Mr. Speaker, those are the mechanisms that we’ll certainly be discussing and that will be part of the package that we will bring forward to the standing committee. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Member for Tu Nedhe, Mr. Beaulieu.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, with the development of the Slave River Athabasca tar sands development, the Fort Resolution people are becoming very concerned with the degradation of the environment. I’d like to ask the Minister of ENR if there is any money available for the people of Fort Resolution to monitor the waters of the Slave River. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The honourable Minister of Environment and Natural Resources, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, there are some funds available for those in unsettled claims areas. It’s there on an application base and Lutselk’e and Resolution have applied for it in the past. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, my understanding from the community was that the environment money that was received for monitoring the water in

Fort Resolution gave them enough money to monitor with one boat with two people for two weeks during the summer. That’s insufficient. I was wondering if the government is looking at increasing that amount of money that would be given to the community for that type of work. Thank you.

Yes. In fact, there’s a meeting on June 24th between ENR

officials and INAC officials to talk about these types of situations and there is going to be a discussion with them about the need and interest on the part of the federal government to see if, on this cost-shared program, there’s an interest and willingness on their part to see if there’s any additional funding so that, in fact, we could expand the type of monitoring that the Member has been referencing. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, if there’s a meeting on June 24th , then I’d like to ask the Minister how

soon after that can the community of Fort Resolution expect to see some more money flowing into that budget in order for them to increase their monitoring? Thank you.

That would depend on the outcome of the meetings with the federal government. If there is willingness, then there has to be the identification of the resources on their part and ours and we’d have to see how soon that money could flow. But the first step would be to have that particular meeting. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. The honourable Premier, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in the area of creating the environment for development to happen in our Territory, we’ve made our statements quite a number of times in quite a number of different forums about trying to create the atmosphere and just the ability to get the job done. As a matter of fact, for example, in our response to the federal government’s report on the regulatory system in the North, we pulled a comprehensive report back in our response and worked with a number of departments who have been involved in this area, looking at what we can do and made recommendations back to the federal government, from, for example, having adequate support for the existing boards that are established through land claims and funding them to the proper level so they can get their job done in an adequate amount of time.

As well, we’ve looked at our own practices and continue to do so. In one of those areas we’ve met with this company from a number of fronts, one about potential opportunities when it comes to supplying energy or, as well, just looking at the regulatory framework that they may be involved with. So there are a number of fronts we’re involved with. We’re sitting down, through one of our strategic initiative committees, to come up with a process that would trigger certain events happening when it comes to applications being made or what a stance should be taken on by one or more of our departments. We’re starting to work more collaboratively around these areas. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, in no way would I ever be advocating that checks and balances need to be wiped away and streamlined by just dropping them by the wayside, but ultimately, Mr. Speaker, when we have things like new mines -- they take 10 years to develop here in the North -- we need to develop a broad economic base, because, as I said, if you don’t have money coming in, we’d have to make cuts. This year is yet another fine example where corporate taxes keep getting a beating and we can only keep looking so far when we don’t have anyone else to draw it from.

But, Mr. Speaker, when we have a situation where Avalon wants to develop a 100-year mine, what is really slowing this government down from supporting this? They ask for power. They can’t get power. They want to develop a 100-year mine. We could use that type of base. What is the Premier doing to make sure that we don’t lose this opportunity? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, when it comes down to not getting things done, I guess that’s when they call on the Premier to make it happen. Then if we stand up and try to make it happen, then we’re accused of not following due process that is established. Clearly, the example given is one where we’re supportive of creating a diversified economy, building our economic base. But clearly, as well, this highlights one of the challenges we continue to recognize and state about others making decisions that happen here in the Northwest Territories.

We have some roles and responsibilities in a number of areas and can work with those areas. The federal government has a significant role to play in the area, as well as our land claim groups or through interim measures agreements through those groups that are in negotiations. There are systems in place that we need to work with to ensure these processes flow smoothly and that’s one of the reasons why we’re getting a number of departments together to look at our processes that are in place and how they’re functioning and how we can ensure we’re doing the adequate amount of work, both on the regulatory side as well as supporting the industry side. Thank you.

As I referred to in my Member’s statement today, I talked about the three-year demand crash that the world will be faced with, that rare earth supplies will be tightened up and, of course, Canada and the North, for that matter, offers one of the best supplies going forward in the future. Mr. Speaker, in the context of fearing that this opportunity may slip through our fingers, what is the Premier willing to do to make sure that this opportunity isn’t lost to the North? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, again, what we’re willing to do is look at the situation, as we already are. We have the Minister of ITI who has had contact, there have been presentations made. We have our other department who would do their job. We have to make sure we have the right approach, the right balance when it comes to the environment as well as the supporting of industry. So we’ll continue to do that. Meanwhile, we will work with our partners in the North, and that would be the regional aboriginal leadership, for example, in areas where there are co-management issues that need to be dealt with. We’ll work with the federal government and send our message there when the time is appropriate and we need to do the push. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Your final, short supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Premier referenced, you know, sort of, the buck stops there in his own sort of language about “getting’ ‘her done.” Mr. Speaker, I want to know what the Premier will do to make sure this job

gets done, because if Avalon comes and develops this mine, they’ll create jobs. They want to process this material here and they certainly want to support our local industries and businesses to help build that mine to help do this work. So what is the Premier going to commit today to make sure that this won’t slip through and we lose this chance to help be a leader in the industry?

Mr. Speaker, on one occasion the Member says we have to have the right balance, the roles, responsibilities, don’t want to take any shortcuts, but then he asks me to step in and make sure this happens. To what cost are we going to look at making sure something happens? The application processes, the roles, the bodies involved are laid out. They’ve had meetings with the appropriate departments. They’ve been informed of the processes. Where it’s adequate and where it makes sense, we’re working together to see what else we can do and getting information to them. But we’re not the only player on the field here and that goes to the bigger picture of trying to bring the control to the North where Northerners make those decisions and not go through a number of hoops and hurdles when it comes to what government has responsibility and who signs off on final deals. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the other day my colleague Ms. Bisaro raised the NWT Association of Communities’ resolutions, the great bunch of work done last week and earlier at their annual general meeting, and I’d like to ask a couple of questions about their suggestions. It involves the Minister of the Housing Corporation and Public Works and Services, the Minister of ENR and MACA. I’m not sure how to divide that up, but the first question is: The association recognized the significant subsidy of all utility costs in the housing programs as a problem that caused a lack of motivation for housing tenants to practice conservation of any sort. They recommended that the housing authorities should have representation on community energy plans and they called on us to mandate the Housing Corporation and associations to develop plans to ensure all appropriate methods are being used to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Are the Ministers, or is the Minister working to provide a timely and positive response to this albeit recent resolution and get things going? This shows the sort of comprehensive and preventative thinking that we’re looking for on the issue of mitigation of climate change. What’s being done? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The honourable Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation, Mr. Michael McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m pleased to be able to speak on behalf of all these different departments. Mr. Speaker, we have done a lot of work in the area of energy efficiency and setting standards and plans that we will be incorporating in our public housing stock. We have, as I indicated earlier today in my Minister’s statement, some significant dollars to invest in that area and that will be focused on energy efficiency. We also plan to invest a good part of our dollars or investment into private homes, with the intention of looking at increasing efficiency and being able to provide some opportunity for savings to the homeowner.

Mr. Speaker, the Member is raising motions from the NWT Association of Communities. Those motions have not come to my department yet. I’ve just consulted with the Premier and he’s just received them and he’s in the process of sending the motions to the appropriate department to respond. If the Member is interested, we certainly can compile the information that we have and provide it to him on the specific issues in this document. Thank you.