Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Deh Cho.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for ECC minister related to my Member's statement regarding fire breaks. Can the Minister advise if the department has standards and layouts to develop fire breaks to communities in the Northwest Territories? Mahsi.

Thank you, Member for Deh Cho. Minister responsible for Environment and Climate Change.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Department of Environment and Climate Change works closely with communities to provide advice and recommendations on ways to help mitigate risk for wildfire. Furel breaks are one of the multiple tools that are used in wildfire prevention, mitigation, and response. Characteristics of the fuel breaks are typically based on specific fuel types in a specific area and take into consideration the type of trees, including tree species, height, and density. It is important to note that the fuel breaks are not intended to stop the spread of wildfire. They are to help -- they are there to help slow the fire and also provide fire personnel a control line to safely initiate from there, where possible, to remove fuel between the community and the main fire. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker, and mahsi to the Minister for that answer. Has the department completed an assessment of what each community has for fire breaks and if they are currently compatible with any standards for such? Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the department regularly provides advice on ways to help protect communities from the risk of wildfires. The department has worked with all 29 forested communities in the NWT to update their community wildfire protection plan, which are designed to help reduce risks for wildfire. One of those tools available to the community is the use of fire break -- or fuel breaks and are included in the community wildlife protection plans. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Mahsi to the Minister for that. I believe that many of the fire breaks that he speaks of are a bit -- not wide enough to prevent fires from entering the communities.

Mr. Speaker, failing to have any set standards to determine proper and safe fire breaks for communities in the Northwest Territories, will the department work to develop acceptable standards of fire breaks to protect communities? Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I noted earlier, the construction of fuel breaks needs to consider a number of factors, specifically to each area and community, including the type of fuel in the area. The Department of Environment and Climate Change has worked closely with each forested community to develop their community plans, which include consideration of these factors. We are committed to continuing to work with communities to provide technical advice and expertise in planning for fuel breaks as well as other fire mitigation measures.

Mr. Speaker, just so people here in the House and people out there are aware, the fires can and have jumped the Mackenzie River from one side to the other. So when we're looking at the size of the fire breaks, again it's not to stop fires. It's to help us be able to break it and to initiate the fight the flames moving forward. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Deh Cho.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Regarding the fire breaks, you know, the wider the fire break and when you get rid of the topsoil, as most communities are starting to chip, using a chipper to chip away and do FireSmarting so that fire -- that chipping there, that's wood chips, and that's fuel, that adds fuel to the fire. So I don't know if that's a real good idea if the department is advising communities to do that. So even their fireguards, you know, they need to be a set standard because they will protect communities. If we're not doing anything, well we're leaving it up in the air for next fire season. We're going to have communities that will be totally lost because of all the forest that we have in the areas. And we need to be proactive and start looking at trying to mitigate these situations. And, you know, because right now what they're doing is just reactive, getting all the Caterpillars, it's all in the South Slave. Now they're making fire breaks after the fact. You know, that's -- that doesn't seem to make -- you know, to rhyme or reason. Funding is always an issue when communities are left to fend for themselves, especially in developing fire breaks that will meet an acceptable standard of protection.

Can the Minister work with all communities to develop a work plan as to the fire break needs of each community and funding requirements and present these findings to the federal government for further funding? Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, ECC has internal funding available each year to help communities implement their community wildfire protection plan, which can include building of fuel breaks. I can advise this House that we work with NWTAC who successfully applied for $20 million of disaster mitigation and adaptation funding from the federal government. That money will be -- as I said yesterday, will be brought forth to NWTAC and they're going to give it -- allocate it to the communities, those 29 communities.

Mr. Speaker, NWTAC realizes that work needs to be done now. So they've reach out and worked with the communities to be able to start that work now and then all those costs can be reimbursed April 1st. So if they know exactly what money they are eligible for -- so we've already done the work. We've already gone to the federal government, and we've done it through the NWTAC. So it doesn't need to be us. We've worked with NWTAC for the communities to get this done. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions today are for the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs. Yesterday I started questioning the Minister in regards to reimbursing residents for airfares incurred during evacuation. And I'd like to continue those questions today.

As I explained today during my Member's statement, some residents tried unsuccessfully to use the government charters, and some also thought when they were leaving on commercial flights that they were aiding the evacuation efforts of the Government of the Northwest Territories. And so I'd like to ask the Minister again, will this government reimburse the personal costs incurred by residents who booked commercial flights to either get out of town or to re-enter the territory once the evacuation order was lifted? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Member for Kam Lake. Minister responsible for Municipal and Community Affairs.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yesterday it was said in the House that we were telling people to get out on the planes, get the planes going out there. This is the communication that we sent out: If it's safe for residents who have vehicles and are available to drive, to start evacuating now. If there are any smoke conditions, residents evacuating by the highway will be escorted from Yellowknife through active fire zone. Air evacuation is scheduled to begin at 1 p.m., Thursday, August 7th, 2023. Only residents who do not have the option to leave the area by road are asked to register for evacuation fly outs.

