Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I want to begin today by offering some general remarks on how the Cabinet is engaging this Assembly in developing its responses, how the government is engaging the review process, the Joint Review Project report itself, the report itself, the content of the government’s public statements to date on the Joint Review Project and my general concerns.
While this Cabinet has heard my process concerns in a number of statements, questions and as reported in the media, I want to restate my basic thoughts on the role of the Assembly in developing the government response.
This is a consensus government and the Cabinet is not the government. Cabinet only has power with the approval of the Assembly. This Cabinet has put forward legalistic arguments saying that to consult with the Assembly on the specific recommendations would recreate an apprehension of bias that would jeopardize the review process. I have never agreed with this argument and I would like to make an observation in a little bit about that.
There may be Ministers responsible for filing this government’s response, but these Ministers cannot speak without the authority of this Assembly. Our agreed conventions for the business of this Assembly demand that all Members be consulted on major announcements and decisions because this is a consensus government and the government’s failure, Cabinet’s failure to do this, is a violation of the basic principles we’ve established for consensus government.
As a result, Members have not had detailed discussion on the Joint Review Panel report and its recommendations and have not been supplied with regular information on the Cabinet’s positions and actions. For example, this government made a major public presentation, one that I tabled earlier today in the House, of its position at the April hearings of the National Energy Board in Inuvik. Copies of that presentation have never been supplied to Members who must go to the NEB public registry if they are to know what the government has said. Even while public review, public review, open and public review was ongoing, with the opportunity for public input this spring, Cabinet did not seek input from Members on specific recommendations, even on a confidential basis. I would like to note that this debate would not be taking place in this Assembly today if the executive summary of the Joint Review Panel report had not been tabled by this side of the House for discussion in Committee of the Whole.
I repeat from a perspective of honouring the principles of consensus government, this entire process has been unacceptable and underscores the requirement for the government to anticipate this sort of situation and deal with such injustices proactively in the future; think ahead and prevent it. We’re different. And that makes it, unfortunately, an obligation for us to look after ourselves when these processes are coming down the pipe, so to speak.
While the government is refusing to talk to Members on its position, it’s proclaiming its simplistic bias extolling the virtues of the project to the world. I tabled today a copy of the ITI department’s advertisement in the May -- this month -- 2010 edition of Up Here Business magazine entitled Mackenzie Gas Project, A Secure Energy Source.
This advertisement says that this government is actively working to ensure that Northerners are fully informed, and invites the public to contact the GNWT to “answer all your pipeline related questions and have your input.” Obviously, today the public is welcome to ask questions and expect answers, but clearly not the MLAs, representatives of the people who are being denied their rights. I have to ask with advertisements like this, is there a basis for apprehensious of bias concerns being raised by the public, Mr. Chair?
Regarding the Joint Review Project itself, the project report, I want to re-emphasize its one most important conclusion. The Joint Review Panel in filing its 176 thoughtful and comprehensive recommendations placed particular stress on its position that the project should only go ahead if all 176 recommendations are met, meaning that unless all 176 recommendations are met, the project should not proceed. We’ve now seen the federal and GNWT interim response to the Joint Review Panel report in which government says it will accept only 10, less than 10 percent of the 115 recommendations aimed at government. I’ve seen the government’s reasoning for rejecting recommendations and that was reflected in the Inuvik proceedings. I am not optimistic that we are strongly seeking to support the panel’s attempts to make this project go ahead on the basis of a truly sustainable development.
Regarding the statements made by this government thus far, there are deep concerns. The JRP was convened to review a proposal for the development and ultimate shipment of .83 to 1.2 billion cubic feet of gas per day to southern markets. That was the extent of the review. Environmental and socio-economic review processes consider applications for finite, limited activities. This is the basis of the confidence placed in review processes, especially under land claims settlements, because a limited review is not a blank cheque. That is especially crucial in the case of the Mackenzie Gas Project proposal.
As Mr. C.W. Sanderson making a presentation of the Government of the Northwest Territories at the April 20th and 21st hearings to the National Energy Board in Inuvik said, “The project is basin opening and will make use of an important corridor in a fragile eco-system.” And later, “The basin opening characteristics of the pipeline are both manifest on the record before you and of extreme importance on the attitude that the GNWT takes to the pipeline.”
Unfortunately, the attitude and legal arguments presented by the GNWT to the NEB aim to violate the basic trust that this would be a limited review of a limited proposal. The terms of reference of the JRP review say that to go beyond 1.2 billion cubic feet would, “require the development of further gas fields,” and that “no specific developments for this purpose have been proposed.” We don’t know. We know there are three gas fields that will provide up to 1.2 billion cubic feet of gas. Other developments would provide more, but we don’t know where, we don’t know what the impacts would be and so on.
The GNWT’s presentation in Inuvik went to great lengths to assert that with the approval of this limited project, future further development of gas sources should be permitted beyond the 1.2 billion or even 1.9 billion cubic feet a day. GNWT’s presentation even suggested this pipeline should be constructed to accommodate that future unevaluated expansion. This is a radical statement of this government’s willingness to abrogate its future duties of oversight; a statement made without reference to the will of this Assembly and, therefore, completely unacceptable.
The Mackenzie Valley Resource Management Act, Mackenzie Valley Environmental Impact Review Board and constitutionally protected land claims agreements were put in place to ensure, first, that Northerners have their say and, second, to ensure that sustainable development through integrated resource management is assured.
The Mackenzie Valley Resource Management Act provides options to control the pace scale of development. The Joint Review Panel called on governments to meet these responsibilities through their recommendations. All of us suffer when governments refuse to acknowledge their responsibilities in the face of clear requirements to deal with cumulative effects. Even worse, the GNWT’s submission to the NEB went to great lengths in lecturing the board not to include any conditions incorporating recommendations of the JRP which might place conditions on later development; a responsible attempt to deal with the mandate of cumulative effects that the JRP had in place.
GNWT apparently believes that the wisdom obtained in a five-year, $20 million review should not result in limiting principles for the consideration of future development proposals, something provided for in the MVRMA. All of this without a word of counsel from the Members of this Legislative Assembly and, again, all without these Assembly Members even being told what our lawyers will say in this public process or after the fact what our lawyers said.
Taken from another point of view, the many recommendations of the JRP report dealing with the social and environmental impacts of the proposal are a report card on how well we are dealing with these issues now. This includes everything from employment training to alcohol and drug treatment, women’s shelters, a huge social list. Not having accepted a single recommendation in this social category of socio-economic concerns, not having accepted a single recommendation, we get a failing grade on our report card.