Bob Bromley

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to follow up on my colleague Mr. Yakeleya’s questions. I see our water use fee is $80,000. That’s incredibly low, given the use of this public resource. As Mr. Yakeleya said, 10 billion litres of water at Norman Wells by Imperial Esso. We know, in fact, that that will be put to shame, in terms of the amount, very quickly by the activity with fracking, which is a very, very intensive water use.

Letting industry use these resources at this rate is an incredible subsidy. It’s an environmental subsidy, but it’s much costlier than some; for example, $15 million in the...

The Greenhouse Gas Strategy is great, but it seems to have been a document we can park on the shelf. These guys are out there assessing and monitoring and doing on-the-ground work, so it would be obviously good and appropriate and I’m sure the Minister agrees, so I will look forward to that.

The last one is on the ecological representation network, the Protected Areas Strategy work and a lot of this has been put on hold by the department, apparently waiting for the development of northern tools. What are those northern tools and when will we see them?

That’s all I had. I just wanted to make sure that we have that commitment. I know the Minister would agree that a Giant Mine would not be something that this government could handle casually as the federal government is.

Thanks to the Minister for that reminder. I always forget about those services. My last question is just on the maintenance side of things. So, the maintenance deficit, I see we’re continuing with our investments in that area. It seems appropriate to me. Have we been making any progress, or what is our O and M maintenance deficit these days? I know we’re doing additional work on the infrastructure side. Thank you.

Thank you. We’re getting there. I appreciate the Minister’s comments. I would say the world has balanced itself into a box, a boxed canyon if you will, and I guess I’d ask if the Minister would agree with that on many issues. So, it’s all in that expression of balancing. We have balanced ourselves to death in many cases and we know that we’re losing species at an untold rate and so on.

The Minister notes that we’re responsible for assessing, monitoring, mitigating impacts of development on our forests, water, as well as wildlife habitat, but he doesn’t mention the climate and that’s probably...

Mr. Chairman, thanks for that information. Will greenhouse gasses be part of the monitoring and assessment work that goes on with the projects? Is that now automatic in consideration of projects? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I want to just follow up a little bit on the tail end of our conversation, the Minister and myself, through you, our Chair. I asked about would the Minister consider implementing a mechanism that’s in the Greenhouse Gas Strategy, and that’s a renewable energy portfolio, a mechanism whereby we would require industry, new industry, for example, to start providing some basic minimal amount of their energy needs through renewable energy. The Minister responded, noting that he is spending many millions of dollars. He has got many projects. He’s replacing boilers. He has a lot...

Maybe I can pursue this at another time. I’m interested in if we’re saving 13 million litres this year, what is that as a proportion of the total litres of fuel we’re consuming this year? That’s a statistic. I’m looking for both fuel and electricity if it is available.

With respect to devolution, I’m asking the departments to maybe explain the changes that they’re encountering as a result of devolution. How many new employees and what will the duties be that will be new as a result of devolution? I know some are going to be just expanding the TSC program; I recognize the need there. So if I...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So, I understand when the Minister references Northwest Territories boards, he’s referring to the federal boards. I know our Premier says we don’t have anything to do with federal boards, so I shouldn’t be talking like that, but in this case obviously we are the final decision-maker for recommendations from the water boards, such as the Mackenzie Land and Water Board. Is that correct?

Thank you for that information. Just on that, I’m sure the Minister is aware that in the last two audits, which were very good and comprehensive and thorough pieces of work, the recommendations where never followed up on by the federal government. Now we are the authority in most of these areas. Can we expect that the Minister will ensure that recommendations that come out of these environmental audits will be actually acted on and put in place? I think the 2010 audit repeated many of the things that were in the 2005 audit and I’m sure the same thing is going to happen in the next one. Thank...