Bob Bromley

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In the specific case I have in the back of my mind, the person had considerable experience: over a decade and a half in mental health and addictions. It seems to me it should be appropriate and should be easily slotted in. I’m wondering why we continue to hire even short-term locums from afar when we could be building the experience of our graduates here.

The Minister did acknowledge that more needs to be done. I’d like to hear exactly what is being done, then, to address that need.

I probably don’t need to state that the role of nurses is particularly enhanced when they are from the community and bring the local and cultural understanding and sometimes even linguistic services to their work. Is this fully appreciated by our health managers, and what is being done to ensure that this appreciation shows itself in the hiring practices?

Mr. Speaker, our northern graduate nurses are choosing to leave the North. I would like to profile the experience of one of my constituents.

As a recent graduate of the nursing program at Aurora College in Yellowknife, she enjoyed considerable support throughout her training. Yet upon graduation she found that the reality is that there are not enough positions to satisfy the employment needs of our graduates. Furthermore, positions appear to be being filled not on the basis of qualifications or affirmative action policies but rather on perhaps who one knows in the system.

This person, who...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It all sounds delightful. I’m wondering how soon this can get off the ground and if there’s a way we can be sure that this side of the House will have lots of input into that process.

Mr. Speaker, this sort of policy is obviously short-sighted. It ignores the fact that we’re having a lot of problems with our food and water but especially with our water. How can we be treating pristine examples that we have here, these resources, in this manner?

I’m interested in what the holistic approach, the broad strategy, of this government is to address the whole way we are treating the environment and how we’re going to pull ourselves into the New Age.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Lakes across Canada, including the Northwest Territories, face being turned into mine dump sites under federal legislation. CBC reports that 16 Canadian lakes are slated to be officially but quietly reclassified as toxic dump sites for mines. This process amounts to a hidden subsidy to mining companies, allowing them to get around laws against the destruction of fish habitats.

Under the Fisheries Act it’s illegal to put harmful substances into fish-bearing waters. But under a little known subsection known as Schedule 2 of the Mining Effluent Regulations, federal...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have to say, as well, that it’s been a privilege to participate in helping to develop this budget. I think there are various perspectives on how much I’ve participated, but I certainly agreed with the Premier in the direction that we set off with, our visions and goals and so on, basically living within our means and, I think, facing up to the fact that we have some new realities coming. We need to respond to those. The more we can respond to those progressively and with good thinking, the better off all our people will be. I’m not convinced that a budget of $1.4...

Mr. Speaker, clearly we have many governments in the North. If people have been following the water conferences that have been happening in Fort Smith and Fort St. John and so on, there is major interest and major concern, especially in the area of water.

How are we going to ensure that all these responsibilities...? It’s getting to be a complex system out there, where there are various mandates and so on. Who is going to play a lead role in getting all these people together and on one page to effect the systemic change that we need to address these issues?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my statement I mentioned the short-sighted policy of turning fish-bearing lakes into mine tailings dumps. I’m wondering if the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources is aware of this and, if he is, if he’s trying to influence the federal government on this policy. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I rise today to support language diversity in the Northwest Territories.

There is so much that’s embodied in a language: ways of being, ways of knowing, incredible understanding, a whole framework for the way the world works.

Mr. Speaker, I was facilitating a workshop in Whati with elders and youth a number of years ago, and I finally realized they all spoke the Tlicho language, except for me. So I said, “Why don’t you guys go ahead?” and they did. But at the end the elders told me it was sad they didn’t speak strong Dogrib and didn’t understand the layers of...