Masi. Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Member is correct. We are about to begin a process to review and evaluate our current NWT film strategy, as the previous Assembly had one laid out for us. In order to move forward on that, we needed to look and build on the success that we have. As all Members know in this House, the amount of work that we've done around the film industry in the 18^th Legislative Assembly, there has been a lot of great work done there working with these people. It's one of my favourite diversification files to work with these individuals. There's a lot of fun in this group of people, but we have to ask ourselves: where have we been? What are we doing? What do we need to do moving forward, and how can we get there?

These are the questions that we have to ask ourselves, and also I think a lot of Members in this House pushed on the ITI file, in particular. How do we measure, and what kind of indicators do we need to put in place to be able to confirm what our progress is? These are the types of things that we have to ask ourselves to allow us to identify the next steps moving forward.

Thank you to the Minister for his reply. I appreciate that he is, in fact, very fond of this industry, and that diversifying the economy is certainly a big piece of our mandate as a government. Earlier, I spoke about a possible program similar to the Mining Incentive Program, but specifically designed for film production. I'm wondering: would the Minister be willing to entertain discussions on such as program, in particular, with industry types, even now and during the life of this 18^th Assembly?

I welcome the Member's enthusiasm, as well, for this industry. He was actually at the Dead North Festival with myself, and participated in the awards night. I'm always happy to have a discussion with all Members of this House about the importance of this industry, particularly the Member for Yellowknife North. As I said, he has a keen interest in this, as well.

As I said, this industry has grown significantly since the 18^th Legislative Assembly, and we need to consider how much we invest in these projects and productions with NWT residents. With the review coming up, it's due in 2019-2020. We have to sit down and have a look at this. There have been some good successes, like I said, in the film rebate programs. A good example is where our department has invested in 11 projects across the Northwest Territories, Mr. Speaker, and we invested roughly $375,000 and were able to leverage $1.5 million out of these projects in NWT. Is this something that we have to build on, or is this something we want to change and do something differently? We need to have those discussions going forward.

I appreciate the Minister's comments, once again. It seems as though at minimum we are going to at least to agree to have a discussion with industry types and see where the future will lie. That said, if a program such as what I was proposing is to come about, then we recognize that any new program would obviously need new money. In many jurisdictions, Mr. Speaker, a visiting film or TV crew will have to buy a licence or permits in order to work in that particular jurisdiction. As well, there may be requirements for local hiring, et cetera. Does the NWT currently have any, call them, "location fees" that they charge to visiting production crews?

Currently, no, we do not charge fees for out-of-town producers in the Northwest Territories. This is something that I am glad the Member has brought up so that we can be aware of it. As far as the film industry goes, we are in a competitive marketplace. We are in a higher-cost jurisdiction. These are things that we have to be relatively paying attention to. I think it would be difficult charging and a financial challenge for these guys who are looking to invest in the Northwest Territories. We are just building on the momentum of attracting these people here in the Northwest Territories and help us build our capacity and awareness around the Northwest Territories as an attractive jurisdiction. Like I said, do we want to be able to risk these opportunities with a small fee that probably would not have a large impact on the revenue that we would collect to help support the industry? These are the discussions that we are going to have to have and have a serious look at these things going forward.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to go down this road a little bit further because there are a lot of jurisdictions around the country that are in fact charging these types of fees and/or issuing these types of permits, and they are for the simple case that (a) you at least know they are in your jurisdiction; (b) you know that they are following certain safety conditions. You never know where they might be filming. In other jurisdictions, like if you are going to go into a territorial park, maybe you need to take out a permit of some kind, and so I am wondering: would the Minister create these kinds of measures in support northern film industry? It would be nominal. It's not something that would be extensive, but I think the payback in terms of being able to support a program like the Producers Incentive Program is what these funds could go towards.

As I said, I do not know if the risk is worth the reward at this point, without some more research and analysis of what implications it would have on the industry. I would certainly like to have a look at it, but I would love to sit down with the Member and have a little better understanding and conversation with him of how he thinks we could implement this thing. Maybe we could even pull some of the people from this industry together and have a chat about what these things are going to look like going forward, as we renew our strategy in the 2020-2021 session. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Hay River North.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have some questions for the Minister of Infrastructure related to my earlier statement about dredging. In my earlier statement, I was talking directly to the federal government because people tell me they listen to what we are saying here, but I am sure, like most people, they tuned out while we were reading that report, so I have some questions about what our government is doing.

It's been tough to get someone to take responsibility for dredging. In 2015, the then Minister of Transportation said:

"I wrote a letter to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and asked the federal government to consider putting money into dredging the Port of Hay River, and I indicated it was vital to the territories for resupply of fuel and food to some communities. I did not get a response."

In a letter to me from the Minister of Transportation, he has stated that Transport Canada has indicated generally that it does not want to fund dredging activities. Given their investment in dredging in the last 25 years, it's clear that they do not. That is because they have ended, the Government of Canada has ended, their national dredging program. They ended it years ago. I would like to know what this government is doing. Like other governments, the Government of Manitoba has a dredging program, so clearly it's within the responsibility of the other territories or provinces, so what is this government doing? Can I get an update from the Minister on dredging the Port of Hay River? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Minister of Infrastructure.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. To update the House or to remind the House, I guess, more than anything, last year, I wrote a letter, actually we applied, Infrastructure applied under the Ocean Protection Plan. If all Members remember that, that is one of the programs the federal government has listed in their mandate going forward. We applied under the 2018 application form for the fund for marine facility planning studies. In that study, in our application with the federal government under the OPP, we asked for planning studies to identify dredging requirements in the Port of Hay River and the Port of Tuktoyaktuk. Both of these facilities are federal facilities. However, this funding application at that time was not approved.

