Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have some questions here with regard to caribou management and caribou quotas and so on. I heard the Minister say when he responded to opening comments where he talked about the resident harvest and that there’s a possibility the resident harvest might be opened up in the fall of this year, of 2013. I didn’t hear him say anything about an opportunity for outfitters to have tags in the fall of 2013 or fall and winter 2013-14.
I am really concerned that our caribou hunt outfitters are in great distress. I know that they have had some assistance through the Sport Hunt Outfitters Marketing Program, but to have facilities sit and basically deteriorate over time through lack of use, that’s what most of them are doing.
It would seem to me that we should be able to provide some tags this fall for outfitters. My understanding, in speaking with the outfitters, is that they don’t want tags for the Bathurst herd. Not all of them, but the majority of them, from what I understand, don’t hunt the Bathurst caribou anyway. They hunt the Bluenose-East and the Ahiak herd. So it would seem to me that if we’re going to open up the Bluenose-East herd to resident hunters, we would also be able to open it up to outfitters and sport hunt outfitters.
So I’d like to know from the Minister, first of all, if there has been any consideration given to providing tags for the caribou outfitters, and I’m coming again from the perspective of a number of these businesses are within the city of Yellowknife. They may not necessarily be my constituents, but they are constituents certainly of other Yellowknife Members and, like I say, they are really struggling. Their businesses are quite likely to fold if we don’t get them some tags sometime soon. So, again, my question with regard to the possibility of providing some caribou tags to outfitters in the fall winter of 13-14. Thank you, Mr. Chair.