Bill Braden

Yes, okay, I’ve got the information or the confirmation that I was seeking here and that is that a significant part in the accountability process that we need to have on our side of the House was missed. That reason alone will justify my support of the upcoming motion to delete this item, Mr. Chairman. As I’ve said in the context of this debate before, I think just about everybody on this side has added their voice to we do not want to deny Fort Simpson a valuable part of their community infrastructure, but we’ve got to be able to hold the government to account on the way decisions are made...

Mr. Speaker, has the GNWT consulted with any of the major user groups in the NWT, like the business or the mining industry communities, other levels of government and consumers, to really verify that its positions are going to be the ones that accurately reflect what we want to have put before the CRTC? What is the level of consultation that we have undertaken, Mr. Speaker?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Through the Minister Roland or directly I’d like to see if the client department, ECE, could help committee out with some of the background on this.

Mr. Chairman, as the Minister has just outlined, we do have a capital planning process. It normally takes a year or two of discussion and negotiation and preparation to even get a particular project in the cycle of, I guess competition with other projects before it may finally land on our desks here and we can actually approve a project. So it is a multi-year situation. The kind of project that the Deh Cho Hall is, is I...

Mr. Speaker, does that mean we are going to defend NorthwesTel's, in effect, monopoly here for at least some of the communities, and we're going to continue asking the CRTC to protect that monopoly through regulatory affairs, Mr. Speaker?

Mr. Speaker, has the GNWT consulted with any of the major user groups in the NWT, like the business or the mining industry communities, other levels of government and consumers, to really verify that its positions are going to be the ones that accurately reflect what we want to have put before the CRTC? What is the level of consultation that we have undertaken, Mr. Speaker?

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. We’ve had tremendous advances in the telecommunications field in the NWT in the last 25 years. Today I think all 33 of our communities enjoy instantaneous telephone, satellite television, fax, we’re getting just about everybody hooked up to high-speed Internet, Mr. Speaker, almost to the point where we’re taking all this for granted. Even I can remember the days of telex, typewriters, VHF telephones and things like that. Things were a lot simpler in those days and sometimes I wish they were back. But in contrast, Mr. Speaker, southern communities enjoy an almost bewildering...

Mr. Speaker, does that mean we are going to defend NorthwesTel's, in effect, monopoly here for at least some of the communities, and we're going to continue asking the CRTC to protect that monopoly through regulatory affairs, Mr. Speaker?

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. We’ve had tremendous advances in the telecommunications field in the NWT in the last 25 years. Today I think all 33 of our communities enjoy instantaneous telephone, satellite television, fax, we’re getting just about everybody hooked up to high-speed Internet, Mr. Speaker, almost to the point where we’re taking all this for granted. Even I can remember the days of telex, typewriters, VHF telephones and things like that. Things were a lot simpler in those days and sometimes I wish they were back. But in contrast, Mr. Speaker, southern communities enjoy an almost bewildering...

Mr. Chairman, as my colleague Mrs. Groenewegen has said, the people of Fort Simpson deserve better. They deserve to know that there is going to be a long-term solution and answer in getting this piece of infrastructure established. That is probably the most important reason why I am voting against this. We really are not helping this community. We are going to end up disappointing them again because beyond the two to four years that this program might keep the building open, there is nothing.

Mr. Chairman, as has already been said here, it’s an embarrassment that this request has made it this...

Mr. Chairman, thank you. I appreciate the Minister’s very patient explanation of all this stuff, but you know, he’s pointed out one of the obvious stages in here, gaps, that for whatever reason or cause the routine step of getting this into the business plan was missed. One of the steps that I’m familiar with and very comfortable with when it comes to getting things into the business plan is bringing an issue or problem or situation before standing committee. I sit on the Standing Committee on Social Programs, which has oversight responsibility for ECE. I do not recall in the four or five...