David Ramsay

The Department of ITI will be working in concert with my colleague Minister Miltenberger at ENR to develop that plan as we move forward, get the information to committee and hand it out to the public as well. The Member can look forward to us working collaboratively with Members and committee on moving this effort forward so that people are better educated about what fracking is. Thank you.

Madam Chair, I thank the Member for that. