Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Well, rules of the House stopped me from saying what I really want to say, but the fact is, it’s not true. I can tell you right now, because I have a constituent who was trying to pay their arrears at the Yellowknife Housing Authority and they were catching up and it was certainly within reach and yet they were told that if they didn’t pay it all up by that Friday they were out. And guess what. They got a reprieve for a couple of weeks and then the Supreme Court folks showed up and it was only because there was a mix-up in processing the paper that gave them a couple extra weeks. So, Mr. Speaker, the briefing notes may say that, but I can tell you they don’t. So I ask it this way: Would the Minister have a serious look at this policy and make sure it’s being implemented, if there really is an intervention program? Because I can tell you it isn’t out there and it isn’t working. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I can tell the Member that it is out there and it is working. The situation he’s referring to is a situation where the courts have already ruled. That would take approximately a year to a year and a half before we went up at that stage. Once the court has ruled that there is an eviction, it is very difficult to intervene. Up to that point, there are all kinds of opportunity to sit down and work out a solution to stay in a unit and I would be glad to sit down with the Member and explain it to him. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member from Nahendeh, Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask the Minister of Transportation follow-up questions on my Member’s statement. I’ve been working with the department and talking with them for more than a year -- for about six years -- and trying to answer the question about getting runway lighting for Jean Marie and new runway lighting for Nahanni Butte. I’d like to ask the Minister what existing plans does the department have to address the need for runway lighting in these communities. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. The honourable Minister responsible for Transportation, Mr. Michael McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Currently there is no runway lighting in the communities of Nahanni Butte and Jean Marie. We continue to use flare pots. We have, historically, installed runway lights and in both communities. They were damaged on many occasions and it was decided to remove them. It is a safety concern with the federal government when we list a runway as having permanent lighting and they don’t work due to damage, and if they’re not consistently operational we certainly would be responsible for some liability in that area. So until we can find a solution as to having lighting in those communities...and we’ve had, Mr. Speaker, training programs to try to avoid damage to these lights, but it hasn’t helped. So we need to find some kind of mechanism for some comfort that if we do install lights that they won’t be damaged. So far we haven’t been able to do that. These lights are fairly expensive. Depending on the style of lighting it could be up to three-quarters of a million dollars for each community and that’s something we can’t afford to keep replacing. Thank you.

The runway lighting training program that the Minister refers to is very successful and I would like to commend the department for continuing that, but we cannot punish communities for past behaviours, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask the Minister, once again, to have a good look at these communities -- Nahanni Butte has never had runway lighting at all; Jean Marie has had it before -- and to look at seriously having this very necessary public safety infrastructure at these community airports. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, once again, I think the Member asked this question in our last session and we can certainly take another look at it. The cost factor is something that concerns us and if there is a way to provide adequate training so that the operators and the people maintaining the airports in those communities could assure us that they’re either going to cover the cost or they’re going to avoid damaging these lights, we certainly would like to look at it. It’s something that I can understand the community wanting to have.

But I do want to correct the Member about Nahanni Butte. Nahanni Butte did have runway lights in the early 1990s and they were removed as they were damaged on a number of occasions. So I can commit also to taking another look at it with our staff to see if there’s a way through this and a way that we can ensure that Transport Canada and all our users of those airports are feeling comfortable as we consider looking at the lighting system.

I know that the cost factors are also an integral part of any capital planning process, but I would just like to say again that this is necessary public infrastructure and must be there.

The safety of residents, safety for the travelling public, not only government travel, there’s a lot of other reasons people land in these communities in the evenings, et cetera. So I would like to once again, on behalf of my communities, ask the Minister to have a serious look at and support this need to install this runway lighting in each of these communities and I’d like to have the department have a good serious look at it, engineer it, plan it and tell me exactly how much it will cost. Thank you.

Certainly we probably could provide that up front, the actual cost of runway lighting in both these communities. We need some resolution to how we can deal with the maintenance issues and then we could pick the next step to consider whether that would be enough for us to invest in those two communities to put the runway lights back in.

Up to now flare pots have been the safest course to use in the landing and darkness and it’s also been something that removes the safety concern of having lights that are on Transport Canada’s list that do not work and are damaged on a regular basis. So we need to have some answers there and I don’t have them right now, but we can provide the dollar figures and take a look if the Member is willing to sit down with the communities and ourselves and see if there is a way through this. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final supplementary, Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Once again, flare pots are like a creation from the 1940s, Mr. Speaker, and that’s something that my communities are not willing to accept any longer and I’d seriously like to ask the Minister to begin the process. We’ve got a capital planning process coming up here in July and August. We’d like to work towards getting that on the capital plan. Will the Minister commit to having a serious look at the needs of these communities and work towards getting them in the capital planning process? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I always take all issues raised by Members very seriously and I certainly will, once again, take a look with our officials and with any input the Member would like to provide to this situation. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member from Tu Nedhe, Mr. Beaulieu.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today I talked about the need for a housing development plan for Tu Nedhe communities. I’d like to follow up

now with questions for the Minister of Housing. Mr. Speaker, can the Minister tell me if the NWT Housing Corporation has a plan for some sort of a community specific housing development plan for the non-market communities? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The honourable Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation, Mr. Michael McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We have developed plans in many of our communities, some very comprehensive, some pretty straightforward in terms of just delivering the capital, and we are currently basing our plans for investment, as the Member is aware, on a 2004 needs assessment. In some of the communities we’ve been able to engage the local government and the LHO, and the NWT Housing Corporation headquarters, and the local leadership to talk about some fairly comprehensive planning that includes dealing with some of the public housing stock, future homeownership programs and also removing some of the abandoned units, and also to do some work in the area of land development and land planning. So it is something that we support; it is something that we’d like to do in all the communities. However, it’s something that is very difficult to move forward unless we have input from many different people. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister, for the response. Will the Minister commit to implementing such a housing plan in both communities of Tu Nedhe: Lutselk’e and Fort Resolution? Thank you.

The Housing Corporation, of course, is always very open to having those discussions. We’ve managed to make some considerable headway in one of the Member’s communities. I think Lutselk’e has done a lot of good work in terms of planning for housing, investment housing development. We need to follow through on that and a lot of our other communities. As we move forward and review our results of the 2009 Community Needs Survey, I’d like to see us do more of this type of work. I’d certainly like to work with the Member to implement a similar plan in the community of Fort Resolution.

I’m aware that a lot of the planning obviously has already taken place, especially in communities where we have to barge the stuff in. I’m fairly pleased with the plan for Lutselk’e. I was wondering if the Minister could provide a copy of any sort of plan or draft copy of any sort of plan that could be available for the Tu Nedhe communities.

I’d be more than willing to share all of the information that we have compiled in terms of investment and plans for the communities, especially in the Member’s riding. We have certainly been encouraging our regional staff to get into the communities, to talk to the leaders, to

share our own housing programs, to share the specifics of all the different areas that we have in terms of support: with our public housing initiatives, with our homeownership programs, our educational programs, our financial counselling programs. As we move forward, we will be starting to develop lands for presentation to the Members. We expect to have our 2004 Needs Survey done very shortly and we would be glad to share that with the Members of this House.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Beaulieu.

Thank you. As indicated in my Member’s statement and mentioned by the Minister, a needs survey is very important. I was wondering if the Minister could tell me specifically when the results of the needs survey can be available for use.