David Krutko

There’s not too much to say. I know the Minister has the information that I mentioned. There is that documentation that I can probably table here in the House, which illustrates the 126 elders in Fort McPherson from the age of 60 to 97. I think, if you’re talking demographics, that’s definitely showing you that almost 20 percent of the population in Fort McPherson is within that category. I think that is a large number and I think even the Gwich’in Tribal Council and the organization in Inuvik were surprised when they realized the number of seniors that we do have in Fort McPherson. With that...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. In regard to the area of community health nursing, I know you’ve heard me many, many times talk about the nursing situation in Tsiigehtchic and I think that there’s motions passed, like I said, in the Gwich’in assemblies, passed in the Dene assemblies and this issue has always been an issue in regards to the health and the well-being of the community.

Like I stated earlier, if you look at the budgets going back to 1998-99, prior to division, if you look at all the smaller communities, you can see the amounts of dollars that were spent in regard to the different care, from...

With that, I’d like to move a motion and suggest that they consider Fort McPherson for a permanent long-term care facility, in light of the 120 seniors we have over the age of 60. I can state that there is a definite need. Mr. Chair, I’d like to move a motion.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to recognize the chief from Inuvik, Herb Blake, and also the president of the Gwich’in Development Corporation. Welcome, Herb.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I think that these community health programs, especially when it comes to the aging population in the Northwest Territories, which we are realizing, I know, from comments from the Minister, which stipulated that the elders population is almost 50 percent and increased over the last number of years. I can vouch for that on the basis of my home community in which they did a study to see exactly how many elders were from Fort McPherson and they counted 126 elders between the ages of 60 and 97 years old.

I think it shows that we do have a large number of...

One of the main components of the land claim agreements is that we knew at some point we were going to come to this situation. In the future, going forward, under the land claim agreements there’s a section that talks about the total allowable harvest that has to be considered before you make a decision to take anyone’s harvesting rights away. There is a certain process of who gets excluded first, second, third, fourth, but the last person that you exclude is the aboriginal harvester in those authority areas. Has this government done an evaluation regarding the allowable harvest levels in this...

Just on that, I know we have had some challenges in collecting from different organizations, territories, in regard to Nunavut, we’ve had challenges collecting from the federal government. So how successful are we in collecting from those jurisdictions when we submit an invoice in regard to those individuals who come here from other jurisdictions? Have we been paid or are there any outstanding amounts that are out there that we should know of? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Following up on my statement earlier, the main estimate in regards to managing wildlife in the Northwest Territories is no longer the Government of the Northwest Territories. It is the Wildlife Boards which have been established under land claim agreements. For those areas where there are no land claim agreements, they still have the right under National Resources Agreements with Ottawa to ensure their fundamental rights are there.

Mr. Speaker, I also want to follow up on questions from my colleague Mr. Menicoche. He mentioned certain sections. Is there a specific...

Yes.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I seek unanimous consent to conclude my statement.

---Unanimous consent granted.