I have a pile of papers here. I have been doing research, and this file goes back a long time. The Minister said that there was an application for a study to find out where it needs to be dredged. Mr. Speaker, we know. The Minister has given us statements before where he said that there has been surveillance-aircraft reported imagery over the harbour. The coast guard has done sounding operations. There is a price tag for dredging. He tells me it's about $10 million. There is an estimated volume that needs to be dredged of about 100,000 cubic metres. So it seems like this work is here. When I flew over the West Channel the other day, I could see the sand bars in the water. I think that we need to move past studies and we need to move towards dredging. Has the Minister submitted or is submitting any application to the federal government for dredging, not just planning studies but for dredging? Can he elaborate on that?

The Member is making his point here. We've talked to different Ministers. Different Assemblies have talked to the federal government about this dredging issue in Hay River and the Port of Tuktoyaktuk. It's an ongoing issue. The federal government got out of this racket in about 2012. That was when they cancelled their program, and they left the jurisdictions hanging. Members and Ministers from that point forward have pushed this issue for a long time. We have in this Assembly, I myself particularly since I have become the Minister of Transportation and the Minister of Infrastructure, have been pushing this issue with different Ministers, and, at the end of the day, they are not that interested. They do not even like the word "dredging" mentioned. What we are doing, our new approach now, is we are working closely with our partners, the Canadian Coast Guard, to explore possibilities of restoring the former federal remote marine resupply sites MoU with our government. We have got an ask in with them, and I am waiting to hear back from the Minister on that. Actually, with any luck here, we are going to be setting up a call, and that will be one of the things I will be discussing with the federal Minister here in the coming weeks.

That response is similar to one that was heard in this House on February 4, 2011, when actually the Member for Great Slave at that time asked our then Transportation Minister or now MP a similar question. He said there was going to be some discussions with Coast Guard; they are going to look into getting some dredging done. Hopefully, these discussions are a little more fruitful.

There is another working group that has been put together, and I believe the government is part of it, and it has been led by the harbour authority. It's been around since 2016. Can the Minister give us some updates about what's been going on with that group?

The development of the working group is intended to facilitate joint work on issues of common interests concerning marine transportation and marine infrastructure in the Northwest Territories. The Department of Infrastructure will continue to emphasise the importance of dredging in the Port of Hay River and other federal port facilities in the Northwest Territories and particularly Tuktoyaktuk, which is of some concern going forward, too, and to Canadian Coast Guard, but cannot guarantee these efforts will increase the likelihood of dredging.

Now, as I have said in this House and the Member has made quite clear, a number of people have approached the federal government on this issue. They clearly do not want to be involved in this thing, and they are trying to download it as much as they can to the jurisdictions. This is an important issue going forward, particularly this year. My concern already is the low water we see. Great Slave Lake is already down. Many of the Members here who live in Yellowknife can testify to that when they go down to how low the level is. The river system is low. So this is going to be an issue that is going to be of significant importance going forward, particularly with the MTS stationed in Hay River that has to use that port facility. We also have to use the part going into Tuktoyaktuk.

We are going to have to try to find a way with the federal government to help support this initiative because, without their support, it's going to end up on our lap and it's going to cost us a significant amount of money. As all Members in this House know, the financial resources of the 18^th Legislative Assembly have been taxed right to the max, and the 19^th Assembly is going to be in just as tough shape going forward, so we are going to have to find a way to partner with the federal government and all the people and players in this industry to try to make this happen. I will continue to do that.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Hay River North.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I agree that the 18^th Assembly is in rough financial shape. I think that the 19^th is going to be in even worse shape and the 20^th in even worse than that. The fact remains that, when something has to get done, it has to get done. We hear about dredging Hay River. We hear about it in Tuktoyaktuk. We hear about it for the ferries. There are some ferries that are in a few inches of water, and that is not sustainable. Will the Minister stop waiting for the federal government to come to the table after 25 years and just pony up and buy some dredging equipment that we can use all across the territory? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Yes. We can postpone a lot of capital projects to do that. That is going to cost a lot of money. That is not something I am willing to do without an analysis of what this thing would even fathom what this would cost, never mind the permitting that would have to be obtained to do this type of thing. At this point, I am going to continue as the Minister of Infrastructure to work with my colleague in the federal government on this issue. I will update the House when I have a call with him in the coming weeks. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Foster parents are a very important part of our child and family system in the Northwest Territories. I greatly appreciate the selfless work that they do to help our children as they grow and develop during difficult times. Mr. Speaker, I have some questions for the Minister of Health and Social Services. Can the Minister tell us how many foster parents we have in the Nahendeh region, including those families who make their homes available for emergencies? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Masi. Minister of Health and Social Services.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There are 159 foster caregivers in the Northwest Territories today. Twenty-eight of those are in the Deh Cho. Thank you.