Thank you, Madam Chair. I'd say if there was any place we could be generating confusion, this could be it given that we now have two lands acts, once we have this in place, the NWT Lands Act and the Commissioner's Lands Act. Not only that, but, as I understand it, this legislation, Commissioner's lands, it reaches out to the Commissioner's Lands Act, changes it to allow Commissioner's land to be considered under this NWT Lands Act and vice-versa, it provides for Territorial lands to be considered and regulated under the Commissioner's Lands Act. How or when this will be happening, I haven't seen one word about that, or why. I know there is concern in the public that this could be used to actually avoid some of the regulatory visions of the Commissioner's Lands Act which is stronger in terms of the need to ensure mandatory closure plans and financial security. That is my first point.
I guess related to that, I would say what certainty is provided in terms of mandatory closure plans and financial security requirements are in this act. I know 19.(h) begins a little bit in that direction. What is in the act mandating a closure and reclamation plan for any lands that are leased pursuant to either legislation?
The leases should be a matter of public record. We've heard a lot of complaints from the mineral industry, for example. They know they're working in the area of leaseholders. They know they theoretically have access to that land, but they need to notify leaseholders about that. They're not able to find out and there are many, many reasons why those working on the land should have access and there should be transparency. This is public land that is leased out. There should be absolute transparency on that. I don't believe that's in this act, but maybe I could get confirmation on that or clarification that it is where it is.
The bill contains provisions, 57(3), to allow Cabinet alone to decide to move these lands back and forth between the acts. Why do we need that? I don't think I've seen any reasoning provided for why we would need that and I don't believe that's any kind of a mirroring. That's above and beyond the need to mirror here.
Again, the concern is it would allow Cabinet to allow developers to avoid putting up financial securities or, for example, other more restrictive provisions of one piece of regulation or regulation over another. So it seems to be a questionable authority to ask for, and not in the public interest.
There are two aspects of the NWT Lands Act that would also require public review. I think the details would be in regulations more than legislation itself, but the first is royalty and fees. Again, in order to ensure an adequate and fair return to the public, those should be reviewed. Secondly, the regime to administer mineral rights disposition is free entry, as we've discussed before, where mining is considered the best and highest use of the land, despite other users or owners or the inherent value of the land itself. Again, a very problematic situation and I know many other jurisdictions, Ontario and Quebec, our largest jurisdictions come to mind, have changed that free entry system.
So, again, the public review is long overdue and has been called for in the past when it was federal law without any response. I guess I have those comments and questions, Madam Chair.