Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The honourable Member for Yellowknife South, Mr. Bob McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to recognize Mr. Chris Hunt, entrepreneur around town. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. If we’ve missed anyone in the gallery today, welcome to the Chamber. I hope you are enjoying the proceedings. It’s always nice to have an audience in here.

Item 7, acknowledgements. Item 8, oral questions. The honourable Member for Tu Nedhe, Mr. Beaulieu.

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The honourable Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation, Mr. Robert McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the NWT Housing Corporation goes a long way in trying to assist seniors in home repairs and getting work done on their units and getting into homeownership. There are many things we do for them. If this is something that is a concern, I’d have to explore that with officials from the Housing Corporation to see if there is something that we might be able to do to address this concern. Thank you.

I guess I’m asking for a change of policy, which would be long term. But at this point in the year and the importance of the construction season, can the Minister direct his delivery staff in the regions to set aside issues pertaining to land arrears as far as tax and leases go for the delivery to our seniors’ households? Thank you.

All those that wish to enter the program through the Housing Corporation are encouraged to apply. There is a process that we have to go through as far as addressing policy changes. So I would encourage those that may know that they’re in arrears, to apply and then the district offices will follow the process as it’s laid out. Thank you.

For the Housing Corporation to be able to address the size of the problem with coordinating issues pertaining to senior households, can the Minister separate the seniors’ core need issues from the rest of the households like families and single peoples’ core need issues and do that as a top priority? Thank you.

Providing programs to seniors is one of our priorities. We do have some programs that are designed specifically for seniors through the Housing Corp and through MACA. We have preventative maintenance programs. So we do have some programs geared towards seniors, but as I was mentioning before, we will look at all ways that we can improve our service and delivery to seniors. We could look at possibly identifying a lot of the seniors out there. The Member has actually been very helpful in identifying a lot of seniors in his constituency that might qualify for some programs. So we continue to take that work on and applying for the Preventative Maintenance Program. Once the seniors are in the system, then they continue to receive that benefit every year. So that’s one of the ways that we track the amount of seniors that are in there. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final supplementary, Mr. Beaulieu.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, that’s good. I would like to thank the Minister for that response. Can the Minister develop a delivery strategy that’s focused on seniors so that when we go back to the seniors’ households and discuss housing issues with them, that we are able to tell them that there is some certain specific

attention being paid to those households? Can the Minister develop a delivery strategy for seniors’ households? Thank you.

This is a concern that we’ve heard from some of the Members on how we deliver programs to the seniors and I had committed earlier to the Member for Tu Nedhe that we do have district staff going into the community. If there were seniors that needed our staff to go see them and help them fill out the applications and also with translation, they’d be willing to do that. So we continue to refine how we deliver our programs for seniors because we do want our seniors to have a nice, comfortable lifestyle and if there is anything we can do to assist with that, that’s something we are constantly looking at doing. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Krutko.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in regards to my Member’s statement, I talked about the regulatory process and the affect it has on land claims agreements. So my questions are probably better directed to the Minister of Aboriginal Affairs, the Premier.

Mr. Speaker, under the McCrank report, page 14, which talks about any fundamental restructuring in regards to the agreement, all the parties to comprehensive land claims agreements, comprehensive land claims agreements are constitutionally protected and any amendments without the effective parties being in the agreement cannot be amended. Then it talks about Section 35 of the Constitution, existing aboriginal treaty rights, aboriginal people are hereby recognized and affirmed, and also Section 50 of the Canadian Constitution which basically says the Constitution of Canada is supreme law of the land and any laws in respect of the provision of the Constitution basically has paramount with other laws. So I would like to ask the Premier, who is responsible for Aboriginal Affairs and, more importantly, responsible for this government, I believe you had a meeting with regard to Mr. Pollard with regard to where he’s going. What got me is Mr. Pollard’s comments in the paper that this is not going to have any effect on the land claim agreements and they are going to go ahead and make these changes. But in the recommendations put forward by Mr. McCrank, it was basically totally going in the opposite direction. So what’s the government’s position on these process changes and also what affects these changes. But in the recommendations put forward

by Mr. McCrank, it’s basically totally going the opposite direction. So I’d like to ask the Premier what is the government’s position on these process changes and also what affects it could have in regard to aboriginal land claim agreements and treaty rights. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Krutko. The honourable Minister responsible for Aboriginal Affairs and Intergovernmental Relations, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Member raises a valid point on the interaction of the land claims in the Northwest Territories, how they’re protected, and any changes to any regimes that are in place need to be paid attention to.

