Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to talk about this fire that happened in the fall in 2023. It just so happens that just after the long weekend on July 1st, my wife and I were going to go down to Fort Smith to see family and friends and join in the events that were happening in the town of Fort Smith. But prior to driving that way, I was passing Behchoko and as I was passing Behchoko, you could see smoke way in the back. And as I was driving, I told my wife that I don't see no planes there, nobody doing anything about that fire it appears. And you know, in the early days, you know, when I listened to the elders in Fort Resolution in my constituency, they would say that if there's a fire back in the early days, they would have a tower and we have people on that tower. And they see that fire and they will spot it, and they will send a crew out there. The guys who go out there for three days to a week or so and each of the fires is put out. And they'll come back home to their communities and that's how it was.
But when this fire happened, I asked a question why aren't they putting that fire out? And they say well, they have a policy called let it burn policy. Why is that? Why is that policy there to let it burn? And I often thought about it. Well, maybe it's because they don't want to pay overtime or anything like that. So that's what happened. That same fire came close to Behchoko, nearly wiping out the whole community. That same fire also came to Yellowknife nearly wiping out this community. How did we get to this point? It should never ever come to that. So it is concerning.
You know, a lot of people were afraid. A lot of people were displaced when the GNWT pulled the trigger to evacuate. It was chaos. My colleague Mr. O'Reilly up there, him and I were at Sir John on day one. For 12 hours that day, people were going to get registered to get on the plane to get out of Yellowknife. We had elders, didn't know what was going on. I had to help three elders. I had to go find three wheelchairs. I found it. I'm not going to tell you where I got it from, but I found it. The point is that we had to do what we can at the time to help our people. And when people were waiting in that line-up at Sir John, it was a mile long. There was no water, no seat, no tea, no coffee, no food. It was just the military that were there directing traffic.
After -- for three days that happened and then people were sent south to Edmonton, to Calgary, to Winnipeg. The patients in the hospital here were sent all over the place. Nobody knew where they were. Families didn't know where they were. I had constituent members who were sitting on the streets in Calgary because they were let go from the hotel or didn't even check in. There was nobody there from the Government of the Northwest Territories to help our people down south, but we got 6,600 government employees.
In Fort Resolution, I was there. We had no communication for five days. My wife was here; I was there. There what's no way I could communicate with her to check on her, my siblings, my son, my grandson, my kids. How that happened? Well, we heard that the lines were disrupted and burnt. We had no communication. Thank God we had StarLink in our community. And there were a few people that had it. That was the only way we were able to communicate to our families and friends.
Our food security for YKDFN, Lutselk'e and Fort Resolution, it was a big concern to us. In Fort Resolution, there was a fire south in Fort Smith, fire in Hay River, Enterprise, towards Kakisa. We had no way to get food into our community for about a good week. The GNWT, through some of their staff and the mining industry, stepped up to provide food to help us out in Fort Resolution. When we lost communication, where we had no telephones, we had no debit machines. We had nothing. So they couldn't sell gas. Gas was at a premium. The store was shut down. How did we get in that situation? Where was our backup as a government?
Lutselk'e, we had family and friends were there visiting and when this evacuation happened, there was no airlines. Air Tindi stopped flying to that community. There was absolutely no transportation to that community. That should never happen. That's why I've been asking for a winter road, extra barging season. Who knows? We may push all-season road. We need that. We need a backup.
While I was in Fort Resolution, we were told to evacuate Fort Resolution. There was a fire in Fort Smith, Hay River. Everybody was already gone. But the leadership in Fort Resolution got together and they said no. Where are we going to put our people? All the hotels are booked. You pretty well have to go maybe far as Winnipeg or BC. So it was really confusing. So the leadership said no, we got an airport here, we've got a lake here. We were better off staying here in Fort Resolution. That was the outcome.
While I was there doing my job as an MLA, I was on the phone for a good ten days dealing with lost constituents kicked out of hotel rooms. They got no money. They don't know where to turn to. Red Cross has been sending them all over the place. Where was the GNWT? There was nobody down there helping our people. But at the same time they had a fire in Alberta a few years earlier - Fort McMurray, Slave Lake, Alberta, BC. What happened in Slave Lake and Fort McMurray is no different than what happened here, but we should have learned something from that, yet we had no plans in place. I was told that this government was totally disorganized. It could have been worse. We could have had a lot of fatalities. Yeah, it's concerning. I'm standing up here today to talk about this motion.
The public is asking for -- to restore public trust in this government. We're not here to blame what happened. We should learn from what happened, so we know what to do next time. But what I heard from my friend on the other side of the House we don't need a public inquiry; It's going to cost millions of dollars; hundreds of thousand people are going to be interviewed; it's going to disrupt the whole government. When I hear that kind of stuff, it's just like you're trying to hide the truth from the people. The truth will set you free they say. Well, this public inquiry will do that.
Our people are hurting. The other day I was in Dettah for my constituency meeting. They made it very clear to me that they're still monies that they paid out of pocket yet to be reimbursed to this day. Why is that happening? Well, the government said no, we're going to cut you off on this day and that's it. There was no communication other than what we heard on the radio. And it happened bang, just like that.
My wife and I were in Hay River eating at The Boardroom when the phone went off. There was accidents, people running to get gas and groceries, and they were driving out of town straight into that fire. Like I said, we could have had a lot of fatalities.
On top of all that, YKDFN, Lutselk'e, Fort Resolution, Fort Resolution Metis Council, paid out a lot of money to the members in the south for food, a little bit of clothing, accommodation. They didn't ask for this. They took the money out of the monies they had from the mining industry, whatever monies they had in their bank account to help their own people. And they want their money back. They didn't ask for this. But I am told that if you want your money back, there's $45,000 you can get from MACA under this policy.
We should do the honourable thing. If you talk about building relationships and trust with Indigenous governments, you said that in your speeches as a Premier and Ministers; collaboration, I hear that. Restore trust. Even though we pass this motion today, there's no guarantee Cabinet's going to go ahead and do this work. But I want to see that. We're asking you to step up. We need it.
Mr. Speaker, I will be supporting this motion today for the people that want to have their voices heard, and they want to tell their story. I'm only touching on a little bit here. They have a lot to say. So, Mr. Speaker, I will be supporting the motion here today. Thank you.