I have not sat down and looked at the total process and structure, but we know and recognize that MLAs and municipal leaders have to be involved, so we will come back as soon as we have completed the process structure and have it presented. If we are not in session, it will be sent out to all the Members as soon as it is completed.

In terms of the regional director, I would like to make one comment. I would expect that when we set the process in gear, and when the process is set up, the regional director will have to be on the team as well. Otherwise, if there are a number of community transfers in any given region, I would expect the regional director to be supportive of that because the communities are indicating that they want to move ahead with these community transfers. How this will work out, I do not know. In addition to that, if they are reporting through the structure of a committee to make sure the community transfers happen -- because this is what happened before. We did not have a process where you can accommodate the community transfers. As a result, there were many different directions, and the people who wanted to move for more takeover felt that what the region was saying was something different from the priorities set by this government.

Presently, the regional directors report to cabinet. I do not know that every little item in this report has to be taken as the word of the Bible. As we move along, there are items in there that may not be applicable because, at the time, we did not design or tell the study group to deal with all of the departmental responsibilities under this government. There are things that we may flesh out. Some things may not be appropriate. We are not saying at this time that 100 per cent of this report is going to be acceptable or workable. We are setting up the instruments to move toward making sure that the programs and responsibilities in the stages of turnover are met in a process. Thank you.

What we are doing now is setting up a process so that people know how they can work toward more control and take over more of the programs and responsibility. It is a process that is going to be set up. Whether people take advantage of that process can take as long as they want. So if a community is not ready or feels that they are not ready, it may be that some communities will want to take over, for example, the drug and alcohol program or some programs that are more relevant. Every community will be different.

Right now, there are many communities asking for more involvement, for example, in the correction of juveniles. These things are very important to people. We are just setting up a mechanism so that when a community comes forward and says they wish to take over these programs, then we know and are able to accommodate the negotiations for the takeover.

Again, I want to say we are not suggesting to move any quicker than the communities are willing to move.

In terms of the aboriginal self-government, when the report was done it was not asked to look at political issues or new political structures such as those that might be contemplated in division or aboriginal self-government. The report was simply asked to look at how great a responsibility for government programs might be placed in the hands of people at the community level, and the community transfer is a means of achieving that.

Now if people do not wish to move ahead, if your group does not wish to move ahead, that is a decision of your communities. We are not here to place before you or shove some responsibilities at a community level if you do not wish to take it. If the communities are offered and they wish not to take part, that is entirely up to them. They may be exploring other things that are far more important or far-reaching and do not wish to participate at this time; that is up to the communities that you represent. I want to make that very clear, that every region may not be the same or that every community may not be the same. We are trying to address the simple issue of the complaints and the concerns that we get from community people in terms of their desires to run their own lives at the community level.

I just want to make sure that you know, if you are placed in the position here before the Legislative Assembly of taking the stand that the people you represent do not wish to take part in this community transfer and wish to wait until some other negotiations go on at a higher level or with the federal government, that is entirely up to the communities you represent. We do not wish to impose upon communities or groups who want to take a political stand in terms of determining a longer-term objective that they do have; however, in many communities, people are saying that they want to take as much of a responsibility as possible. We realize as a government that not everybody, not every community or area, is ready to proceed, and we are willing and quite open to accommodate whether people wish to move faster or slower or not at all.

Mr. Chairman, the discussion on how we move ahead on community transfers can be brought up in this Legislative Assembly at any time; and as we are moving along, some areas in the report that evidently cannot be implemented will be falling off very quickly. We are setting up a community transfer committee which will be under the direction of Minister Kakfwi, and a process is going to be set up so that everyone knows here the general principles of how we are going to get these discussions going. So we can try to work in a mechanism where the MLAs would be involved.

This has not been written down, but what I had thought was that, particularly when a community came forward and wanted to take over a program or a menu of responsibilities, the MLA that is representing that community should be involved on a continuing basis on that takeover. That falls out right away, and we have not put out our communication package so we do not really know how many people are interested, but we know that some communities will not be interested at all, and some might have more interest than the other.

But certainly in terms of the MLAs, I did anticipate that if there was something happening within their constituency that they would be involved as well as, for example, the mayor. We can try to build up a more immediate input from MLAs on the issues of community transfers. So I will try to work that. We have not finished the mechanism of how we are going to do it. We have just announced it, and we have done some work on it. There is a committee to deal with that, and we certainly can work in more involvement if that is desired. We are open to suggestions on how you feel you want to track that on a day-to-day basis. I realize maybe some of the concerns might be that during the time that we are not meeting as a Legislative Assembly, where questions can be brought forward, that there will be things happening that may not allow you to be involved. So we can set up a mechanism to do that with more involvement, and we are certainly open to suggestions on that.

No, Mr. Chairman. I am prepared to listen to what the concerns are and what the issues are. I just want to say that we have taken the report and certain structural actions to try to put together an implementation team. The implementation team will be structured in some way so that MLAs can be involved on an ongoing basis in what is happening in implementing the "Strength at Two Levels" report.

Mr. Speaker:

I MOVE, seconded by the honourable Member for Hay River, that Tabled Document 3-12(1), "Strength at two Levels-Report of the Project to Review the Operations and Structure of Northern Government and Appendices," be moved into committee of the whole for discussion.

Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to deal with the motion to table "Strength at Two Levels."