Mr. Speaker, while I appreciate the Minister's reply as it relates to staffing issues, I mean, that's a concern that we all have here in the North, staffing issues. The fact of the matter is that there is still only one line-up. The staff there, quite frankly, in my view and others', they are doing a commendable job. It's just you can't increase the throughput without having more screening systems. So I'd like to ask the Minister: is this it? After $300,000 and all these improvement fees, is this as good as it gets, or are we going to see a much-improved system? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

He's kind of left an open-ended question there for me, so I'm going to take the opportunity to say, you know, the revolving fund has given us an opportunity at the Yellowknife Airport to do a number of improvements. It's not just the CATSA system. That's a system that we're working on. We're working on something that is not even in my control. We're working with the federal government to try to improve it. We went and did other steps outside what I've just said about the new configuration and the staffing issues. For those of you in the House who have travelled lately, we've put up signage in Asian languages to help way-finding systems there to help people, prior to going into the CATSA system, be a little bit more prepared for when they're travelling. There are videos out there in different languages outside the security system to also educate passengers. So we're doing a lot of different things to improve the Yellowknife Airport, not just the CATSA system. There are the runways and all these other things that we're spending this money on.

As I said here probably a couple of weeks ago in my Minister's statement in the House, we're the victims of our own success, again. Landings are up 15 percent. Traffic by passengers is up by 4 percent. We've put in these new systems and we're trying to accommodate the people as best we can. My best recommendation to the travelling public is, you know, we're so used to being a small jurisdiction that we can go to the airport and jump on a plane 10 minutes before it goes, but the reality of it is, in the Yellowknife Airport, you have to start looking at going out there 90 minutes or 60 minutes prior to departing. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.

Merci, Monsieur le President. Earlier today I reviewed the history of our government's acquisition and management of a Mactung property. We accepted it as financial security against the shaky Cantung Mine and have spent money cleaning up the site, compiling geological reports, and so on, in the hope of finally trying to sell it. Can the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment tell us how much has been spent to assess and clean up the site, compile geological reports, hire a consultant to file Yukon government applications, and now market it? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This is a detailed question, and I have to commend the Member for giving me the questions ahead of time, because we had to compile a lot of information on this set of questions. So I'll go through the Member's list. The government has spent $126,025 removing hazardous and other materials from the site. There has been no assessment of full remediation costs, as this is not work that we are intending to undertake. We have completed Mactung site visits, one by Lands, another resulting in two geological reports on the mine sites and surrounding area, but no formal site assessment has been completed.

This work was completed by the Northwest Territories Geological Survey at a cost of approximately $30,000 and was aided by helicopter support from the federal government's Polar Continental Shelf Program. The Government of the Northwest Territories has spent $16,304 for the preparation and submission of the Class 4 quartz-mining land-use permit application and has engaged Tetra Tech as our consultant for this renewal. A local company was engaged in the renewal of licences, and we are currently working on a budget for the sale process. Those numbers have not been yet finalized.

I want to thank the Minister for that detailed response. I will certainly check Hansard to review that. It is not clear why the Minister is marketing the Mactung property in conjunction with the federal government efforts under way to sell Cantung. These two properties are 140 kilometres away from each other by air and 700 kilometres by road. Can the Minister explain why we are marketing these properties together, and, if they are for sale separately, what is the asking price for Mactung?

Mr. Speaker, selling the Mactung deposit together with the Cantung mine will increase the potential viability of the renewed mining operations. That said, we are looking to get more than just the cash payment or a return on the baseline. We are looking to capitalize on the rise of the tungsten prices to translate these world-class resources into good-paying jobs. We believe there is an opportunity for these two projects to create a future Northwest Territories tungsten industry. Selling them together will give us the best possible option and the shortest time frame to converting these assets into a working project that will deliver benefits to the residents and businesses of the Northwest Territories. We also don't want these two assets to compete against each other in what is a relatively small global market of producers and buyers.

I would like to thank the Minister again for that answer, but he didn't answer one of my questions, which was: how much is the price for the Mactung property? Can the Minister tell us that?

Mr. Speaker, this is early in the process. We don't have a specific price for this. We want to sell these properties together. It will be an open bidding process with an evaluation that brings the best benefits to the residents of the Northwest Territories.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.

