Members, it’s Valentine’s Day today. I wish each of you and all the people of the Northwest Territories a Happy Valentine’s Day. The House normally sits on Valentine’s Day and I know that’s hard for some of the Members who come from the communities into Yellowknife and we can’t be with our loved ones today. I want to take this opportunity to wish my wife, Jenny, the love of my life, a Happy Valentine’s Day. Happy Valentine’s Day, hon. I can’t wait to see you this weekend. It’s going to be good.

Item 2, Ministers’ statements. The honourable Minister, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Members of this House and the people of the Northwest Territories have made it clear that we need to complete a new Wildlife Act.

We need legislation that incorporates the most current tools for wildlife management. This is vital to conserving our wildlife populations for current and future generations.

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources has developed a process to address outstanding issues and to revise the proposed new legislation accordingly.

We are proposing to use Bill 9, introduced in the 16th Legislative Assembly, as a starting point for

consultation and engagement. It includes changes that resulted from input received during consultation and public engagement meetings held between November 2010 and February 2011.

We will undertake another round of public engagement to ensure residents and various interest groups have an opportunity to provide additional input into a new act. This includes the creation of a stakeholders advisory group with

representatives from industry, tourism, outfitters, resident hunters and the public at large.

Strengthening our relationship with Aboriginal governments is one of the priorities of this Assembly. I intend to meet with Aboriginal government leaders to discuss possible mechanisms to address wildlife management issues of common interest. These include the management of migratory species that cross regional boundaries within the NWT, wildlife management plans, management strategies and action plans to guide the conservation and management of shared wildlife and habitat.

Public information materials, including a plain language version of the draft Wildlife Act, will be developed and widely distributed.

Our regional and local offices will be involved in providing information on the draft act in our communities. We also intend to hold public meetings in each of the five regional centres.

By working together with Aboriginal governments, harvesters, industry and other user groups and stakeholders, we can introduce a new Wildlife Act during the 2012 fall session; a bill that is built on mutual respect, is a practical, workable and efficient system for wildlife management in the Northwest Territories and respects the rights and freedoms of all northern residents.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. The honourable Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, Mr. Lafferty.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Recently MLA Blake and I visited Fairbanks, Alaska, to learn about the Alaska Native Language Program. The trip had both an education and a language focus and I think we can learn a lot from their retention and revitalization strategies, and language acquisition and teaching methods. I believe these significantly complement our approaches in the Northwest Territories.

We met with faculty staff at the Alaska Native Language Centre and the College of Rural and Community Development at the University of

Fairbanks, Alaska. The university incorporates indigenous knowledge and promotes Aboriginal language instruction and immersion programming from a kindergarten to postsecondary level.

For example, the Alaska Native Elder Apprenticeship Program provides opportunities for independent and motivated students to be paired with an elder and work intensively together to study an Alaskan native language. Mr. Speaker, this program is very impressive and today I would like to announce that the Department of Education, Culture and Employment will be researching options, like having elders in our schools and forming partnerships to explore the possibility of such a program, to assist with our work in revitalizing our own Aboriginal languages. These ideas will be more fully explored through the business planning process.

This work will involve discussion with the Official Languages Board, the Aboriginal Languages Revitalization Board, the Aboriginal language communities, community leaders and Members of this House. Our goal is to increase the number of Aboriginal language speakers, provide employment opportunities for elders and improve educational opportunities for all Aboriginal students. This is in accordance with the Aboriginal Student Achievement Education Plan and the vision of this Assembly to build on the strengths of Northerners. Mahsi cho, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. Ramsay.

Mr. Speaker, today I would like to highlight work this government is doing to support the mining industry. We want to ensure we have a territory where exploration and development are undertaken in a responsible manner that benefits all Northwest Territories residents.

I recently attended the Mineral Exploration Roundup in Vancouver. This is the world’s premier technical mineral exploration conference, with attendees from over 30 countries. At the roundup, I had the opportunity to speak with people from across Canada and the world about the vast mineral potential of the Northwest Territories. I also met with a number of companies operating in the NWT to listen to their perspectives and concerns.

Mr. Speaker, mining and mineral exploration have brought significant economic opportunities to our territory such as jobs in the mines and with exploration companies, contracts for planes and helicopters to those mines and exploration sites,

and many other spinoff benefits in the purchase of goods and services from northern businesses.

Mining and mineral exploration has also provided us with important infrastructure such as the railline to Hay River, the hydroelectric transmission line between Bluefish and Yellowknife, and the Taltson hydroelectric dam.

We support our mining industry to ensure continued economic growth and keep our mining sector strong. For example, our ongoing partnership with the federal government provides funding for geoscience research. For every dollar invested in government-funded geosciences in the NWT, five dollars are spent by mineral exploration companies.

Geoscience research supports future economic development by attracting investment to our territory and creating spinoff exploration projects; projects that provide employment and business opportunities for NWT residents. We will continue to do our best to realize sustainable Northwest Territories opportunities from this development.

Making progress on devolution will be one of the most important ways we can support the mining industry in the NWT. We need only look to Yukon to see how people can benefit when Northerners are in charge of the development decisions in their own territory. We look forward to a future when the people of the NWT can take charge of the decision-making and have a direct say in our economic future and what happens in our territory.

Mr. Speaker, our mines have also brought significant opportunities to NWT residents and businesses. Since the construction of the first diamond mine in 1996, we have seen more than 17,000 person years of northern resident employment. We continue to see Northerners trained for jobs in the mining industry. With the Mine Training Society of the NWT, we are working with Aboriginal and industry partners, as well as the governments of Nunavut and Yukon to ensure people have the skills they need to take advantage of new employment opportunities.

Also since this time, the three diamond mines – BHP Billiton’s Ekati, Rio Tinto’s Diavik, and DeBeers’ Snap Lake mines – have spent more than $8 billion on goods and services from northern businesses. Nearly $4 billion of those purchases were spent at Aboriginal-owned businesses.

Even through challenges such as the global downturn in the economy, the diamond mines have remained sincere in their commitments to the North and have been strong corporate citizens. Through sponsorships and donations, these mines have supported community projects and programs across the territory.

Mr. Speaker, we have experienced challenges attracting investment from mineral exploration companies. We have heard the concerns of

industry about the uncertainty of investment in mineral exploration in the NWT. As a government, we are committed to work with the federal government, Aboriginal governments, industry and other stakeholders to address the effectiveness of our regulatory regime so we can provide potential investors with a stable investment climate.

