Thank you, Mr.

Bromley. The

honourable Member for Nahendeh, Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment. With regard to the hunters and trappers programming, I’ve got harvester constituents, and they’re having difficulty accessing programs to get into the…. I believe the government has a program to help in purchasing snowmobiles and the new traps so that they can expand their harvesting. I just want to ask the Minister: what is the name of that program? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Menicoche. The

honourable Minister responsible for Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. Bob McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m very pleased to report that trapping remains an important source of cash income for many people in the Northwest Territories, especially in the smaller communities. It allows people to practise a way of life and also to maintain a connection to the land. The name of the program that the Member is

asking about is the Western Harvesters Assistance Program. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you very much for that very, very straight answer. Just in terms of accessing Western Harvesters Assistance Program, Mr. Speaker, where does the constituent go to apply for that program? Is it to the department or is it to some other local organization?

The Western Harvesters Assistance Program is probably one of our most successful programs. It was established about ten years ago with $15 million allocated to the program to be spent on a matching basis with community organizations. To date, $14 million of that $15 million program has been extended and matched successfully by most organizations. There’s about $1 million left to be distributed. Generally, the uptake is by the local aboriginal governments who would apply, and we would confirm matching funds. Then they would establish a program for harvesters to be able to access funds for buying Ski-doos, quads, what have you. In the Deh Cho we’ve been working recently with some of the communities whereby individuals who are receiving residential school payments can apply to their local band and purchase Ski-doos. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

This year was a particularly good year in terms of many of our trappers who did end up in the residential school system, and they did have access to some extra bonus income. I had a couple of constituents who had problems accessing the Western Harvesters Assistance Program, Mr. Speaker. But just once again, where are the guidelines and procedures that constituents can access and further need to understand? Thank you.

All renewable resources offices would have this information. And to be certain, the regional superintendent of ITI would have that information, or we could contact his office. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr.

McLeod. Final

supplementary, Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Just in terms of our government, do we use our new SEED program, the support for entrepreneur economic development program, to assist trappers in this regard as well, Mr. Speaker?

That would be something that I’d have to check into. I would expect that in order to do so it would have to be organized in the form of a business venture.

Thank you, Mr.

McLeod. Oral

questions. The honourable Member for Nunakput, Mr. Jacobson.

Thank you, Mr.

Jacobson. The

honourable Minister responsible for Health and Social Services, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There were extraordinary issues the last time we met, where out of the four physicians that are responsible for the Beaufort-Delta region, a number of them were on leave at the same time. That was not due to planning. So there were some extraordinary situations. But as of, I believe, the end of March the complement there is back to normal with locum coverage.

I need to know in regard to an immediate solution to try to provide the doctor services in my community. It’s been six months.

I believe there are six physician positions allocated for Beaufort-Delta. They have never been able to hire all six. We have about four, and we have to then use locum services for that. This is obviously a very crucial issue. It’s an issue that I actually brought up in our teleconference in the Western Health Ministers meeting last Friday. It’s one that I want to bring forward to a Ministers’ table for all Ministers. We are planning on meeting in September.

At home I want to look at the different staffing models for doctors, but that’s not going to be ready for presentation to the Members until the next business planning session, because it’s something that I’m working on and I have not finalized. I agree with the Member that this is something that we need to take some drastic action on, or at least come up with a different staffing model as to how we can address that.

I’d like to invite the Minister to visit my riding of Nunakput to hear this first-hand from my constituents and the dissatisfaction with what the government is providing.

I appreciate that the Member wants me to come and visit his riding. He did extend that invitation before last session, and I was not able to come. I would be happy to do that and to work with the community and the leadership and the people about how best to address this issue.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr.

Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I’m not sure who my questions are for. We have stated in this House that the cost of living in the North may well be the biggest issue that this government, the 16th Assembly, will grapple with.

We have only to turn on the radio and the television, and we hear about the rising costs of fuel, the rising cost of food. A big part of our costs of living in the North is related to energy. I’m concerned about this government seeming reluctant or the speed at which they are responding to these rising energy costs and the price of fuel.

NTPC has a mandate for some of the delivery of energy in the Northwest Territories. I’d like to ask — I’m not sure if this would be Minister Bob McLeod…. I’d like to ask him what NTPC is doing to get away from the generation of power with diesel fuel.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. I’ll address the question to the honourable Minister Responsible for the Northwest Territories Power Corporation, Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you for the question. The Power Corporation is working very closely with the established Ministerial group on energy, with Mr. McLeod and Mr. Miltenberger, in terms of looking at various options and ways that we can reduce the use of diesel power in our communities. There are a number of initiatives, such as looking at working with a private developer on wind power energy and looking at the hydro strategies.

We have looked at our own efficiencies and operations within the plans of bringing up our technologies in terms of reducing the cost of fuel consumption in our diesel operation plants. There are other initiatives that we have got in terms of going out and doing some public awareness and conservation initiatives and working with other initiatives, such as the Arctic Energy Alliance and doing energy audits across the Northwest Territories on some of those Arctic facilities that are used by the communities.

We’re very closely working with the Ministerial energy committee to look at the big picture in the Northwest Territories to reduce the cost of living in our communities.

There are many innovative and new ways of producing energy. I’m afraid that with the comments I’m hearing back from communities of wanting to get away from NTPC, they’re thinking that they can bring in their own means of generating energy in the community that would be more cost-effective than being served by

NTPC. A while back we thought about creating a monopoly with NTPC for the communities that they were serving.

In specific relation to Hay River I have some concerns here. NTPC has hydro at the Taltson which they wholesale to NUL, and NUL retails it and sells it and distributes it in Hay River.

To the mandate of NTPC. I have a copy of a letter here where the president of NTPC is writing to Minister McLeod saying that NTPC does not have a duty to serve Hay River — this rests with NUL — and that their relationship with Hay River is similar to selling power to Esso or anybody else. So to the mandate of NTPC, I would hope that the communities and the residents of the Northwest Territories would be somewhere in their priorities.