As I said yesterday under section -- or has been saying under section 4 of the DFA with the federal public safety eligibility, section 4.11 is a reference to provincial and territorial eligible costs that the province or territorial province provides temporary relocation shelters, etcetera, to residents. The GNWT did provide evacuation support, including transportation, accommodation, and food. So the GNWT will be making a claim for that cost as in terms for the DFA. The Member -- I understand what the Member has said. I've heard her numerous times. We've had numerous conversations. And, unfortunately, no, we will not be reimbursing people that decided to take the flights out. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I know I've had numerous conversations with the Minister about this and at this point, I'm thankful that the Minister still answers my phone calls. But I'm not done having this conversation.

Mr. Speaker, I get that the government had evacuation flights. Those evacuation flights weren't available on Thursday. There was extreme environmental factors that heightened peoples' fear; and people were being told the fire's going to be here by the weekend, you need to do what you can to get out. Then they sat in those line-ups, and they were not put on planes. I went down to the evacuation centre. People were organized. The military was organized. They had them registered. They had them ready. They were waiting for airplanes. Pilots were waiting to be told when to fly. So it's not just a matter of people just choosing to get on other flights. This was an issue where the flights weren't actually as ready as we'd like to think that they were or we would have liked them to have been. Was it perfect? No. And so I'm asking the government to acknowledge, yes, it wasn't perfect, and there are other mechanisms that we can help residents out. We can help them out by reimbursing the cost of those flights. And I'd like to know if MACA will do that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thursday wasn't perfect. I had conversations with the military. The military people that were there helping us were pretty calm about it. They said, for the first day, it's actually going pretty smoothly. Yes, was there a long lineup? Yes. Were flights not ready to go? Yes. But I can tell you the next day we had people out and when people were registering, we were getting them on flights. We had the military that brought in four extra crews to help us get those flights out. So we did have that. We were still within the timeframe that we had. I understand where the Member's coming, and I still take her phone calls whenever she phones and I mean, I understand we got a job to do. However, at the end of the day we had a process of evacuating people from this city, from Dettah, and N'dilo, and we were following that process. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, that's one side of things. The other side is the re-entry flights. The re-entry flights where people literally sat and waited. Some people have never heard back. They needed to get back for work. And in some cases, like I said in my Member's statement, if people didn't get home they lost their jobs, their permanent residency in this country was going jeopardized, the fact that they needed some people to get home for safety reasons. I mean, there's a multitude of nuances. And the other part of that is that the airlines on the way home were also capping flights between $150 and $250. So I'm wondering, then, if the -- if MACA won't reimburse the flights, even though, yes, I agree it does state under the DFAA eligible response costs include, and that includes transportation. There's also section 5.2.1 which also refers to travel, accommodations, incurred during an evacuation. But if this -- if MACA will not do it under the DFAA, will they put together a program similar, then, to the transportation -- Evacuated Transportation Support Program where we supported residents who drove out. They can put together, you know, a fixed cost of what they'll support residents with and tie it into that. So there are other ways that creatively the government can support residents to refund these costs, and I'm wondering if MACA will do that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I can tell you that we've got numerous phone calls from the Members, including Members from on this side, that had residents that were -- didn't get their information. We then worked with them to get on those flights. Yes, we heard some of the challenges that were there and we were trying to get people on those flights. We also had people that showed up here without telling us, and we were looking for them too. So we did have staff there that we were working on that.

As for coming up with another program, we have our bailiwicks of our options available to us, and at this point in time I am not looking at that. But we can say that it's something that maybe Cabinet can look at later on but right now, we are focusing on what we are able to provide through the Disaster Assistance Program with the department. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Kam Lake.

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Minister. I appreciate the acknowledgement that Cabinet will take some time to discuss this.

Mr. Speaker, it's one of those things where absolutely there was charter flights that were going out. But there was also other people who did help the evacuation and the re-entry process by putting themselves on flights, and people did what they had to do in order to be compliant with the order in order to be safe. I acknowledge that this might in turn be a substantial cost for the government, but this is a cost that the government is much better suited to incur than individual residents of the territory. And so I'm wondering if the Minister can speak to under what parameters would MACA potentially refund a flight to a resident? Because I know that there are times where different residents have different situations that might qualify for a refund from MACA. So I'm wondering if the Minister can speak to that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'm not going to speculate on what conditions or where that -- I would take some time to think about it. So right now, I will not be able to answer that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.