We have a wealth of mineral potential in the NWT: gold, diamonds, tungsten, rare earths and more. Exploring this potential could lead to additional mines that will employ hundreds of NWT residents for years to come. There are seven more projects currently in the works that have the potential to attract more than $2 billion in new investment and add over 2,000 new jobs in the NWT. We remain committed to supporting the industry and plan to come forward with a sustainable economic development and mining strategy to ensure we realize our full mineral potential and our residents see the benefits.

A prosperous mining industry is a key element in achieving our Assembly’s goal of a diversified and healthy economy that provides all regions and communities with opportunities and choices. Mr. Speaker, we must continue to do all we can to promote and support a strong mining and mineral exploration sector in the NWT. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Item 3, Members’ statements. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The federal government’s proposal to collapse the regional land and water boards into one big board is disturbing, unnecessary and possibly unconstitutional.

The regional boards were created under claims processes to provide for regional and local control over the pace and scale of development. Federal negotiator Mr. Pollard says the proposed changes are needed to “meet Canada’s long-term interest of having a single land and water board structure.” Makes a nice sound bite, but a single board does nothing to meet the real problem: failure of implementation.

No less than five federal reports, two Auditor General reports, the 2008 McCrank Report and the 2005 and 2010 NWT environmental audits – the last completed less than one year ago – all contain concrete recommendations for improvements. These include the need to complete outstanding land and self-government processes, complete land

use plans, provide adequate stable funding for boards, fund First Nation governments and community participation to meet constitutional consultation requirements, completion of a cumulative impact monitoring program and keeping board vacancies filled, at least so quorum can be met, are continually called for.

All these actions are under federal control. One big board is a proposal to fix something that isn’t broken but, rather, is hampered by the federal failure to meet its obligations.

Can change to boards even be done without opening claims agreements? First Nations signed claims agreements because regional boards gave the assurance of regional and local control. That was the deal. Regional First Nation governments may now wonder what the Crown’s promises are worth. The Akaitcho and Dehcho might ask how long covenants under their settlements would last.

The federal government has a legal duty to consult and accommodate First Nations’ concerns on any changes. I don’t see that happening in this case.

Meanwhile, we’re talking devolution. This government agreed to create mirror legislation replicating whatever regime exists at the time of transfer. You’d think that in good faith the federal government would seek our consent and include us as equal partners in any move to change the law we will inherit.

I will be asking the Minister of ENR on this government’s view on the need for one big board and how we’re making our views known to the federal government. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The honourable Member for Range Lake, Mr. Dolynny.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Being a pharmacist for the past 20 years in the Territories has allowed me the ability to see changes in prescriber behaviour and people’s view on prescription drugs, especially narcotics.

Admittedly, I would have to say our prescribers are doing an incredible job to make sure we aren’t over-prescribing for hard narcotics, pain management and therapies. That said, there are always those patients that slip through the cracks and find the means to double doctor, or what we refer to as polypharmacy, for acquiring their drug of choice. Obviously the new WOLF prescriber system has taken care of a lot of this potential abuse and the pharmacy community supports any continued enhancements to this system.

However, I don’t want to give the impression that everything is okay out there, as we do suffer like any other jurisdiction in Canada. Prescription drugs

like OxyContin, Percocet, and Tylenol 3s are by far the most prevalent narcotic prescribed for pain management in the Territories. In fact, I want to point out that OxyContin is being phased out of Canada as we speak and a new tamper-resistant formulation of OxyContin called OxyNEO is available and being developed in an effort to prevent individuals seeking OxyContin’s euphoric effects for unintended use. This will have huge impacts affecting prescribed opiate abuse.

Regardless of which narcotics are used and sometimes abused are what most health care stakeholders come across when the topic of abuse or prescribed addiction come into play. We are not quite yet at an epidemic state for opiate or narcotic abuse, but this is more from an observational point of view. You see, we have no way to know this information as there are no stats on opiate addiction as such for any community in the NWT. The most recent NWT addictions report published in 2010 provides information for alcohol, illicit drug use, tobacco use and gambling, yet nothing on prescription narcotics.

In any event, it is important that as a government we must be armed with the right information affecting our people. We can all agree that abuse and addiction take on many forms under many different situations, and in order for us to understand the issue of addiction and treat it, we need to know where to start. Emerging drug addictions have to start with gathering of information, and without the proper statistics on prescription narcotic abuse we will never know its true destructive impact on the lives of the people of the Northwest Territories.

I will have questions later today for the Minister of Health on getting assurances that prescription narcotic drug abuse be included in all future NWT addiction reporting and information sharing.

Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. The honourable Member for Hay River North, Mr. Bouchard.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As a new Member here I’d like to discuss the budget process that this government is involved in. During the process, the government has introduced an act to increase the borrowing limit and we are asking the federal government to increase our debt limit. Not once during this discussion have we discussed the cost reductions in our O and M. I know this is a scary discussion, the fact that we may look at cutbacks or even to make the operations more efficient, but what is scarier is the fact that since 2000 the operations budget has doubled from $600 million to $1.2 billion. However, during this time the

population has only increased by 7.5 percent and the public service only by 26 percent.

My questions today will be for the Minister of Finance about what this government has done over the past years to review the operational costs and to reduce this large, increasing rate in the operations.

I know there are a great deal of people out there that believe that we can be doing more with less. We are looking for more money from the federal government; however, if we reduced our costs by 5 percent, that would represent $60 million.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Last week the people of Jean Marie River received some very disturbing news. A public health advisory was issued about high mercury levels in the fish at nearby Ekali Lake. Last August we also received advisories for Deep Lake and McGill Lake near Jean Marie River, as well as at Fish Lake near Wrigley.

Fish are a very important part of our traditional diet. It’s a healthy food and people depend on it to make ends meet in small communities where the costs of store-bought groceries are very high.

I want to be clear that the chief public health officer is not telling people to stop eating fish from Ekali Lake completely. First of all, he is saying there’s no problem with eating whitefish from the lake. That is good news. Second, he is saying that it’s okay to eat some jackfish and pickerel, but no more than two servings a week for most people. Pregnant women and breastfeeding mothers should have no more than two servings per month. Children aged one to four can have one serving a month and children between five and 11 can have up to one and three-quarter servings per month. It is also better to eat smaller fish because they do not have much mercury.

I’m very concerned about the health and safety of Nahendeh residents. Spring will soon be here and Ekali Lake is a popular place. I want to make sure that the message is getting out. It’s important for people to know that they have to be careful about how much jackfish and pickerel they eat from the lake. It’s also important for people to know that they do not have to stop eating fish completely. This needs to be explained clearly in the language of the people.

