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.