Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I seek unanimous consent to waive Rule 69(2) and have Bill 69, An Act to Amend the Legislative Assembly and Executive Council Act, No. 2, moved into Committee of the Whole for today.

---Unanimous consent granted

Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Kam Lake, that Bill 69, An Act to Amend the Legislative Assembly and Executive Council Act, No. 2, be read for the second time.

Mr. Speaker, Bill 69 makes a number of amendments to the Legislative Assembly and Executive Council Act. These include amendments to:

• allow for the duration of the Legislative Assembly to be extended in the event of a postponed polling day under the Elections and Plebiscites Act;

• align the sitting requirements of the Legislative Assembly with the Northwest Territories Act (Canada);

• clarify certain provisions in respect of processes for appointments and revocations; and

• extend the period before an election within which a vacancy may occur without requiring a by-election.

The bill also makes a related amendment to the Elections and Plebiscites Act with respect to a postponed polling day in the event of conflict with a federal election period. This bill comes into force on polling day for the General Election that follows the dissolution of the 17^th Legislative Assembly. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I, too, would like to thank the mover and seconder for bringing this motion forward. We've been working with our local disabilities council for a number of years and one of the things that stands out with us, we've talked about our mobility, the mobility of these individuals, and our chairperson has been working and she's indicated that if these individuals don't have mobility it's hard for them to get out, it's hard to go to school, hard to go to work, hard to be sociable.

With the lack of effectiveness that we've had with these plans and implementing any kind of strategy, it's put a situation of the NWT Disabilities Council and our Hay River local one for an example. Without any kind of funding, without any kind of programs out there, these organizations are left to fight, and literally fight over funding from other organizations throughout the Northwest Territories. You would think that the two organizations would be linked directly, but oftentimes they're competing over the same dollars. It's because of the lack of planning that we've done here, the lack of things we've done over the last 10 or 15 years on this issue.

We need to work with the GNWT, with the people for disabilities, with all the councils and all the people throughout the Northwest Territories to improve this situation. Mr. Nadli spoke today about a handivan for Enterprise. In the community of Hay River we had a handivan for a while. They continue to operate it, but now only for a select group of people that they can actually get funding for. We have seniors and we have people with disabilities who don't have access to any kind of handivan right now because the program is specific to our own group of people that are taking programming. It used to be open to seniors, it used to be open to the people of Enterprise and surrounding areas to help out, but because the funding is so tight they don't have the money to operate this handivan. This is one of the factors of us not having a plan in place.

I will vote in favour of this motion. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Would there be an opportunity to commit to a multi-year approach? As opposed to spending millions of dollars in one year, maybe going to a multiple year, like going $400,000 and $500,000 a year for 10 years, as opposed to giving $12 million to the project.

We're looking for a commitment financially to the project. Is the department willing to put that into their own end budget? Thank you.

Obviously, the obvious question is: Is the territorial government willing to put any kind of dollar figure towards putting this on the capital budget and getting this project moving?

One of the parties that we can't get to the table is the federal government. Are we inviting the federal government to get into this deal?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have questions for the Minister of Transportation about his statement today.

Can the Minister indicate to me when he expects this meeting to occur on getting all the parties involved in dredging for the Hay River area? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'd like to acknowledge Elsie Bouvier, one of my constituents, who is proud to be with her friend Jeanna, who won an award today at the Culture and Heritage Circle Awards.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It's been four years since I've wanted to see a Minister's statement on dredging the port at Hay River. Amen. Hallelujah. We've finally got a statement that made that point.

We know the federal government is still not there and now at least the territorial government is listening. The crack of the door is open. Now we need to kick that door open and get this project going.

Last week I was talking about the fact that we are building roads, which used to be a federal responsibility, 75 federal, 25 for the territorial. If our federal partners aren't going to kick in the door and get this thing going, let's throw our 25 percent in. Let's get a project where we can get this dredging of the Hay River done.

I appreciate the statement and I appreciate the gesture, but a meeting? In four years it took us to get a statement that we're going to have a meeting? We need to get more results than that. We need to have a plan. I've been asking this territorial government to come together with a plan on the costs and how we can go forward from there. We need more than just a meeting. We need to get results.

I will have questions for the Minister on how we get this done sooner than later. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.