Later today I will have questions for the Minister of Health and Social Services about what is being done to ensure people get clear information they understand about the fish in Ekali Lake and other lakes in Nahendeh. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I heard an interesting exchange on the radio last week regarding the strengthening of Canada’s health system. The analyst in the interview compared health systems in other countries to that of Canada and suggested we have much to learn from those other countries. Compared to Australia and Germany, for instance, Canada spends more money per capita on health care and achieves less in the quality of health outcomes. Australia, for instance, spends 40 percent less on health care than we do in Canada. Yet, Australia is much like Canada with similarities to northern Canada, a huge land mass, big spaces and remote, isolated communities.

So how does Australia do it? Well, they have developed a system which uses innovation and technology to reach more residents and spend less money doing it. Let me quote Dr. Snowdon from the radio interview. “One of the interesting innovations Australia has developed is something called general practice networks. So 90 percent of their primary care physicians are organized in networks and they’re all focused on particular geographic parts of the country. So that any time 24 hours a day, seven days a week, someone needs a health care support or service from a primary care physician, they’re available. And if they’re in a very remote and maybe difficult to access community, those physicians use telehealth. So they’ll come up on a screen and talk to and have that discussion with that consumer or that patient to figure out how they can help and how they can get the services they need to that person in their own home or in their own community.”

That is eerily similar to a system I’ve heard proposed by the Department of Health and Social Services over the last few years, and the Australian system is well suited to our northern situation. We here want to establish a medical command centre. We have telehealth in almost every community. But are we taking advantage of the experiences of other countries and adapting them to our own? Can we learn from Australia, copy what they’re doing and improve our own NWT situation? Sure we can, Mr. Speaker, but are we?

In the past years Ministers have made references to the reform of our health system, to a health strategic plan called the Foundation for Change. It is touted as our health reform guide. To implement the plan is a big job, a long-term job and a difficult job. I accept that. But it has been several years now and I have to ask: Are we really accomplishing

anything? Are we really effecting change? It doesn’t seem like it.

We’re still badly in need of doctors in Inuvik and Hay River.

Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to conclude my statement.

---Unanimous consent granted

We still badly need doctors in Inuvik and Hay River; there is still no permanent nurse in Tsiigehtchic; and each year we continue to spend millions of dollars moving people from their home community to a regional centre so they can get the medical services they need. We can provide medical services in our communities. We have the innovation referenced by Dr. Snowdon, we just need to get on with it.

The Health and Social Services budgets in the last two years have earmarked literally millions for the Foundation for Change to reform our health care system. What do we have to show for that money, Mr. Speaker?

I’ll have questions for the Minister of Health at the appropriate time. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The honourable Member for Deh Cho, Mr. Nadli.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Bill C-19 is before the House of Commons, likely this week. It will be considered and more likely passed over to the Senate. In my Member’s statement I want to just illustrate just a great cultural divide, and I wanted to take a moment speaking in my language and I want to end off in just capturing the essence of the differences that we’re experiencing right now.

[English translation not provided.]

Mr. Speaker, my point of using my language illustrates barriers to communication but also illustrates that a law that is before the House of Commons disrespects one’s culture. I would like to follow up on a question later on in the House. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Nadli. The honourable Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Moses.

Thank you, Mr. Moses. The honourable Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Before I start my Member’s statement I want to say Happy Valentine’s Day to all of the people out there. Have a heart on this side here.

Mr. Speaker, I want to say the issue that I want to bring up today. Mr. Menicoche, in a statement, talked a little bit about the fish in the Northwest Territories. We are starting to see some chemicals and metals in the fish and we are warning people about eating fish in our wonderful land. People around Great Slave Lake, Hay River, Fort Resolution, Providence, all the way up the Mackenzie River right to Tuktoyaktuk depend on the water. It is in our blood. People who live along

the Mackenzie River, the water is in our blood and something is not right. We need to have health centres or monitoring stations to check and see what’s going on, what’s being pumped into our life here. The Mackenzie River, any other water in the North is our life for our people. They depend on it.

We need water, proper water monitoring lab stations in the North. We have only one in Yellowknife, but we need another one along the Mackenzie River. We need to know really the crucial impacts of the tar sands, of pulp mills all coming down out of Fort McMurray and BC.

Our people need to know what type of impacts it’s having on our lives. We depend on water, we depend on the food that it brings and we really don’t yet today have an accurate or true account of what kind of stuff is coming in the water and coming down the Mackenzie River or even the Great Slave Lake. Lives are dependent on it, Mr. Speaker.

I’m asking this government to push for a regional lab along the Mackenzie somewhere so we know, we have an accurate baseline to measure the true impacts of the tar sands, pulp mills and what’s being pumped into the Mackenzie River. Otherwise one of the prophecies of my elders would come true.

I’ll have questions for the Environment Minister at the appropriate time. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The NWT population is declining. Mr. Speaker, the Northwest Territories has been good to me. I chose the Northwest Territories as a high school student sitting in a classroom in southwestern Ontario. I picked it off the map. I came here. I didn’t come here with my family, I didn’t transfer here with a job, I didn’t come here as somebody’s spouse. I chose the Northwest Territories. The Northwest Territories has been good to me. I should be the poster person for the Northwest Territories.

---Applause

But, Mr. Speaker, might I also say that I found a man here that wanted to marry me. That’s not a… I just wanted to work that in.

---Laughter

I wanted to work that in because it’s Valentine’s Day. Thank you.

---Laughter

In the third quarter of 2009 we were the only jurisdiction in Canada whose population dropped. Census data for the past five years shows a definite

downward trend while Canada’s population increases and the population of our neighbouring territories, Yukon and Nunavut, are also increasing. To find reasons for our decline we should look no further than the NWT’s high cost of living, the lack of affordable housing and slow paced development. People are leaving many of our small communities where there’s typically higher unemployment. In communities where the population has increased, the number of occupied private dwellings have gone down, evidence of a housing shortage.

In contrast, the Yukon has experienced steady growth over the same period. The Yukon’s population increase is mainly attributed to the mining sector. Two mines came into production in 2010, bringing jobs not only to this industry but also to other sectors. The high price of metals and minerals continue to benefit producers and attract investment from new companies, while on this side of the Mackenzie Mountains companies are still slogging through the red tape. The Yukon also has higher numbers of non-permanent residents, suggesting that more people are being brought in to work in the service industry. These people may decide ultimately to make the Yukon a permanent residence as soon as they have the opportunity.

The Northwest Territories needs to take a hard look at the reasons that our residents leave, why our migrant workers choose not to live here. We need to develop and implement practical strategies that get to the root of why people are leaving. We need targets, we need measurable income, we can no longer afford gimmicks to attract residents, we need real reasons to bring people here, keep people here: job opportunities, comparable cost of living, housing solutions and vibrant communities. This is no one else’s job to try to change this statistic than ours. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to return to the issue I raised yesterday, which is the Betty House, and I want to again state to this House that the Betty House is a very important project in the Northwest Territories. It’s very exciting what it will do, and the fact is it will provide so much support for women here trying to get on their feet. Whether they’re by themselves or with their children, sometimes they just need that extra lending hand of support. I certainly support the objectives of this particular project.

