Thank you, Madam Chair. Just before I begin, I would like to commend the Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya, for his commitment to his constituents and taking a big step standing up for his people and what the people

believe in and what they do need. I would like to thank my colleagues from the Government Operations committee as well as staff that travelled with us on this important matter. One other thank you to the people of the Sahtu region for their warm welcomes, their great hospitality and, as Ms. Bisaro mentioned, their great storytelling.

The Sahtu region is a region that, in all my travels, is one that is very spiritual, probably the most spiritual region that I have travelled to in the Northwest Territories. Upon my visit and the consultations that we took on this tour, I heard and felt the spirit of individuals, families and communities that were broken and hurt. As Ms. Bisaro said, crying for help and the need for help.

You’ve heard some comments here today about increased sales, increased restrictions would benefit the bootleggers, but what we heard from some of these people is that bootleggers had an opportunity to actually purchase more alcohol now, instead of finding other people to purchase it for them. So they can go in and buy as much alcohol as they want. What we heard was stories of them loading them up on sleds and heading out of town. They said they buy hard alcohol because hard alcohol doesn’t freeze.

What we also heard was the history and that in the ‘70s, the Sahtu Secretariat, the regional council, made a motion to put in these restrictions and the rationing system, and the whole region voted on that. The new vote that went on in Norman Wells did not allow the communities to have that say, and that was taken away from them.

We heard from leaders, business groups, residents, elders, youth and the RCMP. We heard from very strong people with strong voices. For somebody to speak up in a community setting in a meeting, that takes a lot of guts and a lot of courage, and for them to speak up on such an issue, I think that sheds light to the issue at hand.

Things that we heard, as I mentioned, there was an increase in sales, increase in consumption, but we also heard that there was an increase in deaths in the region and deaths in our youth. When we’re going through the consultations, we did have a discussion and said the government doesn’t have all the answers and this has to be done in partnership. It’s been mentioned here before that it has to be done through personal choice and communities have to jump on board, as well, should this go through and how we work together.

Just to touch on the bootlegging side of this, we did hear from the RCMP specifically that they have been getting more calls in the small communities; they’ve been having more people in jail cells. They’ve seen an increase in that as well as hearing more bootlegging going on in the communities. We heard residents talking about the amount of people

they see walking in town intoxicated. They’ve seen an increase in numbers they haven’t seen before.

The bill itself, you know, it’s not going to solve all the problems, but it is a good start. From that, we can start focusing on the other needs in that region, but also other regions throughout the Northwest Territories that focus on treatment, education and prevention. I guess what was most shocking to me was in one of the communities where I spoke to a couple of RCMP officers I had known that had worked in the community of Inuvik. They said this bill needs to go through because it’s really affecting the lives of people in the community and they’ve seen an increase in that time in speaking to the chief and especially the leadership was very important.

I guess in my last meeting in Norman Wells is where we did get a lot of both sides of the story. It’s always good to hear. We did hear a lot from the small communities who were all in support of this bill. I wouldn’t say Norman Wells was half and half; I would say there were more people in support of the bill than against it. Some things mentioned was the bill that took the restrictions off was the allowance of some transient people that come up to Norman Wells and only stay there for a year or two and then leave. They make decisions for people that live there their whole lives and it affects their whole lives. Actually, one of the people who were at the meeting said that if the amount of people that came to the voting meetings when the restrictions were lifted were more than there was when we were talking about the bill, we probably wouldn’t be talking about this right now because the vote was so close. If you had more people out to the discussion of the bill, it probably would have been voted down.

One group that really touched me when they spoke was the youth. The youth were very candid. They were very open, telling us all the issues they’ve seen. We had youth tell us how they are able to access more alcohol now because adults who buy for them, who wouldn’t want to use up all their restrictions for the day, can actually buy more booze now and, as such, buy for the youth. The youth were telling us that. As a result, there were some very strong and heartfelt stories from the youth as well.

Madam Chair, I know there is development and activity going on in the Norman Wells region. As I stated earlier in one of my statements, if we don’t have healthy people in those communities – and from this tour, there’s a lot of hurting people there – we’re not going to have people to fill those jobs for the development and we’re going to have to continue to bring people up from down south.

The committee listened very well during this tour. The report was read the other day and there were 15 strong recommendations that go outside of just

the restrictions. We’re looking at social issues that need to be addressed.

I just want to leave you with this one quote that one of the elders had left us with when we were leaving one of the communities. “Hope you make a good decision for us.” I’m here because I listened to a lot of residents of the Sahtu region. As I said, it’s probably the most spiritual region I’ve ever travelled to. Upon the travel to the communities, I could feel the broken spirits that were there and those spirits need to be uplifted again. They need to be rendered and they need the help. I’m one to sit here and say I will help the Member on this bill as well as assist the residents of the Sahtu, so they can have a healthy society again. Mahsi, Madam Chair.