Thank you, Deputy Premier. Final supplementary. Member for Frame Lake.

Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that. I just wish that the GNWT would get on board and, you know, join one of the 650 other Canadian jurisdictions that have made a climate emergency declaration, so. But in all the debate and public statements I've seen from this government around a carbon tax, I don't ever recall it being clearly linked or described as a tool to fight the climate emergency. So can the Deputy Premier confirm that the real purpose of the NWT carbon tax is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as I stand here as Deputy Premier, as well as wearing several Minister roles, I also have the opportunity to be able to redirect this question to another Minister that's able to provide more information on climate change and more specifically to the carbon tax issue. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to redirect to the Honourable Caroline Wawzonek. Thank you.

Thank you, Deputy Premier. Minister responsible for Finance.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And, Mr. Speaker, I am quite happy to confirm while the carbon tax itself remains for us a commitment under the pan-Canadian framework of clean goals and climate change, that's the federal-based system and that's why we have to continue to adapt ours. In the online annual report that is put out by the Department of Finance on carbon tax, in the message from the Minister it does quite clearly, say from me, the carbon tax is intended to encourage carbon conservation and the substitution to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

So, Mr. Speaker, that's quite clear. There's a number of other. I took the chance to have a quick look at Hansard just to make sure I'm being very clear. And it is important that people realize no one likes paying more taxes, no one likes the carbon tax, but there is a reason behind it. I want to find solutions that will reduce carbon taxes in the North because -- so that we have less reliance on fossil fuel use. That's the point of the carbon tax, is to get people off fossil fuels. And, Mr. Speaker, again, I realize we all know that that's difficult in the North but, nevertheless, on another occasion I had the chance to say we don't want to be on fossil fuels; it is not helping the climate. It's expensive. It's not the way of the future.

Fundamentally, this is what we need to do. So semantics or not, Mr. Speaker, we do need to find a pathway off of fossil fuels. And the last one, just to make sure that we're very clear, Mr. Speaker, I think it's when we had some federal Ministers visiting us here, we want them to see the lack of alternatives. If there's federal money that it can start to come here so we get off fossil fuels. We need to do that for climate change reasons. We need to do that for the cost reasons, and we need to do it because it's the right thing to do. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, earlier this year the Lutselk'e Dene First Nation purchased the Frontier Lodge just outside their community. It's a lodge that will be able to provide employment, training, and opportunities for the First Nation. And it's managed by Corey Myers who is the general manager for Frontier Lodge and already, as you know, the lodging industry here in the Northwest Territories is full swing right now, and I just want to mention that the -- you know, the lodge, Cory Myers, received a letter from the health and social services department talking about the current water system they have is no longer acceptable by the GNWT.

Mr. Speaker, we want -- this is a concern to the chief and council in Lutselk'e, and I know Mr. Myers has been working diligently with the Minister of ITI and they've been making some good progress in some areas, and they have a real good relationship. But right now as it is, it's concerning now that the lodge is, you know, may be forced to either close if, you know, the system is not upgraded right away. And we need to take a look at a system, and we need to either need to work together with Mr. Myers, chief and council, ITI, and the health Minister Ms. Julie green there, and if we could work together trying to figure this out so that, you know, some of these barriers we could work around and still provide, you know, employment and training to our people in our communities.

And so anyways, I just wanted to maybe just ask some questions to the Minister.

