Thank you, Mr. Chair. It's been a year of hearing my colleagues demonstrate the unbelievable need for basic services in small communities. It's been a year of clean-up after major events. It's been a year of heartache and hurt, and so many of us are still raw bundles of nerves trying to find some peace. I've been told that 15 to 20 years ago working here was a bit of a party. The diamond companies were swinging, the trips to Ottawa were fun, ribbon cutting happened, and it sounds like there were a lot more laughs. And that's no longer the case. Fast forward to now, and the honeymoon of the 20th Assembly is long gone. Urgent emergencies still exist. Climate change is hammering us in different ways year after year. My colleague from the Sahtu has detailed his constituents' need to see resources flow while it's still possible in the winter season for capital projects as they clearly can't get it moving in the summer by barge due to low water levels.

Every day in this building, I hear the frustration of Members that we can't adequately help residents with their most basic needs, most notably in housing and health care. We are scrambling to help, and many days it feels like we're stuck on a leaky boat with a tiny cup to bale out water.

I agree with my colleague from Frame Lake who spoke earlier today to the fact that systems of how we budget, plan, and make good decision in the GNWT need to change and adapt to this new reality we find ourselves in. Members have asked for real change in investments in housing and health care. We set out on that path after setting our priorities just a little over nine months ago. Unfortunately, moving at the speed of government, that's the blink of an eye, and that is also a frustration for anyone who has ever been in government and for those who haven't. To make meaningful systemic change takes time, effort, and likely tears.

I want to speak to notional. Notional is something I hoped that Cabinet would drop from their offer, and they haven't. The reality of funding for housing means it can't be anything but notional. Nunavut 3000 started out as notional, and they worked from there. So I still have high hopes. Those high hopes might end like a led balloon, and that's on Cabinet to pull out.

I have a personal touchstone in writing by the writer Paul Ford that I return to again and again. Quote: There is this set of heavy lenses mounted on a steel base. Each lens is 8 feet across. Looking through them, the world is blurry. Turning these lenses is exhausting. It wears out the muscles, it takes all your energy an inch a day each, and maybe you have three whole revolutions to go on before you end up in focus. It'll take a hundred years to get a clear picture of the world. I'll be dead by then. But in the meantime, some focus is better than none. End quote.

I have heard about focus and visions in conversations with Cabinet. I have faith in both of the Ministers in housing and health care holding those portfolios. They have shared some confidential information with Members that have a bold vision in the near term, and it's not my place to speak to that detail. But I have confidence that those heavy lenses are being turned in earnest. I am happy to say that I have good relationships with these Ministers, and they're doing the best they can as quick as they can with the tools they have while also trying to build new tools at the same time. That's the sticking point, it seems, what is possible today and what can be accomplished quickly. To that, I'd say for real and lasting and crucially meaningful and impactful change, that takes longer than nine months. In this instance, and for the urgency of the issues facing the Sahtu and for what I see as mainly a pared back capital budget, I will be supporting it. Thank you.