconding the motion. I think it has the full support of the Members on this side. It's a very straightforward and well laid out motion, Mr. Speaker, and it has very specific recommendations in the end.

Mr. Speaker, I don't know, I guess the longer I'm in this business I think some people might think with all the problems and big picture items and small issues that you have to deal with, do you not ever get down about it, and I do not. I really believe in the possibility of leaders and possibility of politics to get things done. I think the climate change issue brings us fresh challenge and new challenge for one that we need to address and one that I think that we can get action on.

Mr. Speaker, as many Members have mentioned, we live in a very interesting place and interesting time. The NWT has unprecedented resource development potential, as well as a natural environment that's second to none. I think that we can be the leaders and we can show the way for the rest of the world on how we can balance resource development with environmental protection. I know it's bigger than probably what a small jurisdiction or small population that we have can address and we may feel like that sometimes, and we may feel like we don't have all the jurisdiction and power that we need, but I believe if we look hard enough and think hard enough, there's a lot we can do to be the leaders in this area. Reducing greenhouse gas is one of them, and making changes into little things is one of them, and making everybody who works and lives and creates jobs here and who have lived here forever, you know, we are all part of this and if we work together I believe we could find an action and make changes in this regard.

I think climate change overall is a global issue. I know it's a hot topic and I know sometimes it may seem overwhelming, but I really see this as a great challenge and great opportunity and, as the saying goes in the other side of the world, every crisis is an opportunity to do good work. I really believe in that in this regard and I look forward to seeing what this government could come up with in terms of the recommendations we're making here.

Another thing I want to add that I haven't heard mentioned here is that whatever we're doing on this strategy, we must involve all stakeholders and that must involve the industry sector as well. Today in the news, Mr. Speaker, the chairperson of Canadian Council of CEOs, Mr. Tom d'Aquino, spoke about the businesses getting involved in the climate change issue, and, of course, businesspeople

are always smart people and they like to always get in front of the issue rather than behind the issue and I think that's a good discussion to have. I know the resource industry sector in the NWT are not just the ones that may produce most greenhouse gas for the work that they do, but they are also impacted negatively by climate change and I'm sure they want to take a leadership role in how we address this. An important principle that we have to go with is the balance. We need resource development as well as protection of the environment. I think that if we put our collective heads together and sometimes we have to bow our collective heads together when we haven't done enough. In terms of protecting water and protecting environment, with all the discussions and focus and time and energy we have spent on developing resource projects, I think we could all agree that we have not gone far enough in coming up with principles and position on this side of the equation. Thanks to many Members in this House and what's being talked about outside of here, we're doing that and we're doing exactly what we have to do. I guess talking is not enough. We're looking for action and this motion is showing that. For that I'm happy to support this motion and I look forward to working with all the Members in this House and outside in making progress. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

---Applause

Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Member from Monfwi, Mr. Lafferty.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker...(English not provided)

Mr. Speaker, I, too, have full support of this motion that's been brought forward. With the climate change, as Mr. Yakeleya indicated, our elders are watching us and how we proceed with this process. Also our elders are watching TV. Believe it or not, they're asking their grandchildren what's on the news, the climate change, international, the North, the communities. They're very curious because we've had a lot of changes lately with the winter road operation. There was a big question mark last year; for example, Gameti, we weren't sure if we were going to get a winter road, but gradually we did. This year we got a winter road way ahead of time. The weather is unpredictable. What's going to happen next year? So the elders are surely looking at us. They're probably watching us now waiting for us to make a decision on this. They're watching the government across from us to see what their approach would be on this particular issue, because it's a very important issue for the communities of the Northwest Territories.

Mr. Speaker, with the greenhouse gas emission that was announced in 2001, the 52 percent came from industry. Mr. Speaker, there's been ongoing discussion with the industry representatives about potential hydro commitment from their perspective. So that's ongoing and we would like to see that further discussion with the industries as well. Also, the commercial industries, the pellet stove initiatives. We're also eyeing that. We've been questioning the department and the departments are fully aware that we want to go in that direction. Also, the 4 percent community electricity. You know, we talk about the pellet stove, the subsidy Mrs. Groenewegen brought up before, how can we subsidize the pellet stove, wood stove and so forth to cut down on the gas emission on the diesel or propane. So those are initiatives that we want the government to pursue and we'd like those findings reported back to us as well.