Merci, Monsieur le President. Thanks to the Minister for that. The Minister has hired a Vancouver consultant to help hype the Mactung property by applying for 10-year Government of Yukon quartz mining land use approval. Such an authorization is supposed to be for an actual exploration program, although it is my understanding that there is no exploration to be undertaken by our government, so the application seems to be an unusual attempt, at best, to inflate the value of the property.

Can the Minister tell us whether there are any precedents in the Yukon for such a speculative land-use application and whether he has any legal advice on the validity of such an application?

Mr. Speaker, that would be a lead story, but the Member is mischaracterizing what is going on here. The Government of Northwest Territories is required to renew the mining land use permit on the Yukon site of this property in order to keep the property in good standing. If we don't renew the permit, it is likely that a full site remediation would be ordered and all the potential benefits would be lost. In addition, the potential purchaser requires the ability to conduct exploration work as part of its due-diligence process. This is how a buyer confirms a mineral resource, and it is also a consideration of arranging purchase and financing. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nunakput.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are for the Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation. Mr. Speaker, with the most recent blizzard in Paulatuk, with winds as high as 140 kilometres an hour, one roof blew apart, which is one of the newer buildings in the community. Mr. Speaker, I am worried the type of construction in the High Arctic communities, the design for a building, will not withstand the winter storms. Mr. Speaker, will the Minister improve the design and quality of homes that are being built in the Arctic and especially in Nunakput, where winter storms are occurring more often? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the roof was designed to withstand the strong winds. Obviously, the damage was unexpected. We will continue to work with the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation as well as leadership in the communities, as you have heard me say many times in this House, as we develop our community housing plans to address some of these priorities as we are seeing weather that continues to happen, especially in the community of Paulatuk. I know we had a very strong storm there last year. Obviously, the roof was designed to withstand the strong winds. It is very unexpected, but we will work on continuing to address these kinds of concerns as we move forward, not only in Paulatuk but with all of our communities across the Northwest Territories.

It is good to see that the Minister is recognizing the harsh winds we have up North. Mr. Speaker, the Department of Housing announced that there will be community housing planning events. There is one scheduled for Paulatuk. Mr. Speaker, can the Minister give an update on what this meeting will consist of and what benefits will it bring to the community, not just the community of Paulatuk, but the region in Nunakput?

I appreciate the response from the Minister. It sounds like there is a start to some commitment there. Mr. Speaker, talking about agreements with territorial governments and between the GNWT and the IRC, it has proven to be a successful start on planning for the region. Mr. Speaker, as we move towards the end of this Assembly, will the Minister continue to improve upon the partnership between the IRC and the GNWT to ensure that the number and quality of homes in Nunakput increase with the rising population?

Of course, not only the IRC but all of our Indigenous governments, we have been meeting a lot since I have taken on the portfolio and building on the success and hard work that the previous Ministers have done. We are working to continue to get all of our programs out to the communities. Obviously, with new leadership and new elections, we need to update our leadership on the programs that the NWT Housing Corp provides, such as the community housing support initiatives. We have made that announcement on the co-investment fund. The bilateral agreements are going to have an impact throughout the Northwest Territories, which really prompted something new that hasn't been done before. We are going to be looking at doing an Indigenous housing summit, which we are actually looking at trying to maybe, possibly, create a Northern Housing Summit that we can have all of our partners and all of our communities participate in, but also invite other jurisdictions, such as the Yukon and Nunavut, to attend, and we will continue that strong partnership with the IRC and continue working with them.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nunakput.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the response. Mr. Speaker, it is good to see that the Housing Corporation is developing some programs that will involve not just the territory, but also our sister territories across the North.

Mr. Speaker, lately there have been some really pressing housing issues in my region, and I commend the Housing Minister and his staff for the hard work that they do to start to put people in homes, Mr. Speaker. As they develop policy, Mr. Speaker, my question to the Minister is: will the Minister involve northern MLAs and Indigenous MLAs, who represent Indigenous groups in their ridings, to be involved in developing policy together so that we have continuity? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I have also mentioned in the House that we are going through a strategic renewal process within the NWT Housing Corporation that we should be looking at presenting to standing committee, and obviously, we would always want input on that.

As MLAs, part of our job is working on direction of legislation and policies, but also including our leadership in that. One of the big things about the community housing plans is that we want community and local input into what is best for them, and it is going to be something that is going to be done throughout all of the communities. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.