Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think if I remember correctly, I was going to try to look it up, but there's the Chinese character that refers to crisis, and comprises of two words if I remember correctly. It refers to danger but it also refers to opportunity. And to me, that's some of what we're facing here, is there's a lot of danger going on there but there's an opportunity to change that story to avert the further humanitarian crisis. I honestly don't think that that's an overstatement. It resonates with me. It resonates with anyone I talk to about this particular situation. And I think that, you know, when you're at the grocery store here in Yellowknife and you're bumping into people and they're talking about Norman Wells and how they afford food in Norman Wells -- I mean, we could talk about all communities but I mean, when they're talking about it right now, that tells me it's an important issue even in Yellowknife. I mean, you don't have to go very far to run into people to talk about this. But the point I'm making is people are talking about it.

I mean, when Norman Wells called a state of emergency and they need the department to help exercise that ability to get those authorities and opportunities that it creates. And I want the government to get behind them. They -- you know, and I think Member -- the Member for Sahtu is right. I mean, you know, we can continue to define the problem but we actually know what the problem is. We should be talking about, really at the end of the day, who is bringing what to the table.

I'd like to use the famous analogy I'm trying to keep alive which is if we were talking about kilometers and highway, currently right now as it's scheduled at just over $6 million, $6.6 million, whatever the number round about there is, it's really about two to three kilometers of highway. Who wouldn't support helping the families, the businesses, the community at large, for two to three kilometers of highway in the Northwest Territories? It resonates in a manner that really hurts and scares. You know, the fact that we're discussing it today is an enormous opportunity for all of us to address and send the message to the people of the Sahtu.

I've heard -- I've had some people tell me -- that people are considering the option of leaving Norman Wells. It's not because they think the town has -- they don't want to be there. It's not a case like that at all. The fact is they just can't afford to be there anymore. I mean, I don't think you have to -- like the old -- for those of us old enough to remember -- unfortunately, I'm starting to be one of them -- I remember the town of Pine Point having the sign when the town closed up. Now, it closed for different reasons but I get that visually -- visual statement of someone spray painting a sheet of plywood saying last one here, turn off the lights. I worry, affordability, it's going to be the last one here to turn off the gas type of thing.

I mean, as my colleagues have all said -- I mean, I could run through the House, but we've already heard it, $6,000 to fill up a fuel tank, and we know you have to fill at least one a month when it gets cold, who has that kind of job that can pay for that? That is just completely beyond any measure.

I like to think about numbers, Mr. Speaker, and one of the things that I often think about is, like, how do we reflect on this? Although I don't have the specific number at my finger when I want to say this, so let's view it in the essence of context as opposed to absolute accuracy. But we know that the Jackfish plant, because of low water, has been running, and someone has to foot that bill of the gas, and how long has that been going. And often I've heard -- although I haven't inquired because it didn't really matter -- it's a bad situation. But I've often heard that it's $50,000 a day in fuel, and they have to have three sets of trucks constantly rolling through on the road to do that. So, again, not worrying about necessarily the absolute accuracy but the principle of it is is it would only take three to four months of running Jackfish to equal the cost that the people in the Sahtu need in the sense of relief.

This Assembly votes for subsidy programs all the time. We don't like to call it that sometimes, but we do. We subsidize education. We subsidize health. We subsidize seniors. We subsidize people who need public housing. Like, it comes in many forms. That's what public governments do. And it's important that we use our resources as wisely as we can to try to help as many people as we can. And would we not be able to find this type of money within our budget? As rightly said, it represents point 3 of our current budget. I mean, it's -- it's well within an easy threshold, if not a rounding error, on our budget. We could do this. And I would say that it would be a shame if we didn't rise to the occasion.

So I go back to this: What are we bringing to the table?

The urgency of discussion is saying, folks, collectively, let's get excited to say what I could do and you can do and we can do to help the people of Norman Wells. Because without that, there will be one person who spray paints that sign and says last person out, turn off the gas.

So, Mr. Speaker, in closing, I want to emphasize that we could probably talk about this as the proverbial cows come home. The problem is we can't wait anymore. The people of Sahtu can't wait anymore. The people of the Northwest Territories want something done. This is not a perfect solution so please don't think it is, but sometimes you got to accept good at the cost of avoiding perfect because we know perfect can take a long time and it can threaten it. And as I can see right now -- I'm just shown a picture, sorry, Mr. Speaker, I still have time. I'm seeing a picture on a text that there's no more fuel in Norman Wells. So whatever resources they're in a competitive market and have just become way more expensive. And when you're flying fuel in to fly it out, in other words flying fuel in for planes just to fly out, I mean, it gets pretty expensive. So if the town no longer has fuel, based on this text picture I just saw, it's a real crisis and we need every hand on deck saying what can we do with housing, how can those folks help there, how can we direct energy, what can the folks in MACA do to bring to the table to find solutions? What can ITI or education do from their point of view? What can the Minister of Finance find ways to find money in budgets or redirect things or even say can we delay things so we can help respond this? What can ECE do? You know, that's the type of attitude, everyone has to say we're willing to give something up to help people in the Sahtu region. Everybody's got to find something. And I think if we all recognize that, that our goal is to collectively solve this problem, I think we're halfway there. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.