Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I assume, along with myself and yourself, that all the Members here will encourage all the youth of the Northwest Territories who are congregating in Hay River tonight to be in the 24th Annual Track and

Field for the Northwest Territories.

---Applause

This event, like I indicated, has over 1,100 athletes and a couple hundred volunteers from the community that are helping to feed, to house and to manage where everybody goes. My assistant is out there working on the shot put event right now. The weather typically is either hot or cold or rainy, and this year we got cold. It’s not going to be raining, but it’s cool out there, so we can dress for that.

Obviously, this event is a fun event for the kids to go out there and compete. We have kids who are four and five years old, all the way to teenagers.

This also is an event that some of our competitive athletes use to springboard into the other national events. One of our great athletes of the Northwest Territories, Brendan Green, was a track and field athlete at these events. I commend this event as a springboard to be more competitive out there.

I’d also like to thank the Members who are travelling down with us for the opening ceremonies tonight. I encourage all the kids. Run, kids, go run!