Since yesterday’s statement and certain questions in the House, I’ve gotten a lot of feedback regarding the Premier’s responses to me and it’s interesting how certain reasons why people start calling or e-mailing and letting you know that they’re

concerned. Many people were not happy and they were wondering if we hurt the feelings of the government. The thing is the government did seem defensive on those particular answers. If they have to take shots at me while I do my job asking where the consultation is, so be it. That’s the only way that they need to do this.

The issue is simply this: It’s not about the support of the project, it’s about the process of the particular issue. I won’t read into the record yet again the Premier’s insult to me, which I perceived and many others did. The fact is this is an important issue. He highlighted in 2010 there was committee consultation, but interestingly enough research and ourselves cannot find any of this particular stuff. He highlighted 2011 that committees were updated, but one word or a one-liner does not constitute consultation, in my view, suggesting that we’re still working out some of the details.

May I remind the House, and certainly not at length, we had some really good quotes from the Minister responsible for homelessness back in May 2011. When I asked him questions about supporting the house, it was interesting how he talked about not having money, not jumping the queue, a worthy project but the community can’t get ahead of itself, no O and M money. It goes on and on about how yes, it’s an important project, but the fact is there’s no money and it needs capital review and, oh my goodness, we shouldn’t get ahead of other types of reviews because if we jumped ahead of them we’d probably offend many people in this Assembly.

The only issue here is process and our Members kept informed. I would say the record stands very clear today that Members were not kept informed. I will continue on this particular project during question period.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It is unfortunate that often I have made a Member’s statement that acknowledges the passing of Tu Nedhe people. I do this regrettably, but acknowledge that passing away is part of life and each should be acknowledged. Since December 2011 four Tu Nedhe citizens have passed away.

Georgina Victoria Fabien, born July 30, 1958, passed away on December 2, 2011, at the age of only 53. Georgina passed away while she was asleep. Georgina is survived by her husband, Darrow Andrews; her son, Jason Barrens; her sisters Rita, Angelina, Kaye, Helen and Lorraine; her brothers Lawrence, Henry, Don, Eddy and

Robert; along with numerous nieces and nephews, great-nieces and nephews.

Raymond Paul Simon, born January 19, 1950, passed away on December 14, 2011, at age 61. Raymond passed away from cancer. Raymond is survived by his loving wife, Dolly; his sons Kristopher and Dexter; his daughters Aleda, Destiny, Jen and Sonia; his four grandchildren Silas, Kelsey, Kaden and Roanna; his brothers Alexie, Wilfred, Richard and Patrick; his sister Irene; and numerous nieces, nephews, cousins and many friends.

Tyra Ellen Walton, born December 3, 1934, passed away on January 6, 2012. Tyra passed away from complications with diabetes. She also had four different battles with cancer, from what I understand. Tyra is survived by her husband, Bill Norn, of 42 years; sons Arthur and Andy; daughters Lynn, Dale and Lorrie; grandchildren that she raised, Gerald, Dion and Tanesha; and numerous other grandchildren, great-grandchildren and great-great-grandchildren.

Billy Lockhart was born February 13, 1936, and passed away on February 2, 2012, at age 75. Billy passed away from cancer. Billy is survived by his sister, Doris; brothers Archie and Paul; nephews Arthur, Roger, Eric, Perry, Earl, Vern, John, Malcolm and Joey; nieces Verda, Della, Rebecca, Ann, Pearl and Rose; along with numerous great-nieces and nephews.

My sincerest condolences go out to the family and friends, and especially the spouses and children of Georgina, Raymond, Tyra and Billy.

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Item 4, returns to oral questions. Item 5, recognition of visitors in the gallery. The honourable Member for Great Slave, Mr. Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to recognize my wife, Carolyn Smith. Happy Valentine’s Day.

Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d also like to recognize Carolyn and wish her a Happy Valentine’s Day.

I’d also like to recognize my constituency assistant, the hardworking Mr. Craig Yeo, whose birthday is actually today. A proud member of Weledeh.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. I’d like to welcome Carolyn and Mr. Yeo to the House. Welcome.

Item 6, acknowledgements. Item 7, oral questions. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement today as well as yesterday and in my oral questions yesterday and certainly today will be principally based on the fact that I don’t feel fair consultation was given on this particular project. Discussion and debate are the pillars of democracy in this Assembly and I would ask the Premier to this House if this is going to be the tone of this particular government when we get great projects like this. Are they just going to pass them through without committee consultation, or are they going to ensure that they engage the Membership on this particular side of the House?

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. The honourable Premier, Mr. McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’ll redirect the question to the Minister of the NWT Housing Corporation.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Money for Betty House was first identified in 2009-2010 and was gone through revised estimates. We had some opportunity to have some discussions and that. However, that doesn’t take away from the fact that Members feel like they weren’t properly consulted on this particular issue, and if that’s the case then I take full responsibility for that and ensure that any projects coming through NWT Housing Corporation in the future will be consulted with the Members like we normally do. This is just one that through different circumstances – change of Assemblies, Ministers, presidents and scopes of work – it was actually fairly complicated and we just recently were able to work out the final details.

May I state for the record that’s one of the best answers I’ve heard in this House in years.

My next question to the Minister of the NWT Housing Corporation is: Would he provide at least a written briefing note to Members to show us where this particular money came from, how it was flowed through and how it will affect the bottom line books of the NWT? If it’s flow-through money I’m sure the briefing note will explain this. That’s the type of information I feel was lost in this discussion and debate.

The Homelessness Coalition put some good work into this. They came forward with a business plan through the Canada Economic Action Plan. We were able to free up

some money to make a small contribution to the overall cost of the project.

I will be pleased to provide a briefing note on the whole situation of Betty House to the Member and Members opposite.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Mr. Hawkins.

No, thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to follow up on my Member’s statement. I have some questions for the Minister of Health and Social Services with regard to our health system reform. The Minister spoke yesterday about moving doctors around. From Hansard I have a sentence where he stated, “We are actually starting on the process now.” I feel that reworking how we use our doctors and changing our system of hiring doctors, and how we assign doctors to their jobs is something that we really need to do relative to getting reform done and I think the Minister agrees with me. I’d like to know where we’re at in this process.

