Bob Bromley

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise to recognize just a few of the amazing artists of the Weledeh riding, knowing that this exercise simply reflects the incredibly talented people that can be found throughout the Northwest Territories in every one of our ridings. In doing so, I hope to underscore the important role and mentorship these people have in strengthening our community and northern spirit, our social relationships and our economy.

I’d like to start with mentioning visual artists in Dettah/N’dilo: Henry Beaulieu, Peter Mitchell, Alex Betsina. Craftspeople and artisans in Dettah: Paul...

Okay; I’d like to call Committee of the Whole to order. We have before us Minister’s Statement 80-16(2), sessional statement. What is the wish of committee? Mrs. Groenewegen.

Mr. Speaker, I believe that when the Premier was Minister of Finance, he made a commitment to look into getting some of these windfall profits that are happening from oil resources of the Northwest Territories as the price of oil has soared. The federal government is now accumulating hundreds of millions of dollars, for example, from Norman Wells. Is that going to be in or has it entered into this process? Will that be profiled? Is this an opportunity to deal with that situation so we get some immediate gain here?

Mr. Speaker, I would like to continue on this theme of devolution and resource sharing negotiations. I want to start by just noting that where there is a vacuum — that is, no information — false information will be developed. So it would be nice to get those vacuums filled.

My first concern is aboriginal governments. Like it or not, we do share governance with them. Which aboriginal governments and claimant groups were contacted by the Premier, and what was their response in this round?

The extra time reflects the many artists we have: Tracy Riley, Azure Degrow and Stephen Kakfwi are a few of the well known Weledeh musicians. Our talented photographers include Tessa Macintosh, Fran Hurcomb, Alex Beaudin and Ozgur Culha, to name a few. Christine Bourqe is known for her unique and original fur garment designs. We have Inuit sculptors, potters, jewellry makers, graphic artists, writers such as Jamie Bastedo, who has written many books of various sorts.

Mr. Speaker, our amazing artist community contributes to quality of life and plays a key role in attracting and retaining...

I’m hoping that this side of the House will be able to see the results of that exercise too. Is the Minister looking into revenue options that were not in the revenue options paper? Are his officials looking into other options perhaps as a result of the round table? If so, what are they?

Great. Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and thanks again to the Minister for those comments. Again, I just want to stress that the experience in other jurisdictions is that when they tried to do this sort of thing, they’ve had to go through a long process because of the unreasonable requirements that initially come out of the utilities. It’s just sort of a heads up and an opportunity for us to expedite the system in an efficient way by dealing with that.

Maybe I’ll just ask if the Minister would be willing to at least be aware of that and be keen should the opportunity come up to deal with that issue...

Thanks for those comments. I think that if the Minister were to look into this, the process actually began a number of years before that. I wonder if I could find out exactly where we’re at right now and when we can expect the capability for this operationally to be in place.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There are myriad ways we can build our local economies, provide opportunities for jobs in our communities and reduce environmental impacts of energy generation. One effective way is to provide for net metering. This is the chance for residents to generate their own power from renewable energy and to be connected to the power grid so they can contribute power when they have excess and draw power when they need it.

This issue has been before the Public Utilities Board for several years, and the Power Corporation has been asked to provide the option for this service. I...

Thanks.