Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to also rise and speak in favour of this motion. I think it’s very important that we speak as a Legislature in one voice in support of a project. it will empower the Ministers in charge of relevant portfolios and the Premier, the business leaders from the North, aboriginal government leaders to speak in one voice that we support the building of the Mackenzie Valley Highway to the Arctic Coast.
As I sit here and listen to the debate it is quite daunting, this project. It’s a huge project at $1.8 billion-plus. This is a huge investment. But I also sit here and remember that when I came in here in 1999, apparently I used to rail about a lot of things. One of the things that I used to rail about was reconstruction and completion of Highway No. 3. When you look at Highway No. 3, it cost over a
million dollars per kilometre just between Behchoko and Yellowknife, which was not done when I came here. In today’s dollars that would be about $150 million for 100 kilometres. But we got that done with the help of the federal government and investments from the territorial government. I know it’s becoming winding in different ways, but I remember looking at that and looking at our capital budget saying this is a huge project to argue for, but we did that and we got it done. It was always understood that we need to expand this work.
The third thing that I’d like to mention is the fact that there’s something not right about the fact that northern communities and our people are not connected by road. I understand it is the only jurisdiction that does not have a road system, but for every other province you should be able to get from point A to point B within their province on their own road. Whereas our NWT residents, our brothers and sisters in the North of the Territories, have to go through Yukon to get to us. There’s something not right about that. It’s time we connect these roads and it’s important that the politicians and leaders stand up and make a point and put an exclamation point to our desires and wishes.
The fourth issue, and last issue, I want to speak to is about the fact that the cost of living issue is the single most important issue that faces all of us. While I make reference to the fact that every resident in Range Lake, for example, speaks to me about cost of living issues -- high cost of fuel, high cost of electricity, high cost of milk or whatever -- but when we travel to communities it is unbelievable how much our residents have to pay for most basic goods that we need to live on. It’s so important that the government, especially the federal government, step in and make investment for the long term and to connect our communities so that our residents could have the most basic necessities in life that they can afford for the long term. Because air travel and air freight is just not going to be viable for the long term and that makes this project more important than any other.
So I’m happy to be standing in favour of this motion.