Can the ITI Minister tell me how many remote lodges were told that they must significantly upgrade their water treatment system before being granted essential operating permits? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh. Deputy Premier.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'd like to redirect the question to Minister Julie Green. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Deputy Premier. Minister responsible for Health and Social Services.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Minister, health Minister Julie Green. I guess my question would be to her again now is, you know, in terms of -- can you also explain what have changed since last summer when Frontier Lodge was granted their food establishment permit that makes their existing water treatment system inadequate now? That being a question to the health Minister. Thank you.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the regulations haven't changed in more than a decade but the information available about the water system has changed, and that's why we're at a different footing now than we were a year ago. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and thank you, Minister. Mr. Speaker, other remote lodges continue to operate with their existing water treatment system. Can the Minister explain why Frontier's not being given the same opportunity? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It's true that some small lodges are exempt from the water system regulations; however, Frontier is not a small lodge; it's more the size of Blachford Lodge, and so the water system requirements are different for Frontier than they would be for a smaller lodge. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Can the Minister provide a reasonable explanation for the lack of consultation with remote lodges with no communication between her department of health and department to properly assess the impacts of these changes to regulations before health and social services started enforcing the new water treatment standards? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned, the regulations themselves haven't changed, and the department is working with the operator to resolve the situation around the permits. And so I encourage the MLA to transmit that message to the operator. I certainly don't want to see them lose a season of business. I went there last year -- I don't think the Member was there, but I went there last year on a retreat and it certainly is a very nice place to be, and I think that this is a problem that can be resolved so that others can enjoy it as well. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Great Slave.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are about water but in a different area. I am going to ask the ITI Minister about the fish plant.

So given that we've heard a lot about the impacts to Hay River and the South Slave with the fires and the flooding, can the Minister speak to what is being done to support the fishers to ensure that there is enough production of fish to go through the plant and not make it a folly? Thank you.

Thank you, Member for Great Slave. Minister responsible for Industry, Tourism and Investment.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Fish Revitalization Strategy from back in 2017 speaks to these exact challenges. Unfortunately, rather than seeing production go up from the time of 2017, production has only continued to go down. We are nowhere near hitting our quota on the lake, and it certainly is going to impact the fish plant. There's no secrets to that, Mr. Speaker. So, Mr. Speaker, we need to work with the fishers. We want to ensure that they know that we're working actively to make sure that we are not going to remain under FFMC forever. There's different pathways to get there, Mr. Speaker, and I've asked to make sure that we have one available and ready to go. We've been hoping the federal government would help us provide that path. It hasn't happened. So we're going to have to chart our own way through.

In the meanwhile, Mr. Speaker, we continue to provide direct supports to the industry. There's shipping and freight supports. There's SEED money to support having infrastructure available, new boats, etcetera, to support some of those costs. And, Mr. Speaker, again, but really, it's wanting to ensure that there's -- well, there's an entire commercial fish program, Mr. Speaker, that has different supports available to them. Perhaps I'll stop there lest I go too long but I do want to acknowledge that we certainly are aware of this and want to ensure that the commercial fish production, any subsidies are tied to ensuring that we're getting those production numbers up. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Minister being brief. There's been a lot of Ministers' statements in QP today.

My next question has to do with that support for the fishers. It's my understanding out of a recent meeting, there is a long list of unmet obligations by the Department of ITI with respect to the fishers and the fish plant. So can the Minister speak with what is being done to meet those action items that were discussed with the fishers and ensuring that they have a healthy fishery? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I was recently in Hay River. I attended there with the deputy minister and assistant deputy minister. We sat down together with fishers and with representatives from the Tu Cho. It was, I believe, a very productive meeting, Mr. Speaker. It gave us the opportunity to have action items.

Mr. Speaker, I think we need to -- I want to be realistic. I know that the fishers have also been evacuated from their homes, from their communities and from a critical time when they should be preparing to open the summer fishing season. That certainly is -- has no doubt interrupted some of the back and forth necessary to move forward. But that said, Mr. Speaker, I know there are funds available that we were alerting our colleagues in Hay River to around training, to ensure that they can bring new fishers on, mentors on, and we're going to work with those interested to see that those funds can be available, that they can apply. Normally this would be an application to ECE. In the circumstances, Mr. Speaker, we're going to try and make -- we're going to ensure that we can support people to have those applications done so that they're ready to hit the water. And, Mr. Speaker, I'm following on those action items myself. It's not been -- it's not been that long, and there's been an evacuation, but as far as making sure that they're going to be moving forward, Mr. Speaker, that is why they are reduced down to an action item list that gets passed around between the parties. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.