There's also the Yukon government who is taking measures to reduce greenhouse emissions. There's been a report done on that. Let's do our part.

The diesel generations in the community. You know, the diesel generations in isolated communities, it's heavy in emissions, the fumes, the emissions drift off to on the lakes, on the land, on the snow. You know, we survive on water in the communities. That's our fresh intake for tea, coffee and regular drinking water. You know, Mr. Speaker, by golly, no one can have a BLT -- bannock, lard and tea -- without fresh water or snow. That's our tradition.

Lastly, Mr. Speaker, we must involve the claimant groups, the claimant groups that we have signed off agreements with. We must respect their agreements, as well, and involve them in the decision-making process. Mahsi.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. To the motion. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. When you think about this problem, our climate and our environment has really changed in our lifetime. Now I'm not as old as many of the Members here...

---Laughter

...but, Mr. Speaker, someday I hope to be that old. The fact is, I can tell you I'm only 35 and I've seen a lot of changes. I can remember being a young man who worked at The Bay cleaning up the front and back in the days when we had boardwalks instead of sidewalks. We'd clean up the front yard and in June and July, when there was no school, we'd move them around and stuff so we could clean up and there would be frost there and you could see that there was permafrost in the ground in July. I mean I can tell you right now, this doesn't happen any more. Things have changed in my lifetime. I've seen bugs in my yard that I've never seen before. I used to be a kid who'd collect critters and the things are not the same anymore. My office here at the Legislative Assembly, last summer I watched a magpie build a nest; I've never seen a magpie up until the last couple of years. Things have changed, Mr. Speaker. The vegetation is shifting and...It's our philosophy.

I think when people often say, you know, the sky is falling on this problem, it truly is. The world has changed. People accepted certain lifestyles and accepted that they didn't have any responsibility for the things they were doing. Again, I remember growing up and watching people burn their garbage and they didn't worry about tomorrow and now people are recycling it. It's all a bit of way we need to move forward and realize that sometimes we need to do good things before crisis gets here. Is this the signal we need before we get to a crisis? I certainly hope that we react before we're forced to, because who knows what we'll have to do.

I don't know if one of my honourable colleagues here had mentioned it, but we were reading a news clip not that long ago about Australia has reached a point where they

have to recycle water. I hope that never is the day here in Canada. I hope that is never the day here in the Northwest Territories.

Mr. Speaker, this is no different than the little story about the starfish where the guy is picking up one and saving one and they say, well, geez, you can't save them all. But they're saying let's start saving some of them and do something. I think this motion speaks to the issue, which is we have to start doing something or nothing will get done. By the point that it becomes a crisis, as I talked about just earlier, it may be too late; we may be forced to make dramatic decisions. So what does it take? We are the action heroes of tomorrow, Mr. Speaker. We can bring forward the legislation and the plans and we can do something about these issues.

Mr. Speaker, if it takes the provinces and the territories to lead in order to catch the attention of the federal government, maybe that's what we need to do. Maybe we need to lead and maybe it's time that the federal government sees how important this issue is. I'm convinced that, yes, the precautionary principle is the right way to go because if we're wrong, our environment is a much healthier and safer place to be. As I said today in my Member's statement, I really think that industry needs to play a role. I mean industry and transportation, when you add their percentages up, they commit 70 percent of our greenhouse gas emissions. That's a phenomenal amount, Mr. Speaker, when you look at a household only contributes 5 percent, all our households in the Territories. Mr. Speaker, multinational corporation are afraid of one thing: our legislation. That's our one tool of getting their attention. You know, yes, there are great corporations out there that do their part and there are some fabulous ones that promote great commercials about how they take care of the environment, but the thing is it's up to us to make that decision and say, look, let's get some legislation in there and make sure if they're not doing it willingly on their own, they will.

Mr. Speaker, in closing here, science may be right on this that we're going into an area we don't want to and if we don't get on board to do something to protect our water, to protect our environment, who knows where we'll be? But then again, if it's just treated as a cycle and science just misunderstood the problem, what did we do? We cleaned up the environment a little more. I mean what's wrong with that?

