Bill Braden

Thank you, Madam Chair. The sessional statement was a very extensive checklist of the initiatives that this Assembly has undertaken. Also, I think it covered a fair number of ongoing programs and projects that carry through from previous assemblies. I guess in this particular message, Madam Chair, I didn’t see any pronouncements or announcements of anything substantively new. Perhaps my expectations were maybe a little out of line in that respect, but it is an opportunity for the government to signal some new things that may be taking place out there or that are in the offing. It’s the kind of...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I take it from the Minister’s answer that there is a considerable focus going on in the Housing Corporation for social renewing and modernizing our social housing inventory. I certainly support that. I restated or refined my question to look at the market communities, Mr. Speaker, where we already have a private sector base of developers and builders. But, for whatever reason, just in keeping up with demand, therefore, affordability and availability is very difficult. Is the corporation looking at all at anything beyond loan guarantees to the private sector to...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions this afternoon are for the Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation and it’s a follow through. First question, it’s a follow through to an area that I know the Minister has himself favoured in another life of this Assembly, Mr. Speaker, and it’s about affordability and availability of housing, especially on a rental side. Mr. Speaker, while the private sector and their investment is the ideal way to address this issue, we are seeing here in Yellowknife continuing upward pressure on rents and availability; and in a report that I heard on the...

Madam Chair, I move that we report progress.

Thank you. I think I have my answer there. The areas that I believe our corporation has not explored and that I would like to see some more action on, more investigation on, Mr. Speaker, are things like tax breaks to developers who create housing for lower and middle income people, and modest grants. I am not talking about something that is going to be a market disrupter, but I would like to see modest grants to developers for that area. Work with tax-based municipalities in order to help them afford some tax incentives for people, investors, to develop this kind of thing. That is where I...

So, Mr. Speaker, you know, northern leaders are very familiar and supportive and on side with aboriginal governments to do whatever can be done to help them achieve land claims and self-government. But you know, where we definitely seem to be at odds, as the Premier has said, is that some leaders are saying to slow down on devolution until we get land claims achieved. But you know, I don’t hear the mines slowing their production down. I don’t know if the pipeline and the oil and gas guys are slowing their production down.

The resources are leaving the Northwest Territories. They will not be...

Merci, Mr. Speaker. My question this afternoon is for the Premier and it’s a follow-up to my statement regarding the status of devolution talks for the resources of the Northwest Territories. Last week, Mr. Speaker, the Premier was quoted in northern media as saying -- and this was in response to the announcement of a pipeline regulatory filing -- “The pipeline won’t come at the expense of our children’s future. We don’t want to see northerners not getting a fair share.” I applaud the Premier’s statement and his statement of his vision which I share.

My question for the Premier, Mr. Speaker, is...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. To continue on the social side of that ledger, battered and abused women and their children used emergency shelters at a rate eight times the national average in the year 2001-2002, and yet this Legislature is struggling with how to trim our budget by $20 million in each of the next two years. In the meantime, over those same two years, Ottawa will reap in excess of an estimated $350 million from our resources. What’s wrong with this picture? Are we destined to be only a cash cow for the federal treasury while our people catch only a few crumbs of precious resources as...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you to the Premier. My final question is if we have a discussion and negotiation process underway, then does our government have a mandate that is brought to this negotiation? Would the Premier be able to release that mandate? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the Premier for the answer, but there’s really not much substance to this. We have had discussions and talks going on, we have meetings arranged and some of them are yet to come, some of them are cancelled. Where is the process? Where is the mechanism by which we’re going to see devolution achieved? I would refer to the process that the federal government engaged in over the last four years and spent considerable money -- in the millions -- to help lift this process off the ground. But I don’t hear from the Premier that there’s actually anything happening right now other...