It was not considered emergency even though the pipe has been there for over 50 years and full of asbestos, people in that area are drinking from that so you don't consider that emergency? It's -- you know, that's -- I don't agree with that. So I think that should have been considered as emergency because it's impacting people's health. So, yeah, anything that's with -- that contained -- like, that was built over 50 years ago and not regularly maintained and full of asbestos is an emergency. Thank you.

Thank you, Member for Monfwi. Bare there any further questions under this section? Member for Hay River South.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to go to the line item there, senior citizens and disabled person's property tax relief.

The community of Hay River has a large number of seniors. And one of the issues that came up was this tax relief program and, you know, they heard that I think that there was possibly going to be a review, and I think a lot of them or some of them took it to mean that they were -- it was going to be discontinued. And what I'd like I guess is for the Minister to just explain to me I guess how this program works? Thank you.

Thank you. Minister of MACA.

For that detail, I'm going to turn to the deputy minister. Thank you.

Thank you. Member for Hay River South.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Yeah, I guess, you know, the seniors, the ones I talked to, they're concerned that, you know, there's a move to basically end this funding. So, you know, if such a decision was to be made, how would -- you know, what criteria would you be looking at to base something like that on? Thank you.

Thank you. Minister of MACA.

Thank you. I wouldn't want to speculate. Like, we are looking at bringing this forward into the next Assembly. So I don't want to speculate on what is or isn't happening with this. I think the Member is asking me to see the future, and I don't know what's going to happen with this. Thank you.

Thank you. Member for Hay River South.

Thank you, Madam Chair. You know, they're going through a review process and that's to figure out what's going to happen in the future. I'm not asking the Minister to tell me what's going to happen in the future but to just give me some idea of the criteria that's used to -- you know, moving forward in how they're doing the review. Thank you.

Thank you. Minister of MACA.

Thank you. So he's asking for the -- what the process is? I can get the deputy minister to provide that. Thank you.

Thank you. Deputy minister Gareau.

Thank you. Member for Hay River South.

Thank you, Madam Chair. You know, in looking at the policy and the way it's -- it rolls out is that, you know, there's a flaw in there in the sense that if you have a couple and one's 65 years and over and the other one's younger, they're forced -- if they want to use that tax relief program, the only way they could do it is for one person, the younger one, to be removed from title, which is -- which is interesting because if for some reason one of them passed away, then, you know, they're -- they're put in a position where the -- where the house has to probably go through probate versus just going through a straight survivorship. And you know, there's added cost to that as well. So, you know, as -- I'm hoping that, you know, that's something that through this process that that's considered. Because all it is is, you know, we're forcing them to do something that we shouldn't -- they shouldn't have to do. It just doesn't make sense to me because, you know, if you got a couple, they're a couple and that's it, whether one's 65 and the other one's younger. So is that something that would be looked at as well? Thank you.

Thank you. Minister of MACA.

We'll agree with him, yes.

Thank you. Member for Hay River South.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to go to the infrastructure, community infrastructure gap as well.

You know, it -- when I look at it and, you know, and I think about how it's -- we're ever going to close it, it sounds like we're not going to be looking to the feds, really, to provide any support, and it sounds like the department doesn't really think that the feds can provide the support that's required. But I find it I guess it's unreasonable to place that burden on taxpayers when in the North here, it's bad enough that the cost of living is high and it's only going to get higher as we go along here. So somehow, we've got to pay for it. So I guess I'd ask the Minister, you know, what is it? Like, what are -- we've been working at this for a while, and I'd like to know, you know, do we have any solutions in sight? Is there anything that you can see? Is there anything that -- you know, that's come across your table that you can point to and say, yeah, this here might work to close that gap? Thank you.

Thank you. Minister of MACA.