As I mentioned in my statement, it’s been several years. We’ve literally put millions of dollars, I think $3.5 million last year, into the Foundation for Change. What have we got to show for that money? Where are we at in the process of changing the way that we use our doctors so that we can get them in the communities where we need them?

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The honourable Minister responsible for Health and Social Services, Mr. Beaulieu.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Although we see that it’s difficult to fill doctors’ positions in the regional centres where the positions are located – Fort Smith, Hay River, Inuvik, Norman Wells and Fort Simpson – that’s still our first priority. Our first priority is still to try to fill those positions in those communities. Failing that, we’re having discussions and have had discussions with the Joint Leadership Council, which are the boards or public administrators, to talk about the possibility of having one system pooling doctors in Yellowknife and having the locums come out of Yellowknife as opposed to having locums that come out from other parts of the country.

Thanks to the Minister. I appreciate that. One of the things that I have heard talk of and that the Australian system highlighted is a central command, so to speak, for medical assistance where doctors are available 24/7 and they can assist communities or small health centres

elsewhere with difficult problems. The Minister said that they’re discussing things with the health authorities and I recognize that needs to be done, but this has been ongoing for quite some time. I guess I need to know from the Minister – if we’re going to do reform, that usually indicates that change is taking place – when can we expect to see some change in how we use our doctors.

Right now we have three public administrators in place of boards. That is at Stanton, Beaufort-Delta and Hay River. In our initial discussions in the communities, the communities had indicated that they would like to see the boards put back in with representatives from the communities. We would like to consult with the new boards or with the current boards. That doesn’t mean that we’re going to wait until all the boards are in place before we start to make a move on this. We’re going right to the communities and indicating that that’s what we wish to do. So we have actually had the very initial discussions already at the community level in the Beaufort-Delta with the Joint Leadership Council about this.

As I indicated earlier, there is opposition, but at the same time what is the alternative. The alternative is continuing a system now that is costly and using locums from the South. So we’re again, first priority, fill in the community at the regional level, second priority, fill in Yellowknife.

Thanks to the Minister. I have to disagree that we need to get rid of the PAs and establish boards. I am happy to hear the Minister say that we’re not going to wait until the boards are in place. I think the Yellowknife Stanton Territorial Health Authority has been without a board for 10 or 12 years. Goodness knows that we can’t wait for those boards to be in place. I think there’s a responsibility on the part of the government to put their foot down and say this is how we’re going to do things. Yes, there needs to be consultation, but when push comes to shove, it’s our responsibility to make a decision.

NPs, nurse practitioners are also part of changing the system. The Minister spoke a little bit yesterday about some of the ways that we use our NPs. I think he stated that we have nine nurse practitioners and most of them are in Yellowknife. I’d like to quote from a 2010 statement from practicenorth.ca which says a commitment has been made to expand the use of nurse practitioners in every health centre, clinic and emergency room in the NWT by 2010.

I’d like to ask the Minister, if we have nine nurse practitioners we obviously haven’t met the goal of 2010, but when can we expect to see a significant expansion of the number of nurse practitioners in the NWT. Thank you.

I can’t give that information. I don’t know when we’re going to be

expanding nurse practitioners. What I do know is that when we do produce nurse practitioners, educate registered nurses to become nurse practitioners, their desire to work in Yellowknife is greater than the desire to go over to the regional centres. That’s why we had the nurse practitioners here. We’d love to have nurse practitioners in the regional centres. We’d love to have the nurse practitioners in the larger communities because they do have an expanded role more than registered nurses. But at this time, they are here.

At this time we have several systems that are competing for those resources. Yellowknife is an attractive place. Yellowknife is not a real issue as far as attracting doctors and so on. I think we have 21… I don’t know the numbers right off the top of my head, but we have quite a few doctors here in Yellowknife between the Yellowknife Health and Social Services Authority, which has a board, and the Stanton Health Authority, which has a public administrator. But those are not real issues, because we’re able to retain doctors here. We’re able to attract doctors here, and obviously we’re also able to retain nurse practitioners here. But because the system is that these health authorities compete against other health authorities because they’re separate systems, then the nurse practitioner has an option, because they could have several offers once they become practitioners. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Your final, short supplementary, Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s difficult to be short. I don’t know where to start. I guess I need to now ask the Minister, he stated that we need to make changes, he stated that the health authorities compete with each other. What is the department doing to ensure that the authorities do not compete with each other for specialized staff such as NPs and doctors? What kind of a plan is there? What is the department doing on the ground to get the people that we need in the Territories and in our communities? Thank you.

We’re trying to reform governance, first of all. We are trying to work with the human resources to get professional at attracting practitioners. But the key is consultation. We have to consult with the communities in order to reform governance. We can’t go in there and say you’re losing five positions, Hay River, they’re going to be moved here; Fort Smith is losing all their doctors, they’re going to be moved here without proper consultation. At the first Joint Leadership Council some of the board members were not happy with this. They want us to continue to push and sell the communities where those doctors are located, and some of the MLAs in here said use us to sell our communities to attract doctors. That’s what we wish to do. We want to do that. Our priority

would be to have, like I said, in the communities. Unfortunately, we’re having difficulty. We can fill five doctors all at once and that seems to be the way to go, or seven all at once, or nine all at once. It’s very difficult to fill the first doctor position or the second doctor position. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to address my questions to the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources today. Following up on my Member’s statement earlier, I would like to begin by asking: What is this government’s position on the federal proposal to collapse the regional land and water boards established under the MVRMA into one board? Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The honourable Minister responsible for Environment and Natural Resources, Mr. Premier.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Government of Canada is responsible for making those decisions and we would want to make sure that those decisions do not affect our devolution negotiations. Thank you.

Thanks, to the Premier. I note from Mr. Pollard’s statement that the one board proposal will “maintain the co-management foundation of the land, permitting and water licensing processes set out in the Gwich’in, Sahtu and Tlicho agreements and the act.” But he goes on to say, “The proposed changes to the act will not provide for regional panels.”

I can’t reconcile taking away regional panels with maintaining a local and regional co-management promised in the First Nations settlements. Could the Premier explain this government’s position on whether this proposal is consistent with this government’s priorities for regional and local control of the pace and scale of development? Mahsi.

I guess, in our view, this demonstrates the fact that we need to move fairly quickly with devolution so that we can have decisions made by the people that are affected by those decisions. Thank you.

I appreciate the Premier’s comments there. I’d say obviously, then, the government does not agree with this and they have a moral responsibility to fight this proposal and retain the local and regional control.

The model of consultation being used here is the typical federal approach of preordaining the outcome. Mr. Pollard says again he will “lead the

consultation process on reconfiguring the current four board structure into one board,” then carry the one board model forward into remaining claims negotiations.

