Question 483-15(5): Candidate Protected Areas  Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Our government's intention is to respect all of those areas that either have some protection to the claims or have been identified through the Protected Areas Strategy as well as other interests people may have for spiritual sites or culturally important

Question 483-15(5): Candidate Protected Areas  Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, over the years, as we first began discussing protected areas, there hadn't been a lot of progress being made. I was beginning to wonder if this was just going to be another boondoggle. Clearly, in yesterday's commitment by the Minister of Environme

Question 472-15(5): Diamond Mines Impact Benefit Agreements  Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This one is getting pretty specific in terms of our plans, so, Mr. Speaker, I would like to refer it to the Minister of ITI.

Question 472-15(5): Diamond Mines Impact Benefit Agreements  Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I said, the impact benefit agreements are with people on whose traditional lands the activity is taking place. The socio-economic agreements were broader umbrella agreements that provided for training, employment opportunities, contracting and purchas

Question 472-15(5): Diamond Mines Impact Benefit Agreements  Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Certainly, in terms of the agreement with BHP or Ekati mine, there is a provision for travel assistance, I believe, in hiring that goes way beyond the traditional boundaries for people whose traditional land the activity is taking place on. So there are

Question 472-15(5): Diamond Mines Impact Benefit Agreements  Mr. Speaker, to my knowledge, and I wasn't involved directly in all of them at the time, but the impact benefit agreements were negotiated with those people on whose traditional lands that economic activity was taking place. The GNWT, our government, did a broad umbrella socio-e

Question 468-15(5): Devolution Of Federal Government Civil Service Positions  Mr. Speaker, I never did say we would complete all our negotiations and resource revenue sharing agreement by the end of March. I think the media may have taken it that way, but what I said is I want to achieve an agreement-in-principle by the end of March, recognizing that the f

Question 468-15(5): Devolution Of Federal Government Civil Service Positions  Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We have not had the opportunity to sit down with a group of employees whose positions would be considered for moving North. We have been working through a negotiator. In fact, Mr. Speaker, we are still negotiating the exact positions. Which ones? Because

Question 468-15(5): Devolution Of Federal Government Civil Service Positions  Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Most of the jobs are already located in the Northwest Territories, and they are jobs where people are working for Indian Affairs in the land resources northern program side. So most of them are here already. The biggest issue we have is with salary and ben

Question 468-15(5): Devolution Of Federal Government Civil Service Positions  Thank you, Mr. Speaker. While it is primarily land and resources, it does consider all of the positions within the Northern Affairs program that deliver services in the Northwest Territories or for the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Question 467-15(5): Resource Revenue Sharing Negotiations  Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I've said before, my focus is on our negotiations. As long as we're negotiating, as long as we feel we're making some progress, then I want negotiations to be the focus. If we begin to pull other avenues here and then we may jeopardize the negotiations

Question 467-15(5): Resource Revenue Sharing Negotiations  Mr. Speaker, how the revenues from Norman Wells have been treated is a longstanding issue. The federal government takes the position that they have an equity share in the Norman Wells project, the pipeline and so on, therefore it's their revenue and it shouldn't be considered as

Question 466-15(5): Mackenzie Gas Project Socio-economic Impact Funding  Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The ripple effect of the pipeline happening or not happening is going to affect I would guess all of Canada where they have this extra source of gas. Everybody across Canada, in one way or other, benefits a little bit. But, Mr. Speaker, those along the

Question 466-15(5): Mackenzie Gas Project Socio-economic Impact Funding  Mr. Speaker, the answer is very clear. Those other communities, particularly the ones in this area here have IBAs. They have impact benefit agreements from the diamond mines. I didn't hear up and down the valley complaining that they weren't getting benefit agreements from the pi

Question 466-15(5): Mackenzie Gas Project Socio-economic Impact Funding  Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We have done a lot of work on the impacts. We did give money, as the Member mentioned, to communities to look at the impacts. Mr. Speaker, every community, every band council, is free to go and negotiate their own agreement if they want to. They don't hav