Thank you, Mr. Speaker. When Mr. Yakeleya first stated this idea to me, I thought it was a fantastic idea. It’s quite a breath of fresh air in the way we do business, and we should really target areas that could really use not only educational opportunities, but educational opportunities that are necessary and are relevant.

This motion is, really, it’s talking about the tsunami of opportunities that are sort of creeping along and about to crash into the Sahtu region. There is so much opportunity there, but one of the key things to this is they need skilled workers that are relevant to that industry.

The idea of a Sahtu regional institute of technology, I have to say, is right along the lines of a brilliant idea about getting the right type of skills in the right area. We could talk at length, if not days, about the need for skilled labour in the Northwest Territories. We often hear criticism from folks like myself about our socio-economic agreements not being lived up to, certainly, in the spirit and the intent.

If we can’t get them here, you know, let’s train them. Let’s start training and developing our own people who want jobs. This is a real opportunity in the sense of energy, in the sense of future, in the sense of investments, but that’s dwarfed by the opportunity and the untapped potential that belongs in people who are looking for work so they can feed their families, so they can house their families, so they have a future.

In short, this is a great motion. I look forward to the free vote from Cabinet to support this. They’re so happy. They were smiling when I said that, I know. I just, once again, want to thank Mr. Yakeleya for this initiative. If it just takes ideas like this to finally break through that crusty exterior Cabinet has on Members’ ideas, this is the excitement we need to do. I hope this motion passes. It certainly has my full support.