Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I know, indeed, we do need expert, but what just happened in Northwest Territories, how can an expert let 4 million hectares of land burn? In the past, a lot of people have said, even the veteran firefighters have said the same thing, and elders have said, in the past government used to pick up all kinds of people on the street to fight fires, and it was those people, because of them, our community is still here. A lot of them, it happened all over. And that was the only jobs that a lot of our Indigenous people had at that time. It's not like before. We know that. But I wouldn't call these expert all the time because expert let 4 million hectares of land burn. And that's where I think here what I would like to see happen here is that strengthening communications. There was a lot of poor communications. There was a lot of things that we could have done to prepare for our communities, for our community members, especially the community members because we have a lot of elders. We have a lot of vulnerable people. We have a lot of children in the communities. You know, like, the firebreaks. And use the veteran firefighters, the elders, the traditional knowledge. We could have avoided many of these situations that we saw over the summer.
And what I would like to see is that, okay, communication needs to be strengthened but more involvement with the Indigenous government. ECC, or the department, needs to work with the ECC -- with the Indigenous government and community government and other organizations, especially when they know it is going to be hot, dry summer. Like, we should prepare for the worst. That's what they should have done. But the people in Yellowknife office, some of our people working here did not know what was happening. Only after that disaster strike, then that's when they were informed. And there was a lot of poor communications. So what I would like to see is the communications strengthened and use more of the veteran firefighters and elders. Because when I was talking to some of the firefighters, the veterans, some of them said we did not go home for two months sometimes. We were out there going from one regions to another fighting fires to save our communities. And we don't see that happening now. What we see is that, okay, they messed with Mother Nature. They don't want to go there and put out the fire. And especially now. We know the water level is low. But if it's going to be a dry season, do something about it, get to it right away before it gets out of control. And that's what destroyed the Highway No. 3.
We lost 15 cabins and four infrastructure in my communities. Our big land is destroyed. A lot of -- our Tlicho land is destroyed where a lot of people do hunting and trapping. It's just that we know we're not going to get it back because it's going to take seven years. And who knows, maybe longer with the climate change. Climate change is here. We might not get our land back or that replenish itself within seven years. It might take longer. So I think communications and meeting with the people, meeting with the Indigenous government, community government, keeping them informed should be strengthened in this and do more. We need an annual report. We need something so that we avoid this next year or within the next, you know, fire seasons. But something needs to be done right away about this. Thank you.