Thank you Mr. Chairman. Thank

you for the opportunity to comment here. Bill 6 is clearly a comprehensive piece of legislation, a long-awaited piece of legislation, and a key part in the puzzle in protecting and working to keep our ecosystems whole across Canada. It is very unique and really, in terms of wildlife legislation, it talks mostly about the process rather than species, so it is unique in that respect and I think reflects an innovative response and reaction, really, to the

northern situation we have here with the development of various regional governments and so on. In fact, I see it almost as a bit of a model that we could think about, or a guide for political development in the Northwest Territories. Consultations have been comprehensive, extensive, broad engagements with the land claims organizations and regional governments. I particularly enjoyed participating in this, taking this bill on the road and speaking to people across the Northwest Territories. One of the things that struck me was the recognition that people have, and especially sort of the traditional approach of a holistic or, really, if you will, an ecosystem approach to looking after our land. Of course, the benefits are that habitat is often the basis of problems. When we start losing our habitat or disrupting it or poisoning it, we start losing members of populations of wildlife and eventually they can get to the point where they are threatened. Fundamentally recognized by people is looking after habitat and I hope that will be reflected in the Wildlife Act as well. So I don’t really have questions, except...I don’t have questions. I would like to, again, say thanks and compliments to all those who did participate on this piece of work and especially in the department. It has been a difficult one and I think a lot of lessons learned along the way in our new administrative and governing world here, and so there was a lot of patience and persistence in particular that has brought this to the table today, so all kudos to them. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.