Bob McLeod

Like my colleagues have mentioned, this is a very serious issue not to be taken lightly and I’ve listened very carefully to what everybody has said on both sides. Like everybody here, I’m very proud and honoured to be an MLA. I’m also proud and honoured to serve my constituents for the past 16 months. I have been proud and honoured to work with my colleagues on both sides of the floor. I’ve been proud to work with GNWT staff both here in headquarters and up and down the valley. Their efforts are crucial to our success and I applaud them all.

The past several months have been challenging for all...

We want to work with the standing committees and we also want to get out very quickly so we can find a way to come up with a revised investment policy that’s transparent, that meets everybody’s requirements, because we’d like to get this money out there and working. So we’ll get out there quickly to get it to the stage whereby we can get the money working. We definitely want to work with the Members.

Certainly, we’re very pleased and we want to continue to work with the committees. One of the things that we’ve looked at is investing the money in the government business programs. This is another area that we can look at, recognizing that the loans programs that we have with the government, there’s a loss ratio of about 14 to 20 percent loss, which we have to come to this Assembly to write off, so we take that into consideration.

We’d be very pleased to continue to work with the standing committees. We also have the Ministerial Advisory Panel on the Economy that we will be consulting with on...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a very long list. I don’t know if everybody is still here, but I’d like to start by recognizing the executive director of the NWT Tourism, Mr. Jerry Laprieur; the executive director of the NWT Chamber of Commerce, Mr. John Curran; the president of the Yellowknife Chamber of Commerce, Mr. Jon Jaque; the president of Canadian North, Tracy Medve; vice-president Kelly Kaylo from Canadian North as well. I’d like to recognize Gord Clarke, the treasurer of NWT Chamber of Mines. Constituents: I have Anne Juneau, constituent of Yellowknife South; Gayla Wick, constituent...

The loan that we’re talking about is a northern company that we’ve invested in. We’re very pleased to and what we are trying to do is use that fund for that. We would be very pleased to work with the committee to do exactly that.

I should point out that the Opportunities Fund is funded through the Immigrant Investment Program and the $400,000 that was invested by the immigrants has to be repaid within five years. The type of investments that we think would work best are companies that can pay a fairly high rate of interest, that can pay it all back within a five-year period. Also, the federal...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We would like to work very closely with the committee as well. I’ve written to the chair of the standing committee and advised her of our decision on the most recent proposal, and indicated to her that we will be working with the committee and whatever other parties that we feel should be consulted with to develop investment policies and revised procedures. Thank you.

Thank you. I’d like to recognize my wife, Melody, of 35 years, and my oldest grandson who turned five on Monday and he’s not here because it’s his birthday present, we’re just trying to get him started early. Also, some relatives and friends from Fort Providence: Irene Lafferty, Chief Berna Landry, elders Danny Squirrel and Sam Elleze. My Yellowknife South constituent Gayla Wick, and a long-time colleague, Floyd Adlem.

Thank you. I’d like to recognize my wife, Melody, of 35 years, and my oldest grandson who turned five on Monday and he’s not here because it’s his birthday present, we’re just trying to get him started early. Also, some relatives and friends from Fort Providence: Irene Lafferty, Chief Berna Landry, elders Danny Squirrel and Sam Elleze. My Yellowknife South constituent Gayla Wick, and a long-time colleague, Floyd Adlem.

Mr. Speaker, management of the public service is a shared responsibility with all departments. We do have a deputy ministers’ human resource committee, and we’ll make sure that all of the departments are aware of this.

Mr. Speaker, it doesn’t sound like it’s a summer student issue; it sounds like it’s a government operations issue. Certainly one of the initiatives of our government is to work on making our operations a lot more effective and efficient, including the reduction and elimination of wasteful practices.