Mr. Speaker, I’d like to follow up on my Member’s statement earlier today with the Minister of Housing.

The fuel spills that are occurring in N’dilo and Dettah as a result of the aging fuel tanks are costing us a lot — two incidents, 160,000-some dollars, over $80,000 per incident — and it’s probably a couple of thousand dollars to replace the tanks.

Under the old SDPMI program, the Yellowknives Dene could replace the tanks and be reimbursed by the Housing Corporation, but under the CARE program it has to be approved ahead of time. This has proved onerous. This has been brought up with the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In 2006 two fuel spills occurred in the community of N’dilo as a result of old leaking fuel tanks at the private residences of elders. Neither of these elders had house insurance, and the Yellowknife Dene First Nation now faces a bill of $163,000 to remediate the spill.

These spills could easily have been prevented, which makes the environmental and financial costs that much more regrettable. The Yellowknife Dene First Nation has been in contact with the Housing Corporation on two separate occasions over eight months and has not received a formal response to the request...

That’s good for now.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just want to follow up on the Thomas Simpson and Bompas Elementary schools in Fort Simpson. I know there were discussions about a pellet boiler being considered for replacement there. Has a decision been made yet on that project?

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just want to make a brief comment on the K’alemi Dene School project, which is scheduled for completion this year.

I was down at an event at that school on Friday with the Minister of ITI and can certainly testify that the current school is brimming over with young little people. So it will be very good to see this project completed this year. I’m just wondering if there is a schedule for when K’alemi Dene School will be completed and ready for occupancy.

That’s good news. I can’t help but observe that we’re dealing with the symptoms first here rather than the cause. I think it’s always important to consider that climate change is the cause of many of these things that are draining our capital dollars away, so the more we get on with the mitigation side around the world…. I know we’re working to play our part here.

I also appreciate the water heating idea; I think that’s very good. Obviously, this building does present challenges, and that’s part of what I’m happy to hear we’re grappling with, because that’s a real situation that many of our...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and thank you very much to the Minister for that commitment. This, again, is very costly all around if we don’t act. These are disasters waiting to happen. Rather than fiddling while Rome burns, I’d like to see some action. Does the Minister agree that this is an appropriate role for the Housing Corporation to play and that they have a responsibility under these programs to do this?

Mr. Speaker, thank you for those comments from the Minister. That, too, is my understanding, and that’s the starting point for this discussion here. The Yellowknives Dene have raised this issue, as I said, over the past eight months on behalf of these elders who are low income private homeowners. Has the department assessed their tanks, and have you developed a schedule to replace those tanks according to the expression of concern and the tens of thousands of dollars this is costing both the Yellowknives Dene Nation and us?

Thank you, Minister, for those remarks. Often at the hospital, in the emergency rooms there, because the way locks are on the doors and so on, it can lead to very dangerous situations for the medical staff. I am assuming all that is being addressed in the design of this space. Is that correct?

I recognize the points the Minister has raised. Often these dollars are so large that I wonder. A lot of data management now gets outsourced to other countries, even other continents. I would ask that the Minister always look for opportunities to hire people locally and deal with some of this information manually. Given that we often are dealing with relatively modest sample sizes and the numbers to actually deal with it, we perhaps don’t need these Cadillac systems for all of those data management needs.