Lastly, Mr. Speaker, I once read many years ago about Ben Franklin and he talked about...He said if we don't hang together, we'll certainly hang separately. So I think this is certainly our job and our point in time that we all hang in together because as a team we can do something. I think as a territory and as a government and as a Legislature, we need to take strides. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. To the motion. The honourable Premier, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Because this motion is a recommendation for the government to take action, Cabinet will not be voting on the motion. Mr. Speaker, I want to assure all Members that, in our view, the issues, the challenges of climate change are real. That there isn't any alternative except to take actions to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels, particularly the more dirty fuels, the diesel and so on, cleaner ways. Mr. Speaker, to reduce our greenhouse gases has to be an objective of all of us.

Mr. Speaker, I'm a young man, too...

---Laughter

...who has seen a lot over the years and I'm very proud that as a government we first put together a Greenhouse Gas Reduction Strategy in 1998, and then, over the years, have renewed it. That Greenhouse Gas Strategy will be tabled next week as part of our overall Energy Strategy.

Mr. Speaker, it is important that we take action on a lot of fronts. Mr. Speaker, the Energy Strategy that we'll be tabling next week will deal with recommendations and ideas for implementation that will range from advice to industry, to ourselves as government and, in fact, to individuals. Part of the Energy Strategy is the greenhouse strategy which will be updated.

Another part of that strategy will deal with hydro energy. We have a lot of hydro potential in the Northwest Territories and I hope to see that develop over the number of years. Mr. Speaker, we should soon have, if we haven't got it completed today, we will soon have the program description completed for the Taltson hydro, which will reduce the diesel fuel consumption at the mines by 125 million litres; a substantial difference.

Mr. Speaker, we have been working with the federal government, other governments, we will work closely with our colleagues in the Yukon and Northwest Territories on a Northern Strategy. We're also working with the federal government; we're working with industry. Mr. Speaker, in a lot of ways we have to look at a Northern Strategy on climate change, because we are the ones who are going to feel the impact of it first and also it will impact us in ways that are more extreme, probably, than we'll see in many other parts of the world, in the short term, at least. In the longer term we may see some parts of the world very much impacted as was shown in the Inconvenient Truth, the movie by Al Gore.

Mr. Speaker, there are practical ways that we can all take steps to reduce our energy consumption and I don't think any action taken is too small to be considered. Whether it's switching over from incandescent light bulbs to florescent light bulbs as some other jurisdictions, like Australia, has done and, I believe, New Brunswick is considering it, and I think we should be considering something like that. Mr. Speaker, I'd also say there are practical things we can do right in this House to show leadership and I challenge everybody to drive a smaller, more efficient vehicle than I do.

---Laughter

Mr. Speaker, we all have to take those little steps to make a difference. I support the need for us to take action, and our not voting today isn't because we don't agree with it in any way but simply because it is direction to government. However, this is probably the most serious issue we have to deal with and I trust that it's not just a passing fad across Canada or North America that people will talk about and then turn their attention to other things later on, but this is a real issue that we have to deal with. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. To the motion. I'll go to the mover of the motion for some final remarks, Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I'd like to thank my colleagues again for their work on developing the motion that's before us today and the hard work that went into it over the past few weeks. I'd also like to thank the Premier for his comments in warming up to the motion.

Mr. Speaker, I think the main thing is that we do our part and we do what we can, but it's hard to do that when we don't have control, as some of my colleagues have mentioned on this side of the House. We continue to fight with Ottawa on resource revenue, a deal for northerners, a fair deal. How are we going to get the much needed capital infrastructure to get our projects off the ground, to get the hydro development that we need, to look at other alternative energy sources without a resource revenue deal? We also need to work at settling the two big outstanding claims with the Akaitcho and the Dehcho so we can move forward on devolution. We can get the jobs that are in Ottawa today in the Northwest Territories; we can really deal with our environment here on the ground in the Northwest Territories, not from some ivory tower in Ottawa, Mr. Speaker. Again, I want to thank my colleagues here. We have to work together. I know Mr. Lafferty spoke of working with aboriginal governments. We have to listen, as he mentioned, to the elders, the traditional knowledge that's out there, we must pay attention to this as we move forward with any plan. Again, I do want to thank Members and, Mr. Speaker, I'd also like to ask for a recorded vote on the motion. Thank you.

---Applause

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. The motion is on the floor. The motion is in order.