Mr. Speaker, to be quite honest, I have more faith in our community governments than our own. I believe the structure of community governments allows them to be more nimble. I believe the services they provide their people every day on the ground are more important than much of the work we do in this House. Yet, Mr. Speaker, the GNWT continues to have a paternalistic relationship with its communities. This is no more apparent than with the relationship with our capital city.
Inevitably, Mr. Speaker, in every Yellowknife election, some city councillor decides to talk about a land value tax, a tax that would allow land to be assessed differently in incentivized development, or a vacancy tax to tax some of the long vacant lots in Yellowknife. Then, this conversation is quickly stifled because someone has to remind them that they don't have that power. The GNWT has not given it to them and likely will never will because I cannot get MACA to bring forward any legislation, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, the city of Yellowknife has half the population. It has the capacity to take on many of these issues, and I believe they should. I would like the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs to engage discussions on a city charter with them. I would like to have conversations about devolving powers. I can't foresee a Legislative Assembly where there will ever be agreement on liquor, Mr. Speaker, yet I believe there is a path forward where we give communities control over what they want their liquor regulations to look forward. I believe we can devolve powers to solve some of the debates in this House we likely will never solve.
Mr. Speaker, recently, the City of Yellowknife passed a motion in support of granting permanent residents the right to vote. They don't have the power to do that. This House does. Another debate which I don't see a path forward to us actually giving the community what they want.
Mr. Speaker, city charters exist for capital cities all across the country. They create a sustainable financial arrangement, and often, it forces large cities to take the good times with the bad. If the GNWT revenues go down, city revenues go down. If the GNWT revenues go up, city revenues go up. We need to have a conversation about where the GNWT's mandate ends and where our communities' start because we have continually off-loaded powers without funding them, and I believe there are significant gaps that were brought forward during this pandemic. I will have questions for the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs about whether we can figure out where our mandates ends and our communities' begins. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.