Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to welcome all the people to the gallery, Aboriginal government leaders that are here, the hardworking devolution crew that is here, taking a moment’s respite from their labours and taking close notes about the concerns of where we are today.

Eighteen years now I have been an MLA and I have been waiting that long for this day, myself and Madam Groenewegen. This fact is one of the reasons that I ran for re-election. It was to try to conclude the process that we started late in the last Assembly.

As I can say once again, this is the biggest political moment since division. There will be no others for decades to come of this significance. It is a critical next step in us realizing our political destiny. It is not an event; it is a process.

The basic question for me and for Northerners is a simple one as we stand here burdened and bowed by the very many federal shackles that constrain us. We look at the agreement that we have negotiated, that will get us almost shackle-free. Will we be better off tomorrow or today after this vote than we are today? The answer is unequivocally yes. When people want to know, that is the language I put it in. We have to get rid of those federal shackles. There is going to be some there that are extremely galling, but we will get there. We can get to them as we take this step. It is not perfect. This government and this federal government will continue their work. This next government and the next federal government, as well, will follow through on the implementation and the pressure from Northerners to take over and finally control the resource development piece will be relentless.

We talked at great length in this House about the economics. That is good and it is important. The one piece that I want to mention that I think is incredibly important and we don’t want to overlook is water. We’re going to finally have legal control over water. We’re negotiating transboundary agreements with the provinces. Within the next few months they’re going be complete as a package, hopefully, and Northerners finally will control that

most valuable resource. I say that not lightly, because we’ve been across this territory to every community and the one thing that people say is the most important that binds everybody is water. We had to work hard to do that and the devolution negotiators deserve credit, because the federal government was tough, and wily, and slippery, and we had to watch very carefully. We are going to have, finally, at long last, that right, and that right, to me, makes this even more important.

So I will be, clearly, supporting this motion. Thank you.