Bob McLeod

Mr. Speaker, the Northwest Territories is being presented with an exciting opportunity to engage on northern priorities on both the national and international stage.

On May 13, 2013, Canada will be taking over chairmanship of the Arctic Council for a two-year term. The Arctic Council is a consensus-based, high-level intergovernmental forum that works to promote the social, environmental and economic aspects of sustainable development in the Arctic region. All eight circumpolar nations sit on the council and receive direct input from the six permanent participant organizations representing the...

I guess within the context of the 120 days that we are required to respond, that didn’t get us enough time to respond. I fully expect that within six months we should be able to respond.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. First of all with regard to the ombudsman office, we’re reviewing the legislative base rights as well as all of the different avenues there are currently for which people that have issues can have them addressed, and we will take what we find and we will see what is the best way forward we would go without reinventing the wheel. If we take that approach, it depends what kind of wheel we’re going to use as some of the wheels cost $900,000 and other wheels cost $10 million. So we would certainly look at finding out what we think has to be done, and if it means perhaps we...

Mr. Speaker, that is our plan. Ultimately, we will pull all of these strategies together. We have put in place the framework so that we can all work together. That is what we are trying to develop through Section 6 of the Devolution Agreement-in-Principle. We will have the benefit of all of these strategies that we will have input from all of the different sectors and stakeholders of the Northwest Territories and governments as well. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I had the opportunity to discuss Plan Nord with Premier Charest before the last election where he lost the election. We discussed the elements of Plan Nord. He was very excited about Plan Nord. He saw it as the way of the future. But in discussions with Premier Charest, it quickly became obvious to me that without devolution, and recognizing that Quebec is a province, unless we had control or we had the ability to make decisions on land and water and development of resources, it would be very difficult for us to implement something similar to Plan Nord. Also, we are...

I guess that will be based on some decision points that we will have to come to. I guess to me the most obvious one will be if we see fit to proceed with establishing an ombudsman office, would it be established as part of the Legislative Assembly or would it be an officer of the Legislative Assembly? If we make it as part of the government, that would be defeating some of the objectives that have been described in why we need an ombudsman office. I see some decision points that would have to be made. Also, if at $600,000, if that’s what Yukon is, and assuming we follow the Yukon model, where...

I guess those are the kinds of areas where we’re doing further analysis. I think there’s a number of avenues. I think the average citizen, if they’ve got a complaint, they usually phone their MLA or they’ll phone the Minister in charge or they’ll contact the Premier’s office. I guess there are other avenues like legal recourse and so on. So there’s a number of different avenues and I guess those are the kinds of things that we will be doing the analysis on, in addition to all of the best practices that we’ll be reviewing. Thank you.

Thank you. I guess that’s the rationale behind a number of these strategies, is that we want to make sure that industry and other potential investors know that we’re a responsible, mature government that can make decisions, and that we will have a very smooth transition through devolution and that they will have a very clear understanding of where we’re coming from in areas like minerals development, economic development, the land use and sustainability frameworks amongst others. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, this is something that we are working on from a number of fronts. First and foremost, we are working with our Aboriginal government partners, obviously, on devolution. We have been able to develop an Aboriginal Engagement Strategy where we are working very well with our Aboriginal governments. I think that we are starting to develop a common vision and understanding for going forward in the North.

As a government, we have a host of strategies that we are working on, including the Economic Opportunity Strategy, a Minerals Development Strategy and the Transportation Strategy. We are...

Mr. Speaker, on September 12th negotiations towards a Deline Final Self-Government Agreement reached a significant milestone. After many years, the negotiators have agreed on the draft text of a Final Self-Government Agreement and financial agreement. This achievement is important as it lays the basis for the parties to ratify the final agreement. As Mr. Yakeleya noted when this was announced last month, the move towards self-government complements the Sahtu Comprehensive Dene and Metis Land Claim and gives Deline the opportunity to make their own history.

Mr. Speaker, this government’s goal of...