Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m very honoured today to second this motion. This is history in the making in the Northwest Territories.

If I could go back to my campaign material for the last five elections, I’m sure I’d see devolution at the top of every platform, and that is also a part of a platform that I believe everyone in this House ran on. It is an amazing feat, indeed, to see the agreement that has come into place that is before us today.

I see that the newspaper, the Yellowknifer, says that MLAs have no say on devolution. I would like to know about those hours and hours of briefings that I attended, because we certainly did have a lot of information shared with us as it went along, as did our Aboriginal governments and our Aboriginal leaders, and I want to commend them today, too, for their part in this.

Looking back, I’ve said this before in this House, but I’ll say it again, and not to belabour the point, but as over the years I have scanned the landscape for what kind of leadership it would take to pull this agreement together and pull the Aboriginal governments together, and we know that not every Aboriginal government in the Northwest Territories is yet a signatory to the agreement-in-principle or to the Devolution Agreement, but we have high hopes that they will be.

Like I said, as I look back, I wondered, in my own mind, I would see leaders come along and I’d say, who will lead the staff, the technical people to have that relationship with Ottawa. There are so many things that had to come into alignment in order to get to the day where we are today. I would like to very much commend our Premier, Mr. McLeod, for the work that he has done. He picked up the mantle from previous leaders as well.

I remember the day that Premier Floyd Roland signed the agreement-in-principle in the Great Hall with the Metis and the Inuvialuit, and I believe that was a brave move on his part. There was some heckling going on, and I know he had some trepidation, as well, as he embarked on this, because we want a good deal for our people. We don’t want to sign on to something that we cannot believe in and truly endorse, and say that this will advance the aspirations and potential of the people we represent.

Today, as the Premier says, this is a good deal. As everyone knows in negotiations, negotiations are negotiations. There’s no such thing as a perfect deal, but this is a good deal. It’s a start of much work that lies ahead. There’s much legislation to

pen as we go forward, and continued consultations with our partner governments as well, and many things had to align today to bring us to this point.

As I said, I am extremely proud to second this motion, and I am extremely proud of this government and where it has brought the devolution file.