Sergeant-at-Arms, please escort the witnesses into the chamber.

Minister, please introduce your witnesses.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Today with me I have, on my left, Megan Birch, Director of Policy and Planning Division, Department of Justice, and on my right, Clayton Lowther, Legislative Counsel Legislative Division, Department of Justice. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. I will now turn to the chair of the Standing Committee on Social Development, the committee that reviewed the bill for any opening comments on Bill 34.

Okay. Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, Bill 34, Trespass to Property Act, received second reading in the Legislative Assembly on October 31st, 2025, and was referred to the Standing Committee on Social Development for review.

In January 2026, committee held public hearings on the bill in Yellowknife and Hay River and met with the Hay River Healthy Community Committee. Committee also received four written submissions. I would like to thank all the stakeholders and members of the public who participated in committee's review and provided us with valuable feedback on Bill 34.

On February 25th, 2026, committee held its clause-by-clause review of the bill where nine amendments were made to Bill 34 with the Minister's concurrence.

I thank the committee for their efforts in reviewing this legislation.

Individual members may have additional comments or questions. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. I will now open the floor to general comments on Bill 34. Member for Range Lake.

Thank you, Madam Chair. And thank you to the -- our committee chair for her work steering the ship on this important piece of legislation. As noted, the bill was amended substantially with nine pretty crucial amendments. One of those was to allow -- or expand the enforcement power to peace officers that could be defined in regulations. Now that that change has been made, I'd like to ask the Minister what the process will be to develop those regulations, as a number of stakeholders wrote in to the committee requesting that those responsible for enforcing the act could be broadened from the RCMP. So now that the bill is amended, that can be possible, but it's still not in there until the regulations are drafted.

So can the Minister just walk the public through how that process works and what the intentions of the department are. Thank you.

Thank you. Minister of Justice.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I think this area, as it being a change that happened during the review of committee, is certainly an area that I think will require a little bit more work. And, you know, a look across the territory, there's a significant, I think, difference in sort of what the city -- things might look like in the city and how it may look in a smaller community. So certainly I think there's some work to do on this, and I think we need to also ensure that we're consulting appropriately with the potential affected residents that, you know, need to have input as we move forward in drafting the regulations. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. I'll go back to Member for Range Lake.

Thank you, Madam Chair. And thank you to the Minister for that. So it's important to note that this is an enabling power. It's not a prescriptive power. So creating the ability for other peace officers to enforce the act doesn't mean they must, but obviously if a community asked for that, that would be what the regulations would be drafted for.

So where we're at now, I guess, what I'm trying to get at, is if the City of Yellowknife feels prepared -- and the committee received written correspondence to that end -- is prepared to use their municipal enforcement officers or wants to use them under the act, how long will it take to get them into regulation so that's made possible? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. Minister of Justice.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I will pass to the director for a little more detail. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Director Birch.

Thank you. I'll go back to the Member for Range Lake.

Thank you. So the key concern here is that the way the bill was drafted initially, it only applied to the RCMP, which the RCMP welcomed as an additional tool in the toolkit. But when the committee put questions to the RCMP around, will this increase your workload, do you anticipate seeing more issues, they said, no, because we already get a ton of complaints related to trespass, and this just allows us to deal with those when we want to proceed them. But the flip side to that is, so what good -- there's not going to be a huge rush of operational need and we're going to be short RCMP members, but the flip to that is people want to see more results down the streets, they want to see more results in their businesses, and they want to see this act actually used effectively. So if we're not seeing more volume, that's why more peace officers would be helpful to this end. And that's also something that was shared by the RCMP.

So I guess where I'm at is that that's why we made this change. There are communities that are signaling that they're interested in this. Is there a kind of near-term possibility for this?

Like, I know we have to look at it. I'm not saying that we won't. But what is the anticipated -- now that the minister's concurred with the amendment, has had time to -- the department's looked at it, had time to wrap their heads around it, what is the anticipated time required to develop such a regulation to expand into other peace officers? Thank you.

Thank you. I'll go to the Minister of Justice.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I would suggest we're probably looking at a four- to six-month window to have the opportunity to go through, address that, and be able to come back and see what that can look like. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. I'll go back to the Member for Range Lake.

Thank you. That's exactly what I was looking for. So I'm sure there's going to be many people out there who -- or municipalities and communities who are looking for that enabling power or at least a chat about it. So now they know in four- to six-months, the department will be ready for a phone call. So thank you very much to the Minister for clarifying that.

Would you like to comment, Minister of Justice?

Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate the input from the Member. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. I will now go to the Member for Yellowknife North.