We have two environmental audits and the McCrank Report telling us the solutions lie elsewhere, with no mention of collapsing boards by any of those federal reviews. So the outcome is presupposed and the consultation is apparently meaningless. Will the Premier inform Mr. Pollard that it wants to see the outstanding recommendations for improvement fulfilled before any changes to board structure are considered? Mahsi.

As the Member may recall, we have been identified as a stakeholder and we were lumped in with all of the stakeholders when the federal government sought input. When we first came in as a government, the Premier and Cabinet, we were advised that we had to wait until letters went to Aboriginal governments before our government could find out the nature of these proposed recommendations. We have since met with Mr. Pollard and we have been asked to provide a written response to the recommendations, and that we would be part of the debriefing when the federal government debriefs the Aboriginal governments as to what their plan is with regard to the regulatory improvement initiative, as they call it. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Short supplementary, Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thanks again to the Premier. I assume, given that this is inconsistent with our positions on regional and local control and what that comment would mean, we would certainly not support this.

My last question does indeed relate to the devolution situation that the Premier refers to. This federal government is making all kinds of very significant changes here as we are negotiating the devolution goals and whittling away at the sorts of things and resources we are in line to inherit. For example, whittling down from our regional boards to one board and so on. What does this say to the good faith of our partners in this negotiation process when they’re doing this while we’re negotiating the drawing down of this responsibility? I’d appreciate the Premier’s views. Mahsi.

I guess the federal government is trying to provide some certainty to industry and to level the playing field with other northern territories. Once again, I reiterate that this gives more credence to getting on with devolution so that we can make these changes that will benefit all of the people of the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Colleagues, before we go on, I would like to recognize in the gallery two today, the assistant auditor generator, Jerome Berthelette and Ronnie Campbell, the Office of the Auditor General of Canada. Welcome to the House.

The honourable Member for the Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wanted to ask questions to the Minister of ENR on the water quality monitoring that could be and should be happening in the Northwest Territories, more specifically working towards another lab in the Northwest Territories. There is one in Yellowknife. I would like to see another one, preferably in the Sahtu where there is going to be a lot of oil and gas development. We need to look at ensuring that people do have safe quality water and that they know what is coming down the Mackenzie River from the tar sands or the pulp mills. Can the Minister answer that question?

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The honourable Minister of Environment and Natural Resources, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There is a lot of work underway in regards to water, as the Member is well aware, over the last few years and continuing to this very day. As a government, we pull together all of our resources within government to make sure we are working with communities. We are looking at source and water protection, making sure from the source to the tap we deal with that water. We have arrangements – especially in the southern part of the territory where the water comes in from Alberta – we have some initiatives with two different groups, the Slave and the Delta as well as the Peace-Athabasca Delta. We are working with the Alberta government, federal government, Aboriginal governments, with a number of NGOs to do all of this monitoring and the collecting of data. We have been looking at the fish. We have been working with the universities, as well; University of Saskatchewan for one. We have arrangements with members of the Council of Environment Ministers. The Premier is a member of Council of Federation which is taking an active interest in the water.

We are currently negotiating our transboundary agreements that are going to be binding to Alberta, Saskatchewan, Vancouver and the Northwest Territories. We know that the Alberta-federal government has just released their monitoring plan for water which includes, to a certain extent, the Northwest Territories. However, we recognize as does the Member, we need to do more. We have discussions currently underway once again with

other potential partners to look at water monitoring, capacity, especially farther north. Specifically if we can do it and find the resources, we think it is very critical if we can get some water monitoring to pass around the Member’s community of Fort Good Hope. We think it is an area that needs to have some attention paid to it. We are working on that and should be able to show some progress in the next couple of months. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the Minister for outlining all such work that this government is doing to deal with the water issue. I want to ask any thoughts on what they can do for the people of Fort Good Hope. That would be appreciated by the people there. What baseline water quality information is currently being collected now in the Sahtu?

Mr. Speaker, we are looking at the Canadian Water Quality Guidelines as guidelines that have been developed probably across Canada. It gives guidance and sets standards to be followed by various jurisdictions. We also, when it comes to water in the communities, it has to, of course, meet all of the standards for the health of people, so it is considered potable and meets all of those various tests as well. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, several years ago Imperial Oil was found guilty by Environment Canada for water quality for dumping chemicals in the Mackenzie River. They paid a fine. I think it was a slap on the wrist for them for about $195,000 because of their conviction of dumping chemicals in the Mackenzie River. I want to ask the Minister on the water quality lab, is that something that this government is looking at in the future, putting another lab in the Northwest Territories along the Mackenzie River, more specifically somewhere in the Norman Wells or Fort Good Hope area?

Mr. Speaker, we see a clear need for community-based water monitoring. It is an issue that has come up through all of our consultations up and down the valley as we develop our Northern Voices, Northern Waters water strategy. As we look at the transboundary issues and the negotiations there, it is clear as well that that type of monitoring, both on the Alberta side and as it enters into the territory and as it goes farther north, are going to be critical.

We see community-based water monitoring as very critical. We have been spending a lot of time and energy at the border where the water is crossing, but we also recognize there are needs farther north. As we look at our planning for the expansion of community-based water monitoring, we are definitely looking at places like the Member’s community of Fort Good Hope where there have been a lot of concerns raised. It would be a good

point to try to do that as we move forward in our planning. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have said in my Member’s statement that several elders in 1979, Chief Paul Wright and Chief George Kodakin said in the public meeting that one day we are going to put our nets in the water and when we lift the nets, there are either going to be no fish in there or there are going to be fish in there that will be sick and dying and no one will want to eat them. That is the prophecy they said to us in 1979. This is why I bring this issue up of water quality monitoring in the Sahtu along the Mackenzie River. We need to know.

How soon would the Minister be able to tell us that we could specifically have one in Providence, Wrigley, along Norman Wells and so forth, Tsiigehtchic and all the way up to the Beaufort-Delta? Specifically, we need to have water monitoring quality stations in the future. Will we have a lab and ask for another lab? When can the Minister tell us that this is something that he will take to the federal government to start putting these sites into the plan to have along in the Northwest Territories?

Mr. Speaker, I would be remiss if I didn’t point out at this juncture as we talk about the need to have better information on the water, better decision-making as it pertains to water at a time when the federal government is cutting billions of dollars out of their various departmental programs to save anywhere between $4 million and $8 billion this year. They are looking at a lot of cases, scientists and Environment and Natural Resources and a lot of resources that they currently have are going to disappear.

We are pursuing this as a GNWT initiative with some partners that we are working with, but clearly, if we want to do this the right way, if we want to actually have the decision-making, then it gets us back to the need to get devolution so that we have a legal authority over land, water and resource development. We don’t have to rely on the federal government. We can use our own sources. We can make our own decisions in the North. That is the critical piece in the next year and a half.

