In regards to the Sunrise Festival, I know the department really does a great job in promoting our northern lights, and we do see that. It’s pretty evident here in Yellowknife when we see all the tourists here. But like I mentioned in my Member’s statement, there’s no other place that I know of in the world that has a celebration of welcoming back the sun. This is huge and I think that it’s something that we can market as well. Also, the Minister had mentioned in his Minister’s statement before about the Oil and Gas Strategy. We know the economy is slow and that oil and gas activity is not...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d also like to welcome Mr. Richard Letourneau. He’s a constituent of Inuvik Boot Lake and I just want to thank him for all the work he does in Inuvik at the school. He’s also with the French society. I hope you enjoy the proceedings today. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Last question. Just in terms of that, to make that assessment from a medical practitioner, I think that’s why that time after withdrawal, that time for observation to look at the patient, keep them in the hospital for 24, 48, 72 hours, which also can be done within this act, to see what other psychiatric assessments might need to be done on this patient, and then in terms of medical practitioners, you know, communities that don’t have nurses, how many psychiatrists or medical practitioners do we have in the Northwest right now that can actually do that kind of diagnosis?

I know we’re unique in the North in terms of barriers and challenges, especially when it comes to the remote communities. I just want to make reference to a news article on CBC, I don’t know how many years ago, but they were talking to a psychologist or psychiatric physician that talked about not being able to do a correct assessment because he couldn’t see the individual and talk to him, so I think there are some flaws in there. I just want to put that out there.

In terms of withdrawal management, do we have a policy right now in terms of how long do we keep an individual who’s going through...

What are we doing for the small communities that just have health centres and specifically with the eight communities that don’t have nurses that can provide any kind of medical treatment for anybody that might be going through some withdrawals? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I’m kind of intrigued in how the Department of Justice and Department of ECE both contributed to the Day Shelter here in Yellowknife. I believe there’s only one other Day Shelter in the Northwest Territories and that’s in Inuvik, and whether or not the department would work with the other departments in looking at accessing those funds, as well, because the cost of doing business further up north is a lot higher. So, I’m intrigued and wouldn’t mind getting more information on that, and I’ll ask the Ministers when it does become time to review this. Thank you, Mr. Chair. More of a comment.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Before I begin, I’d just like to thank Mr. Dolynny and Mr. Nadli, as well as any other Members who have brought a lobbyist registry before government. I’m happy to speak on it today.

When we discussed this in committee, the first thing that came to mind was transparency and accountability on our government and our departments and how we do business throughout the Northwest Territories. The public and public offices have the right to know who is lobbying our government and who is going into contracts with our government. We need to know which groups, businesses and...

I think the concept of having a contest to get Southerners up to our regions in the NWT shows that people are interested in coming up to the North. They had over 4,500 entries just from the Facebook site as well as the radio contest. I didn’t get any statistics on how the TV program showed up.

The active group in Inuvik, the Tourism Stakeholder Committee, is also looking at doing something similar for the Aboriginal Day, Summer Solstice, as well as the Great Northern Arts Festival and our annual reindeer crossing. Would the department look at funding or look at supporting contests of a similar...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have questions today for the Minister of ITI in regards to some of our tourist investments and some of our tourism supports. I mentioned in my Member’s statement the Inuvik Sunrise Festival and the support and interest it got from media campaigns and Facebook. I was just looking at the numbers here, but this very creative group in Inuvik used an organization on Facebook and they garnered over 1,800 contest entries and then on the Rogers Media on the radio show they had over 2,600 entries. So, over 4,500 contest entries to get up to Inuvik to welcome back the sun.

I’d...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. On January 9th to 11th, the community of Inuvik welcomed about 25 out-of-town visitors for the annual Sunrise Festival. I don’t know of any other place in the world that puts that type of events and activities into an event like this where the community is welcoming back the sun after about a month of darkness.

There was about three days of activities and events that were planned in Inuvik. The Town of Inuvik and its partners, organizations and businesses in the community came together and developed a really great three days of events and showcases. I just wanted to...