Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I really want to commend my colleague Mr. Beaulieu for his statement. I feel the same because housing is such a big part of our problems in Nunakput. Either a shortage of houses, young families can’t have a house due to none being there. There is a rental market, no private industry to bring in units for the housing market.
I really like what I see in regards to the infrastructure investment summary. I just have a
couple of comments in regards to that. I am happy for Paulatuk. We got the six major retrofits coming up. One replacement and a fourplex which is going to be there this year, which is going to be good for the young families that I have in Paulatuk.
Another thing in regards to Paulatuk, I promised my elders two years ago, when Minister Miltenberger was the Housing Minister, we promised the community and the elders in the old-folks home that we would build a back deck. Still there is no back deck. I don’t see this in our executive summary. That has to get done. For the fourplex in the community of Paulatuk, it is a good thing.
For Sachs Harbour, I have two new units and a major retrofit. Sachs Harbour is a community in need of units. Yesterday we heard in the statement that we don’t need units. There is teachers going in, there is no private units in the community again that we don’t have units for rental. We have young families that want to live in Sachs Harbour but there are no units. We put a fourplex in there would be fine for this upcoming year, but that isn’t going to happen, we just got retrofits. I hope the Minister is listening because this is what is going to be needed in Sachs.
For Tuktoyaktuk, we have the one new unit and four major retrofits. Four units need replacement and one new unit for our fourplex. I think it is a fourplex, or one unit, but that is good. I think Tuktoyaktuk needs to get the nineplex in the community... It is really run down. It is probably about 30 years old now and has to be replaced. We have young families going in there with babies that are, you know they are scared to go in there and live, because anytime you get a west wind you have snow blowing in your house almost right through your living room. If we tore that nineplex down, we would be able to get a couple of new fourplexes in there and everybody is happy.
Ulukhaktok; now it is good to see the retrofits that are going on in the community. We have the one new unit and a major retrofit and the materials for another unit, so it looks really good. But again I see the short change in regards to what the communities get and then what the South Slave get again. I turn the page and I see for Behchoko four new units and then 14 major retrofits with 12 new units in that community. Last year, I asked just for two, you could throw up twelve and you would never know the difference. We are short units. That is how bad it is in our communities. We have people having to move to Inuvik because there are no units available. Now you have 16 units going into Behchoko, all brand new and you have two major retrofits in Sachs Harbour. If we took two off of that, we would be happy.
Then you get Yellowknife with a private market that has the capability of private businesses in regards to the 12 new units in Yellowknife, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Minister, I think that if it isn’t spent yet, you could change this, you know? We could just get a little bit out of Yellowknife anyway. Sorry, Ms. Bisaro. Then you have 26 retrofits for Yellowknife as well.
All in all, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Minister, I like what I see. I think we still have a little bit of work we could do for, hopefully, this upcoming year in the planning keeping Sachs Harbour, Ulukhaktok and Tuktoyaktuk, my communities that I represent. We are short units. Whatever report that you were given out of Inuvik with regards to the statement yesterday, I think that is totally wrong. I really looked forward to the planning session, but I will have the rest of my comments for the page by page. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.