The monitoring stations, we will be working on and hopefully in the course of the next business plan we will be able to show some progress, but in the meantime the fundamental issue that we do need are the levers of control finally in the Northwest Territories, land, water and resource development. Thank you.

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

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement today I talked about the declining population of the Northwest Territories. There are ways of addressing that. We can attract new people. We can keep the people we have. We can multiply the people we have or there is another huge target audience out there, the people who work in the Northwest Territories but live somewhere else. That is what I want to ask the Minister of ITI about today. Have there been changes in the socio-economic agreements that were originally signed with the diamond mines? We hear that the Yukon is doing so well because of the mining sector. We also have a good mining sector with the diamond mines, but if people don’t have to live in the Northwest Territories and it’s easier if they can be flown out of the South, then I guess they have that option of doing that. So I’d like to ask the Minister of ITI, have we regressed from the original commitment we had with the diamond companies with respect to incentives and inducements to keep people in the North. Thank you.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Concerning the SEAs, we had come up with an MOU with the three diamond mines. That MOU expired last year. We’re currently in the process of trying to replace that MOU. I’ve had the opportunity now as the Minister of ITI, to sit down with the three head folks at the diamond mines and we have to chart a course forward when it comes to replacing that MOU, and I fully intend on doing that and including my colleague, the Minister of Health and Social Services, and my colleague, the Minister of ECE, in a way forward on that. Thank you.

We are, I’m sure, aware of the challenges faced by these companies, as well, in attracting and recruiting people to work for them, regardless of whether they live in the North or the South, just getting the manpower or the labour force that they need to operate their mines. But I’d like to ask the Minister, in his discussions with the three diamond mines, is it his sense that they are aware of our plight in the need to see more benefit from these resources that we are extracting from our territory and the absolute advantages of having these folks live in the North. Thank you.

Thank you. They’re acutely aware of that and I believe wholeheartedly

that they’d like nothing more than to see the majority of their workforce take up residence here in the Northwest Territories. However, the reality is, and I just returned from an FTP meeting in Goose Bay, Labrador, where the economy is red hot in Labrador, as well, and the representative from the province of Alberta mentioned to the Ministers at that meeting that in four years’ time the province of Alberta is going to have a 77,000 person deficit when it comes to skilled tradespeople in the province of Alberta, and that’s just in Alberta. There are many areas around the country nowadays where people can choose to live where they want to live and go to the work, and that unfortunately is the reality that we’re in. That’s the hill that we have to climb and I think we really need to start thinking about how we’re going to retain the people that we have. I think that should be front and centre as well. Thank you.

Thank you. So apart from the pressure that we could put on industry to try and have their people live and work in the North through inducements and incentives for their employees, what kind of a campaign do we have to try and communicate to people? I mean, we obviously love it here in the North. What kind of campaign do we have as a government to show people the kind of lifestyle, unique lifestyle that they can have here in the Northwest Territories? The Spectacular NWT is a wonderful campaign; you know, a nice place to visit, wouldn’t want to live there. Or does it say come and see us and live here? Thank you.

Thank you. We have had the Make Your Mark campaign that has been doing a great deal of work in eastern Canada and trying to tell people about the opportunities that are here in the Northwest Territories. Many people that currently live in a city like Yellowknife have roots in eastern Canada. We need to do everything we can to ensure that we’re putting out the welcome mat.

We’re looking across the country for people that want to move and live here in the Northwest Territories, but we’ve got a couple of hurdles again that we need to get over and one of those hurdles is the cost of living. When surveys are done with the mine workers that are on site, the main focus is the cost of living here in the Northwest Territories as compared to the South. That’s an obstacle that we have to try to continue to pursue and get over.

The other obstacle is if you look here in the city of Yellowknife with a vacancy rate of 0.6 percent, there aren’t too many houses on the market. We really need to do something with the City of Yellowknife, free up some land and get some housing developments started so that there are places. If we’re going to try to attract people to live here, we need to have houses for them to live in. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Final, short supplementary, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Lots of houses for sale in Hay River. I just thought I’d throw that in there.

One of the other things that we’ve seen is with the mining companies that come in here. They have trained our northern people, they have employed our northern people, but it is even easier for them to go live in St. Albert or Spruce Grove. We’ve had out-migration. One of the side effects of our people getting jobs at the mine is that they say, you know what, it’s easier to live in Spruce Grove than it is to live in Behchoko, and we’ve had out-migration as a result of that.

What can we do about this? Where is the campaign to try as a government to encourage people not only to move here but to also stay here? Thank you.

Thank you. We need to really look at communities like Hay River, like Fort Smith, like Fort Simpson and try to see how moving forward we can attract people to live in the Northwest Territories. If there are opportunities for people to live in a community like Hay River, Fort Smith or Fort Simpson, we need to gear up and we need to come up with a way to try to attract people to do that.

We’re continuing on with the Make Your Mark campaign and as we move forward it’s certainly my intention to try to keep as many people here in the North as we can and attract as many people as we can.

I look forward to working with the Regular Members on the opposite side of the House to ensure that we are doing everything in our power to ensure that that happens, and that includes working with industry. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. The Member for Range Lake, Mr. Dolynny.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I stand here before you not just as the MLA for Range Lake but as a health care professional who’s been practicing here in the North for over 20 years and serving not only the needs of Yellowknife but pretty much the needs of all of the Northwest Territories and prior to 1999, Nunavut as well. So I stand here before you today as someone who I think has got a lot of vast experience when it comes to prescription drugs and health care.

I will not deny the fact that illicit drug use, tobacco, alcohol, these are all serious addictions out there that we see every day, and I don’t want to take anything away from those addictions out there, but

what I was talking about in my Member’s statement earlier today is what I like to refer to as the quiet addiction. This is the addiction we don’t talk about as much, because we talk about the other ones that have so much more press time and media attention. That’s narcotic and opiate dependence that leads to dependency as well as addiction.

This is a serious issue that tends to go quietly and unannounced, and again, when you’re trying to get information about it, there is nothing out there. So I was very concerned when trying to look for information about it. We statistically have nothing out there to lead by. So my question for the Minister of Health here today is: Why is the department not looking more into the addictions of prescription narcotic abuse and why is this information not available to the people of the Northwest Territories?

Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. The Minister of Health and Social Services, Mr. Beaulieu.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The information is not available because the department does not track use of opiates. However, we do have the NWT Pharmacy Act which will give us the power to set up the regulations, but we don’t have the funding to set it up. Health Canada does track non-insured health benefits prescription use, if they’re going to that program to purchase the prescription drugs; but if they pay cash, we don’t track that either. Thank you.