As the Government of the Northwest Territories, we’ve developed a consultation strategy and a consultation framework with First Nations and aboriginal governments here in the Northwest Territories to look at any program that might impact on those types of agreements. The federal government has just initiated its work to look at doing some work around the regulatory environment that we’re faced with, and the initial meeting we had was very preliminary, more or less a chance to meet firsthand Mr. Pollard, who will be doing the work for the Minister of DIAND, and we’ll see what the work presents. Right now, we don’t know what that final work will do. We’re going to stay in touch with the work as it develops to ensure that, in fact, the processes are in place, that the respect for them are being paid and that we continue to build a positive environment with our aboriginal governments in the Northwest Territories.

So we’re going to stay in touch in that manner. As well, from a Government of the Northwest Territories perspective itself as well as just to the type of work that’s going to be done, I think, in fact, that the work that we all think about when the McCrank report came out is going to be somewhat less than that. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, again, in regard to my Member’s statement and also the quote I just read where basically it says that there has to be a fundamental agreement on any changes, my fear is that the government seems to have its mind already made up that they’re going to go ahead full speed and make these changes without full consultation with the affected land claims and, more importantly, the affected treaty rights.

So I’d like to ask the Premier, what is the government’s position on inclusion of the aboriginal groups who are going to be affected by this change to ensure that they’re full participants on any redrafting or changes to the Mackenzie Valley Resources Management Act?

Mr. Speaker, the chief negotiator on the regulatory reform file is in the very

early stages of his consultation with all governments in the Northwest Territories. We’re going to track that involvement and the work that starts to flow out of it and see where things go from that point of view.

So it’s very early. Again, the meeting that we had was very preliminary and some of the basic sort of steps that are being looked at. We know that all the First Nations and aboriginal groups and governments out there will be paid a visit and we’ll see how they react. In fact, I think this may be a subject matter that regional leaders would like to have a discussion on as well. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, that’s the fear I have, is that they’re simply going to pay a visit. For me, that’s not consultation. I think there have been court cases in Canada, especially the Delgamuukw decision, there was also a court case here in the Northwest Territories in regard to the Mackenzie Valley Resources Act in regard to the people of Kakisa who took the Mackenzie Valley Environmental Review Board to court on the basis that they basically weren’t fully consulted. I think that we have to ensure that we do everything to protect the rights of those people, not only with land claims but also without, to any regulatory changes that are going to take place. It has to include the fundamental principle of full involvement by way of participation, not only by consultation but involvement under regulatory boards and systems we set up. So what type of guarantees can we get from the government to ensure that those full consultations take place and not simply them paying us a visit?

Mr. Speaker, the chief negotiator is an experienced Northerner and a past representative of the Legislative Assembly in his own time. I think that’s one of the reasons why, with his experience in the North, that may help in the deliberations that are to follow. We’re going to stay in close contact with him. We have our consultation framework that’s in place and we’d be prepared to share that with the chief negotiator on the file and see what work comes from that. Again, we’ll stay in touch with the regional leaders, as well, with this issue as it develops. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, can the Premier allow us to be included in whatever processes going forward and making sure that all Members of the House are informed and consulted fully in regard to where this government is going and, more importantly, where this issue is proceeding to? So can we be fully informed and consulted by the Premier? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, we will encourage the chief negotiator to set up a meeting with committee as well as the work that we do in

preparation. As our practice is, we will set up some time to sit down with Members to see what positions are being developed and how we should respond to some of those. Thank you.