Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This has already been summed up earlier today about the NWT Water Stewardship Strategy. I think the department has a lot done, a really fantastic job, and so far a lot of really good work. I have attended some presentations on it. I am quite happy with what I have seen so far in the department moving
forward, but I am concerned about the water flowing into the Northwest Territories.
I recently have read a report by an independent scientist who studied the Slave River downriver from the oil sands project. It pretty much indicated that there were significant amounts of pollution in the water. It is all part of the Mackenzie Basin. We are all part of the Mackenzie Basin. It is great that we are doing such a wonderful job on our Water Stewardship Strategy, but how are we going to make the upriver provinces respect the water? What hammer or what mechanisms are going to exist as strategy that will be enforceable so that we don’t have to have the concerns about the water that we do now? You have heard Mr. Yakeleya talk about the water and some of the changes they are seeing already. I don’t know if those are a result of what is going on upstream, but they could be. Clearly the water coming down the river has some pollution in it. What mechanisms are we going to see and hear, if any, that are going to help us have some confidence that our water is safe and protected?