Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is to the Minister of Personnel regarding the statement he made on the sale of staff housing. I would like to know why only Yellowknife, Hay River and Fort Smith will be the communities where staff houses will be sold. There are other communities that have staff housing as well. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is to the Minister responsible for Municipal and Community Affairs regarding the community of Jean Marie River. Last July the secretary/manager left the community, and the department knew well ahead of time that this person would be leaving, and up to date this position has not been filled. As a result of that, there are a lot of problems within the community in terms of taking care of the administration of the community financially and project wise, and I know the problem there is that there is no co-ordination. Is the department going to be filling this position soon? Mahsi.

(Translation) Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to make some comments in regard to my constituents. I am speaking for the six communities that I represent. Recently the chief and councillors had elections. (Translation ends) Last Friday they had elections in Nahanni Butte and Wrigley. I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate the newly-elected chief and council of Nahanni Butte and Wrigley.

On Friday, February 21st, the residents of Wrigley elected Charlie Tale as their chief. Also elected Friday in Wrigley were councillors Gabe Hardisty, Martha Drake, Mike Canadian, James Hardisty, Tim Lennie and Lloyd Moses.

In Nahanni Butte the people elected Jayne Konisenta as their chief, and Chief Konisenta joins the previously-elected council of Sam Ekotla, William Konisenta, David Konisenta, Lena Marcellais, and Laura Vital.

I hope that this government recognizes and will work with these new community governments. For Chief Konisenta and Chief Tale, it is their first time as leaders. So I would like to congratulate them. Mahsi cho.

Mahsi. Supplementary. One possible strategy is to truck food supplies into the community over winter roads and store it either at the store or another facility. This would lessen the amount of food supplies transported into the community by air. Would the Minister take this suggestion into account when he looks at the serious problem?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As many Members of this House are aware, the cost of food in the North is quite high. I just want to identify the community of Trout Lake as, I believe, one of the highest in the Northwest Territories, and according to the latest food price index published by the Bureau of Statistics, the cost of food in Trout Lake is 68 per cent higher than Yellowknife, and 68 per cent higher than what a lot of people in Yellowknife complain about. Mr. Speaker, the people of Trout Lake live a traditional lifestyle and do not have high income levels. People simply cannot afford to pay such prices for food.

My question is for the Minister of Economic Development and Tourism and deals with the store in Trout Lake that his department runs. Would the Minister commit his department to look at finding innovative ways to better manage food supplies in Trout Lake to lower the cost of food in this community?

Mahsi Cho. Because of the success the association had achieved over the past years, we faced the unique situation of having two other communities, Wrigley and Jean Marie River, ask Fort Simpson to take responsibility for the delivery of their HAP units there, as well. As a chief, the most useful contribution I could make was to have the best people in my community work on the band council's housing committee. We were fortunate that band councillors Andy Norwegian, Rita Cli and Ron Hardisty accepted the challenge of being on the housing committee. And I was fortunate to recruit Rene Lamothe to work for the housing committee as a project manager. In my role as chief, I asked this group to keep a tight financial rein on the matters and to use a common sense approach to meeting people's basic needs for housing.

Mr. Speaker, the housing committee made a lot of difficult decisions. I supported their decisions then, and I do now. I would like to commend these people for their contribution and to indicate to this House that it is truly regrettable to see the sort of misinformation and finger-pointing that has surrounded this issue.

But what matters, Mr. Speaker, is the bottom line; and the bottom line here is that Liidli Koe Construction succeeded in meeting its goal for 1990-91. It built and delivered 11 houses for families in three Nahendeh communities -- seven in Fort Simpson, three in Wrigley and one in Jean Marie River -- and people were able to move into their homes. And it delivered these homes at a lower average per unit cost than the previous year.

There has been some talk locally of a formal investigation into this matter. Personally, I would welcome any sort of investigation. We have nothing to hide, but it would not accomplish anything. I agree with the Minister responsible for the Housing Corporation, Hon. Don Morin, when he says that our job now is to build houses.

Mr. Speaker, as a final comment, I would like to register my concern over the fact that internal Housing Corporation documents were turned over to the media, and that this government has appeared helpless to do anything about this abuse of confidence. I will have more to say about that issue in my statements later this session. Mahsi cho.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, allegations about the 1990/1991 delivery of HAP houses for

three Nahendeh communities by the Liidli Koe Construction Association have caused discouragement and resentment within my constituency. I believe that the actions and statements of a disgruntled former Housing Corporation employee, and the highly selective and poorly researched coverage which aired on CBC's Focus North -- I call it the "Unfocused North" -- program, have directed a lot of negative attention on the Fort Simpson Dene band and the Liidli Koe Construction Association, and upon good people who have given their time and energy to assist their community.

I had originally decided not to dignify these inaccuracies and falsehoods with a response, but I would like to set the record straight. Mr. Speaker, the Dene band to which I belong has been involved in providing houses for the people of Fort Simpson for over 15 years. Our partnership with the public government -- first the federal government and later the government of the Northwest Territories -- has been in part based on what I believe are our rights and responsibilities set out in a treaty, Treaty No. 11, which was signed by our forefathers in 1921. Mr. Speaker, we made a decision to proceed with block funding arrangements several years ago because we believed the greater autonomy they represented were in keeping with the partnership and with our tradition of community self-sufficiency. When I became chief of the Fort Simpson Dene Band in July 1990, however, I inherited a number of problems within the housing infrastructure of our community. The Liidli Koe Construction Association, which is managed by the housing committee of the Fort Simpson Band Council, was struggling with a surplus of capital assets and a very severe cash shortage. Late block funding payments, received in July from the territorial Housing Corporation, had disrupted project schedules which were supposed to begin as soon as the snow melted in the spring. There were problems with some local contractors' attitudes toward meeting our project deadlines when they knew they were dealing with public funding.

Interpersonal strife and suspicion within the bureaucracy of the Housing Corporation was interfering with our ability to get answers and commitments we needed to do a good job. I think my time is coming to an end, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As seconder of this motion I also feel it is important that we discuss this before it gets passed. I think it is important that some of the concerns come out from people that I represent. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to thank the honourable Minister for his answer, but I do not think he quite answered me because he is telling me some of the things he is doing, but I want to know if the government has a strategy of some sort for dealing with this growing concern in the North of protecting our environment from pollution from outside our borders.

I am going to ask a series of questions. I want to know if there is an overall plan of action, for example on dealing with the pollution in the water from pulp mills, in the air currents and so forth. To me the government should have an overall plan and strategy in addressing these issues. Going after a specific pulp mill in Alberta and taking them to court is like a band-aid solution. If you lose it you lose it, but if you win, it might be a good victory. But there are a series of pulp mills in the South that are contributing to the pollution in the North. Is there an overall plan that the government has that would address this concern?