Thank you. I appreciate the Minister for giving reference to the act. There’s no doubt that the topic of addictions is a high topic for the Members on this side of the House. You can only count on many hands how many times this has been brought up even in this Assembly here. But the idea about addictions is understanding where you start. We talked about emerging addiction areas; well, I don’t want to use the word emerging because I believe this has been around here not only for the short period but it’s been around here for a very long period of time. Given what was said here today and the response from the Minister, can myself as a Member and the people of the Northwest Territories get some reassurance and assurances that this information can be statistically gathered in the very near future? Thank you.

Thank you. Yes, through regulations we can gather the information. However, at this time, like I said, we haven’t gone through the act to gather the information. I’m told that information can be gathered. The electronic medical health records that we are starting to use now allows us to gather information in Yellowknife and Hay River at this time. We need to expand the electronic medical health records right across the Territories as a first step if we’re going to track all the prescription drug use across the Territories. For

now we are capable of tracking in Yellowknife and Hay River.

Again I appreciate the Minister’s response on that. Can the Minister or his department give some idea of the timelines when these regulations might be altered or amended so that we can gather information throughout the Territories? As I said, this is not just isolated to urban Northwest Territories; I believe this issue is prevalent everywhere. Having an understanding of the timeline would definitely help prepare, with respect to addictions.

We will be working with our partners at the Bureau of Statistics. We’re going to include questions on prescription drug use the next time we do addictions surveys, the general addictions survey. That survey is scheduled to begin in late 2012.

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

No further questions, Mr. Speaker.

The honourable Member for Deh Cho, Mr. Nadli.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In the Northwest Territories we pride ourselves in being self-reliant, fending for ourselves, families and communities. Firearms or guns become a large necessity as tools for livelihood for survival and subsistence. As we look forward to the warming weather and spring hunt, can the Minister of Justice give an update to this House in terms of the Department of Justice’s perspective on Bill C-19 that is before the House of Commons?

Thank you, Mr. Nadli. The honourable Minister responsible for Justice, Mr. Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Recognizing the value and importance of hunting in the Northwest Territories and the need for long guns to do most hunting activities, the GNWT has actually always opposed the long-gun registry. Our position hasn’t changed. We oppose the long-gun registry and actually support the federal government’s position on getting rid of it.

Supporting the long-gun registry and the government, what measures is the department taking in the likelihood that the bill is passed and becomes law in terms of respecting the uniqueness of the North and also some of the cultural values respecting long guns?

Right now the long-gun registry is a reality and there is a requirement

to register long guns in Canada. In the Northwest Territories we’ve always opposed it. We still oppose it. It’s my understanding that the bill has actually gone to third reading in the House of Commons and that if it passes it will go to the Senate. If it does pass in the Senate and becomes law, then the long-gun registry won’t exist and we support that position. We don’t support the long-gun registry.

Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. The honourable Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Moses.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m just going to follow up on some remarks made by my fellow colleague Mrs. Groenewegen. My questions today are for the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. Ramsay. It’s in regard to his Minister’s statement that he gave earlier where he mentioned that mining has brought significant economic opportunities to our territory such as jobs in the mines. Then he goes on further and says that he wants to benefit all Northwest Territories residents.

Back in January we had a leadership meeting in Inuvik and he had mentioned and had some questions in regard to the recruitment process that some of the diamond mines came up to Inuvik, did some recruitment, did some promotion, however, we didn’t see much follow-up on that. I do understand that he’s in new MOU discussions with some of the mines. I just wanted to ask the Minister what progress has been made in those discussions or since the meetings in January in getting the people of Inuvik, who have gone through some training, getting them possible jobs at the mines.

Thank you, Mr. Moses. The honourable Minister responsible for Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. David Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s important that the benefits of mining accrue to all regions in the Northwest Territories. The situation right now in the Beaufort-Delta is such that people are looking for work. The mines have done some work in the Beaufort-Delta in trying to attract employees to work at the mines. As we move forward, this is going to be an issue and I want to let the Member know that as we work through whatever replaces the MOU, the opportunities for other people in the Northwest Territories, I’d rather see people living somewhere in the Northwest Territories working at our diamond mines than people flying in from the East Coast or southern Canada.

I want to follow up as well to a Minister’s statement made by Mr. Lafferty, ECE,

directed to Mr. Ramsay. I just wanted to ask Mr. Ramsay, based on some of the results with the apprenticeship and occupational certification that’s done through ECE, the department has issued 23 certificates of qualification and eight certificates of competence to journeypersons in the Northwest Territories. Today there are 424 apprentices in the Northwest Territories. Has the Minister of ITI done any work with the Minister of ECE to ensure that once these guys get their papers that they’re not just kicked out the door, that they have a job and place for them once they’ve gone through their certifications?

I know a new subcommittee of Cabinet has been formed. It’s Economic Development and Employment, of which I’m the chair. I will be working closely with the lead deputy on that, Dan Daniels from ECE. I will certainly be working closely. We need to also keep in mind that as we move forward with devolution and we get more responsibility, we’re making decisions for ourselves, we’re growing our mining industry here in the Northwest Territories and the opportunities that that will bring, that there are going to be more jobs available. We need to ensure that our people are trained and we’ll have to make every effort to work with our colleagues in Nunavut and the Yukon to come up with a comprehensive mine training strategy for northern Canada, something that we will be pursuing in the future.

I just wanted one short supplementary question here to finish off. That’s in regard to the recruitment process that has gone up into Inuvik and the new deal with the MOU that’s being discussed. I don’t want this to fall onto a case in point where the diamond mines say they’ve come to Inuvik, they’ve done their consultation, and leave it at that. It’s in the agreements that they’ve done their consultations. I want to see follow-up. I want to see that in this new MOU that in fact the mines do hire northern people from these communities, regardless if it’s Inuvik, Fort Simpson or Hay River; that they are being looked at first for hiring in these mines, in these resources that we have in the Northwest Territories. In regard to the MOU, can the Minister of ITI give us an idea of when the MOU will be drafted or even finalized?

I understand the Member’s concerns. Obviously the MOU expired last year. We’re in the process of working on replacing the MOU and what form that takes is yet to be determined. I certainly will bring up the issue of exhausting all avenues for employment in all regions of the Northwest Territories to the mining presidents when I do meet with them again and we do get some formal correspondence from them on the next steps forward as we work towards a replacement for that MOU moving forward.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask the Minister of Health and Social Services about the public advisory on Ekali Lake and other lakes in the Nahendeh riding. I’d like to know the communication plans that the department has to advise the public about eating fish from these lakes.