This is page numbers 5713 - 5790 of the Hansard for the 18th Assembly, 3rd Session. The original version can be accessed on the Legislative Assembly's website or by contacting the Legislative Assembly Library. The word of the day was women. View the webstream of the day's session.

Topics

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.

Kevin O'Reilly

Kevin O'Reilly Frame Lake

Merci, Monsieur le President. On May 23rd, the Premier, in response to my questions on the carbon tax said, "The approach to carbon tax that we develop needs to be consistent with the federal backstop." I understand that the federal output-based pricing system has been clarified. The Standing Committee on Government Operations is taking the carbon pricing bills on the road next week. I would like to ask a question of the Minister of Finance: can the Minister explain whether there will be any changes to the NWT carbon tax as a result of the federal output-based pricing system, and what will be the effects on our revenues, funds for reinvestment, greenhouse gas emissions, and reaching our targets? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Masi. Minister of Finance.

Robert C. McLeod

Robert C. McLeod Inuvik Twin Lakes

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We are planning to make relatively minor tweaks to our approach to allow the ministry to bring it in line with the federal output-based pricing system as released in July of 2018. We will continue to rebate a portion of the carbon tax paid by large emitters, and we will establish individualized trusts that these emitters can access to invest in energy initiatives. So, while the amounts have changed, the structure of our approach to large emitters remains unchanged.

Kevin O'Reilly

Kevin O'Reilly Frame Lake

I would like to thank the Minister for that. I am sorry. I missed the very first part of what he was saying, but can the Minister explain what this difference in revenues is going to be, then, for the Government of the Northwest Territories under this revised approach?

Robert C. McLeod

Robert C. McLeod Inuvik Twin Lakes

The Member would be aware that the GNWT approach is largely revenue neutral with carbon tax revenues being used to offset the impact on the cost of living and doing business in the NWT and for investing in energy initiatives. There are some administrative costs to administer the new tax and the offset program, and I do not think it would be appropriate and I will not be discussing what specific tax filers would be paying.

Kevin O'Reilly

Kevin O'Reilly Frame Lake

I want to thank the Minister for that. Is the Minister prepared to table some information for the MLAs and the public, then, about what the difference would be between the output-based pricing system for large emitters here in the Northwest Territories versus the July 2018 proposal developed by Cabinet?

Robert C. McLeod

Robert C. McLeod Inuvik Twin Lakes

The federal government, they released their further detail on the output-based pricing system in December of 2018. It was apparent from that information released by the federal government that, their final version of the output-based pricing system, there will be likely be much lower carbon tax revenues from the largest emitters under the federal system. This was confirmed by the federal government. This certainly has resulted in us looking at our approach as it does not make sense for us to place our businesses at a competitive disadvantage compared to what would happen under the federal backstop. That said, we continue to believe our general approach to large emitters is more appropriate in our northern context, but we will need to make some tweaks to ensure that we are largely consistent with the federal system.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.

Kevin O'Reilly

Kevin O'Reilly Frame Lake

Merci, Monsieur le President I want to thank the Minister for that. Can the Minister tell us when we can expect or when the public can expect to know about what these tweaks are going to be to our carbon pricing system? Let's start with that.

Robert C. McLeod

Robert C. McLeod Inuvik Twin Lakes

We will start with that, and I believe that's question number four, so it seems like we are going to end with that. We have a couple of bills that committee has taken on the road, and that is going to point out some of our approach to carbon pricing. Again, I have to ensure the members of the public that, under the federal backstop, it would be more costly to residents of the Northwest Territories, so we are going to use a made-in-the-North approach, and so we are pleased that the federal government is able to take us up on that. We have got a couple of bills that committee has taken out, and they are going to be getting the feedback, and we will have opportunities to continue to inform committee and the public as to our approach, but we feel that ours is one that is a bit more beneficial to the people of the Northwest Territories because this is an initiative of the federal government and their plan is to impose it regardless of what the jurisdictions are doing. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.

Kieron Testart

Kieron Testart Kam Lake

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Following up on my honourable friend the Member for Frame Lake's questions to the Minister of Finance on carbon pricing, I would like to know: the federal government has announced their intention to implement carbon pricing on July 1st in provinces is territories that do not have their own plan, including Yukon and Nunavut, who will be using the aforementioned federal backstop mode. As the legislation required to enable the carbon tax is not yet passed in the House, what is the update on our own government's timelines for implementing carbon pricing in the Northwest Territories? Thank you.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Masi. Minister of Finance.

