Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate the Member’s comments. The issue of the water treatment plants in Kakisa and Enterprise, I know the Member has initiated discussions with Minister McLeod. That issue will be given due consideration.
The issue of Providence and the old site where the road used to be and the ferry, Transportation is in
the process of responding to the letter from the Member who has raised that concern.
In terms of small communities and some of the school needs, we do have money in the budget for planning studies for Colville and Trout Lake. So there is going to be some progress on those two key issues.
The housing shortage is a critical one that we’ve talked about collectively as a Legislative Assembly. In addition to the money identified in this budget for housing as an information item at this point, it’s our intention to come forward through the O and M side with another plan to do some dramatic investments in housing, especially in small communities to try to deal with the pressures especially for unfilled positions as it relates to government jobs, teachers, nurses and such.
All these processes and all these projects take time. The Anne Buggins Wellness Centre was started, if memory serves, way back in the 15th Assembly. I was Minister of Health at the time and Minister McLeod was Minister of MACA, and we thought it would be a six-month process to sort everything out and it took considerably longer and finished off by those that came afterwards, but it’s a good project to see done.
The level of service on the reserve tied to their TLE negotiations, it would be nice to have that resolved, as well, and I’m sure they’ve done that, but in my constituency we have two treaty land entitlement agreements. So people can see how those work, the benefits as well as maybe some of the drawbacks. I thank the Member for his comments. Thank you.