Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Minister Lafferty for your opening comments on your department. I wanted to make some brief points here in your presentation and certainly we’ll be looking for more information once we get to the detail of the budget here.

I know that for any of the other departments, we’re always underfunded for some of the needs in our small communities. So it’s no surprise that I am going to make mention of the policing services in Colville Lake. Many other communities don’t have an RCMP station in their communities and Colville Lake has continued over the years requesting a detachment to be established there. I certainly want to say I support Gameti and Wrigley and it’s been noted at the last Assembly that the then-Minister of Justice indicated to me that Colville Lake would be the next area they look at in terms of having an RCMP detachment there. I look forward to working with this Minister and this department to see if the day will come when Colville Lake will have a permanent RCMP presence in their community. How we go about that will be up to you and your department to figure out in terms of where and how funding can be directed to that issue.

Again, those are the issues I’ll be hitting on this Minister about to seek more presence of the RCMP in Colville Lake. The Minister is under a lot of pressure because there are other communities that

will be asking for the same thing, but I look forward to this Minister’s leadership to see where we can see an increase in RCMP presence in Colville Lake. Hopefully one day he can announce in the House that Colville Lake will be getting an RCMP station. I’m looking forward to that.

The other issue I’ll be asking the Minister to do with the support of our community justice committees isin our small communities, where they are tasked with an enormous amount of work to work with the communities; work within the legal system; work with the aboriginal justice areas; and they are given a lot of responsibilities. At the same time we need to back up our efforts and initiatives for these types of programs in our communities with some good resources and solid commitment in terms of funding, training, and just all around justice committee development in terms of how we can better our communities by establishing a strong justice committee. I’m going to look for the Minister’s direction in terms of how to implement the aboriginal justice system into the community. I’ll be asking the Minister some questions on that and how they’re working with the federal government to implement some of the aboriginal justice initiatives. I know the Minister is going to make some announcements as to his discussions with Cabinet and the federal government.

In closing, regarding the operations of various initiatives Justice has undertaken and reviewed, I will be asking the Minister about the Arctic Tern Facility in Inuvik with the number of dollars that we’re contributing to that facility, with the amount of people in that facility, with the ratio of staff to the number of people going through the facility and the amount of dollars we’re spending on that facility. I’m going to ask the Minister, when we get into details, about more specifics on that facility and plans for that facility. In the words of government, we’re looking for efficiencies and effectiveness. What my understanding is at this time -- and I stand to be corrected by the Minister and his department -- in terms of efficiency and effectiveness, I think this one here really needs to be re-evaluated and looked at in terms of what to do with this type of facility with the type of programming it has and with this amount of money. If that’s the way it’s going to be, then I can see reasons why we don’t have some policing in some communities. A lot of money is going to facilities that need to be looked at again. Because it involves people and human beings, it’s very sensitive and difficult at times because you’re talking about people’s lives. That’s the balance.

I’m looking to the Minister in terms of leadership from this Cabinet on how to make choices. Communities without RCMP, facilities that are run not very efficiently. Those are tough choices and decisions that need to be made. I look forward to the Minister’s leadership and direction as to who we

serve. It’s very hard for all of us as Assembly Members to get the best for our people, when you have a number of communities without RCMP members, whole communities, it’s not very hard to give the logical decision where the money should be spent.

Those are some of the things that I’m going to bring up with this department through the detailed items on the budget. I look forward to the Minister’s discussions with the federal government regarding national initiatives that could support our communities in terms of justice. I look forward to some creative opportunities where the Minister and his department can see the benefit of going outside the box, so to speak. I know the Minister has done that in terms of the wilderness camp in my region, for which I want to congratulate him because it’s a very successful program. The department has done a lot of hard work and persistence and encouragement and tweaking of the wilderness program and trying to fit it within the system. Sometimes the system doesn’t want to participate, so we have to look at other ways where we can make it work. It’s been very successful, so I want to give kudos to the department for staying the course, staying with the vision of the people, to the Sahtu specifically, to the people in Fort Good Hope, to make this program work. In that type of commitment and desire, we could see things work. It requires a lot of work. This system has been in the Northwest Territories for some time. However, our people have been in the Territories longer than that. When we try something new I think we need to wholeheartedly look at how it evolves over time. I want to let the Minister know, in front of the House and his staff, that I certainly appreciate the patience and cooperation for a wilderness camp like this in the region in the hope that they will continue with this type of funding.

Those are my general comments. I will be back with more when we get into the detail.