Robert C. McLeod

Robert C. McLeod Inuvik Twin Lakes

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am going to take the Member's question as notice.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

The question has been taken as notice. Oral questions. Member for Deh Cho.

Michael Nadli

Michael Nadli Deh Cho

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are to the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs. Recently, we witnessed what transpired over the start of early spring in Alberta. We saw forest fires, and then recently we saw perhaps a weather anomaly, and that was a report of a tornado in Fort Smith. We have experienced some natural disasters up here in the Northwest Territories, including floods, so my questions are related to trying to understand just how this government works with communities in terms of preparing emergency plans. My questions are, of course, to the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs. ENR goes through a process of determining valleys at risk and working with communities, so my question is to the Minister: how many communities have completed their emergency plans such as evacuations? Mahsi.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs.

Alfred Moses

Alfred Moses Inuvik Boot Lake

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. First of all, I would just like to update Members and residents and/or other leaders across the NWT that the Emergency Management Act requires communities to prepare and approve emergency plans and programs. MACA does administer a number of activities and tools to help community governments. As well, regional offices maintain adequate emergency capacity, including emergency planning workshops and desktop emergency plan reviews. We will continue to do that. I would like to update the Member that, as of March 2019, we have had nine community governments that have emergency plans validated in the past two years and 21 community governments that have plans that are less than five years old. Since 2012, we have 31 community governments that have participated in emergency planning workshops and/or tabletop exercises to update and validate their emergency plans.

In 2019-2020, we are looking at conducting five workshops throughout the Northwest Territories, but this is a partnership-building exercise, and we do provide the services, but we do need communities to work with us and update and work on their community plans. I appreciate the Member's comments in terms of the dry season in the South Slave area.

Michael Nadli

Michael Nadli Deh Cho

This government has advanced some good initiatives, including what was recently beneficial for one of my communities in the Deh Cho riding. Enterprise has stepped up, has worked with both levels of government, including ENR and MACA, to try to advance the idea of their FireSmart project, and kudos to both the local government in Enterprise and ENR, as well. I just wanted to understand whether the program in terms of the FireSmart initiative has been successful. I think it's a well-intended initiative. I just wanted to understand the role of MACA. What role would MACA play in terms of rolling out this FireSmart program with ENR? Because what we have seen in the past is we had, during the forest fire season, bulldozers create fire guards, but can we undertake FireSmart initiatives and be involved with the local government to ensure the aesthetics in the communities that have really beautiful scenery are maintained?

Alfred Moses

Alfred Moses Inuvik Boot Lake

As previously mentioned, our regional office engages with communities on emergency plan requirements and implementation of a process for systematic annual review of all community emergency plans. Also, as I mentioned earlier, we are looking at doing five workshops in the upcoming year. We do work with the Department of ENR, as well as Lands, and, more importantly, working with the community governments to help them update their plans and to make sure that we do a review of that. One of the programs that we have developed, and we have already had discussions in this House about, is the Small Community Employment Program that communities get funding for. I know that some communities have used that funding to do FireSmart programs. We will continue to promote this, especially when we do have a dry season.

With what is happening in Alberta and northern BC, as well as the Yukon, we have to make sure that our residents and our communities are safe.

Michael Nadli

Michael Nadli Deh Cho

With the last experience in the 2014 fire season, MACA recently restructured the civil and emergency organizations that address these kinds of situations. What other changes came about because of the 2014 fire season?

Alfred Moses

Alfred Moses Inuvik Boot Lake

First of all, I think that we did develop a comprehensive set of guidelines to help facilitate community evacuations, should they happen, which covers anything from the roles and responsibilities of people in the community to what resources that we have. We will continue to work on that. I mentioned the statistics earlier about how many communities have emergency plans, within this year, within the last five years. We need to keep them updated, and we need to make sure that all of our communities practice their emergency plans and make sure that, in instances such as the South Slave communities, they don't get caught in a situation with evacuations.

Cross-departmentally, I think, with the government and the federal government, we would be able to make a quick response should something happen, and that is something that is always on our mind and discussed.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackson Lafferty

Masi. Oral questions. Member for Deh Cho.

Michael Nadli

Michael Nadli Deh Cho

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Minister did state that there are nine communities that have their emergency plans in place and that, within the year, his department is going to lead the running of five workshops to ensure that other communities complete their emergency measures planning. Could the Minister state to this House whether this is going to be given high priority? We are just seeing the onset of summer. Would that be a very high priority, working along with communities governments? Mahsi.