Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I just want to share a few comments as well. The media said that was an all-encompassing budget. We all worked hard on it and we are to be commended to try to capture all the goals and wants and needs of all the regions and all the different interest groups, as well as bearing in mind, of course, the climate change and the green initiatives that in the long term should save us money.

Those are the same needs that I share for my constituency. We have grassroots organizations that are interested in green alternatives from geothermal to biomass initiatives, and I’m glad to see that in the budget. I will be working with the communities and groups, once the budget is approved, on trying to get some of these initiatives, some of the work done to get these projects up and running.

At the same time, government is to be commended for the capital items that are happening in the Nahendeh region. As well, I’d like to thank committee members for their support in moving forward on some really, really big initiatives like the Trout Lake Airport and the highway improvements that will be coming in the new fiscal year. I continue to be concerned about getting the contracts out early. I know that last year we had some really good capital projects, but because of capacity issues, we weren’t able to deliver them. My commitment to my residents and my constituents is that these contracts will get out of the gate early, like the chipsealing from the Providence junction and about 80 kilometres towards Fort Simpson, the completion of the highway from the B.C. border to Fort Liard, getting that reconstruction completed.

I just wanted to bring up another issue that had little mention in our budget, which is of course aboriginal language initiatives. It had little attention in the budget. As chair of the Government Operations committee, we spent considerable time in reviewing the Aboriginal Languages Act, and we delivered an all-encompassing report. I do see, of course, the need for government to completely and accurately assess all the recommendations that were in the report. However, Mr. Chair, it was my hope to see, at a minimum, a return to our interpreter translator or aboriginal language teachers be given support in the 2010-11 budget year.

At the appropriate time I will ask the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment perhaps, if there is attention in the specific line items. But at the same time, waiting for government’s response means that some of the recommendations, and very important recommendations about aboriginal language recovery, will have to wait until the 2011-2012 budget year and that is kind of disconcerting to me. Anyway, I’m hopeful that there is resources in this fiscal year and I’m hopeful that there is planning. Actually, I did hear there was some ongoing internal committee work in the department looking at how to best introduce and revitalize aboriginal languages. I’ll be paying attention to that this coming budget and I hope to see the strengthening and some resources in this fiscal year as we move towards strengthening our aboriginal language resources, our aboriginal teaching programs, that we can strengthen our languages and hopefully build towards that.

I’m pleased to see that I’ll be co-chairing with the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment at our language symposium that will be held in March. It’s going to be a huge event. There will be national and even international participation in this and how we best address our 11 official languages and support those languages. I know that our front-line workers are doing their best and they’re to be commended, but we do have to dedicate more resources. Hopefully we can do it in this fiscal year

and not wait until 2011-2012 for the bulk of the restructuring of our delivery of our language services.

Those are just a couple of brief overview comments that I’d like to share at this time. Mahsi cho.