Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We take our responsibility very, very seriously when it comes to all issues related to environment and natural resources, but with wildlife in particular, and we work very hard to accommodate all Northerners. I think we’re demonstrating that, even though not to the Member’s satisfaction. I point out that we have also, for the first time in 30-some years, reopened the harvest for bison, a modest harvest for bison in the South Slave, which hasn’t been done since the mid-‘80s.

In regard to working with the Yellowknives, we have spent extensive time and effort, right from the deputy minister on down, with repeated meetings with the Yellowknives, and I’ll ask the deputy minister to lay out for committee the steps he has taken and the efforts we’ve made both to come to an accommodation but also recognize that there’s a lot of pressure from among the Yellowknives to go and take advantage of the tags and put the 150 tags to use. I’ll ask, Mr. Chairman, with your indulgence, to let the deputy fill in the detail.

Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. Mr. Campbell.

Thank you, Mr. Campbell. Continuing on with page 13-25 on wildlife, I have Mr. Blake.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. There’s a lot of good discussion here on management with the wildlife. I just wanted to share a few things. I fully know what the department is working with. I had some experience with the Porcupine Caribou Management Board a few years back. I think that we need to do the same sort of procedure as what the Porcupine Caribou Management Board has done, was develop an actual plan for these herds in our area here. I know we have great success working with… There is a number of parties that work for that management plan, including the Inuvialuit Game Council, the Gwich’in Tribal Council, Vuntut Gwitchin Government, Tron’dek Hwech’in, Nacho Nyuk Dun Mayo Government of the Yukon, the territorial government and also the Government of Canada. That shows that people can actually work together for the health of the herd. I think that is what we need to do here. They developed a scale that, if the herd is one area, there’s action that needs to be done. Whether people like it or not, for the health of the herd, you have to do it. If we even did that a couple of years back, we thought we were in the red zone, which is 25,000 to 45,000 caribou so we did a bulls only campaign. We did take a while to get buy-in, but it’s just a matter of educating the people and the public as to what needs to be done to manage that resource. I know we are just in the early stages here. It turned out that, even with our actions,

because we didn’t get a good population count, the herd was actually doing very well. It was in the neighbourhood of 134,000 caribou. That just goes to show that…

I think we are at that critical point here. Everybody needs to work together to make sure that these herds are available to our future generations. I fully support what the department is doing. I think that we need to implement this sort of plan for the herds in this region. I hope that they can work with the people from PCMB to try to develop the same sort of plan for these herds here that sets down guidelines we need to follow. We will do that.

One thing I wanted to mention, too, it was stated that no one has harvest data. I just wanted to correct that statement, because the Gwich’in actually do a harvest study three times a year. Hunters do mark down what they harvest. I believe the same goes for the Inuvialuit Game Council as well. I just wanted to correct that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Blake. Minister Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the Member’s comments. I do fully concur that the model developed by the Porcupine Caribou Management Board is one that is worthy of emulation that the thresholds that they’ve agreed to have taken the politics out of the management of a very critical herd. It’s a lesson that we need to learn down here and a goal we need to achieve here are those types of thresholds. The area where the Porcupine is, of course, this is a very politically complex area. The biggest noticeable difference is where there are unsettled claims and settled claims. With the Wek’eezhii Board it is much more clear-cut with the Tlicho in the Chief Drygeese area, unsettled claims. The Metis are here as well. It’s much more politically sensitive.

I appreciate the Member’s comments. We are trying to take the lessons learned from the Porcupine Caribou Management Board.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Committee, we are on 13-25, activity summary, wildlife, operations expenditure summary, $16.118 million. Does committee agree?

Thank you. 13-27, information item, wildlife, active positions. Any questions?

Seeing none, 13-29, activity summary, water resources, operations expenditure summary, $10.737 million. Agreed?

Thank you, committee. Page 13-30, activity summary, water resources, grants and contributions, $1.090 million. Does committee agree?

Thank you. Page 13-31, information item, water resources, active positions. Any questions?

Thank you, committee. Page 13-33, activity summary, conservation assessment and monitoring, operations expenditure summary, $8.423 million. Does committee agree? Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Is this the area that would include the CIMP work, the Cumulative Impact Monitoring Program work? If so, what do we expect? I know that has been a work in progress for many years and I think the intent has been to be able to identify thresholds that would help guide industry.

Does the Minister know where we’re at on that and when we can expect to have that sort of information? I know this actually hasn’t started yet, so I’m not expecting the Minister to be fully on top of this yet, but I would be interested in that information. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Yes, this is the correct activity for your question. For that answer we will go to Mr. Campbell.

Thanks for that information. Where are we at on the environmental audit? I believe there is one in progress here, but there are sections that are wanting to be completed and overdue. Do we know where that’s at and do we

have funding in this budget to complete that process? Thanks.