Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Member for Tu Nedhe, Mr. Beaulieu.

Mahsi cho, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement I talked about the need for a winter road to Lutselk’e. I have questions for the Minister of Transportation on that. Will the Minister direct his staff to start working on the possibility of a winter road with the community within the next few weeks?

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The honourable Minister responsible for Transportation, Mr. Michael McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Constructing a winter road into Lutselk’e is not something that we have on our capital plan at this point. We’d have to have further discussion as to routes that the Member or the community is considering and the rationale behind it.

Will the Minister work with his department and the community to complete a feasibility study of a winter road to Lutselk’e?

As the Member knows, there are challenges in looking at construction of an ice road over the lake to Lutselk’e. There are serious issues when it comes to ice conditions and pressure ridges and things of that nature. There’s also the safety of travellers on a lake the size of the Great Slave Lake. We are also monitoring the possibility of future development such as Avalon, which is in a stage where it’s still being considered as to what their plans will be in the long term. We can certainly start looking at routes that might be preferred, that would work, and start costing them out, but it would be very preliminary at this point.

Will the Minister work with the community, then, to determine those routes looking at all the routes? In my discussions with community members, I’ve been given three or four different options, maybe even five different options on what they said would be good routes. Everybody has their reason for doing it. I recognize that the Minister has responded to me in the past about pressure ridges on the lakes. A lot of the possibilities are over land. Can the Minister work with the community to determine the routes and look at all the routes?

We certainly can undertake to do what the Member has requested. There are serious challenges, of course, as to what the mines or exploration companies are going to be doing and that would be something we’d have to have a lot better information. We also would be challenged as to how we would pay for such a road that the Member is suggesting. Those things have to be looked at. I don’t have any problem directing our staff to start having those discussions with communities. There may be other routes that haven’t been considered yet and we’d like to look at that, if we can get that time to discuss it with the members of his community. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Your final, short supplementary, Mr. Beaulieu.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Will the Minister take a look at the preliminary possibilities in the infrastructure plan to construct a winter road in the next capital planning process? Thank you.

I can commit to the Member that we can do some class D costing of what it would take to build a winter road to his community and maybe look at a number of scenarios to see what we’re spending now and what it would cost to do a winter road overland to his communities. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Nahendeh, Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. The honourable Minister of Transportation, Mr. Michael McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Member is right; we have had a lot of discussion on this issue and I’m surprised he’s back requesting information again, with a little more drama this time. Mr. Speaker, we have budgeted $12 million for a three-year period for Highway No. 7. We have done a lot of the work that we have indicated. There is still a lot of work that has to be done. Some of the geo-assessments have been done. The survey work has been done for the most part. We can provide that to the Member in writing. I believe we had this same discussion when we dealt with our capital budget, Mr. Speaker.

He had indicated that the engineering study was completed. I was just wondering how much additional work was pinpointed by that study and which areas would be worked on this year. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, as the Member knows, the Highway No. 7 is at the point of its life where it needs to be totally reconstructed. That is going to cost roughly $250 million or close to that amount. Mr. Speaker, we have identified several areas that we’re going to be working on and focusing on this year. There is some work that’s going to be done at kilometre 76 to develop a quarry, we’re going to be doing some work from kilometres 20 to 37, and doing some embankment investigation and some construction at kilometre 170. Those are the areas that we have targeted for this year. I think, Mr. Speaker, there are some areas that will be carried over from last year that we have to also accommodate in this year’s construction season. Thank you.

Then the answer is easy: we just have to request $250 million from the capital planning process. Just moving forward, though, Mr. Speaker, I know that the residents of Fort Liard and Fort Simpson travel quite a bit in between. I would like to thank him for the update on the plans; however, the section from the B.C. border to Fort Liard is something that the Fort Liard residents are really interested in chipsealing or else some other alternative methods. Are there any plans to look at that? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, we certainly can look at the condition of the road and provide what was targeted for investment for that section. Mr. Speaker, in the Member’s statement he indicated that there were bathtub-sized holes in the road. He forgets I also drive on that road on occasion and I have never seen a bathtub-sized pothole on Highway No. 7. That’s not to say that it has its challenges, especially in the spring, and we’re probably going to be hearing a lot more as we move into the spring thaw and the condition of this road deteriorates and we have huge issues. It’s going to warrant further investment.

The B.C. government has earmarked some dollars for their section of the road. They, of course, are investing in the road because of the forestry development that’s happening in their area and also the oil and gas exploration that’s happening on the B.C. side. We don’t have that to encourage us or to convince our federal counterparts for investment, so it’s difficult. The Member is indicating he would want to request $250 million. He’d have to get in line as there’s a very limited budget we have of capital and huge needs. It’s a challenging situation that we’re in. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Your final, short supplementary, Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Just in terms of chipsealing, will the Minister and his department consider a chipsealing project if the municipality of Fort Liard actually moves towards chipsealing their main street? They may have a plan for this summer and an opportunity, because the chipsealing machine will be there to do some of the highway towards the B.C. border at that time. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, we always try to take the opportunity, when the equipment is in the area, to work with communities to provide them with the information of what work will be done and what we can accommodate while the machine and equipment has the opportunity to do some chipsealing. Our intention, of course, is to try to get the whole road reconstructed first and then provide chipsealing. We are also focusing to do that in other areas of the NWT, but just to find adequate resources to reconstruct some of these

roads is proving very challenging and it may take some time.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement I was talking about alcohol ignition interlock devices. The Motor Vehicles Act was amended in 2003. I would like to ask the Minister of Transportation is there any provision in legislation or regulation for a judge to order that a person can have their driver’s licence reinstated once an alcohol ignition interlock device is installed in their vehicle. Thank you.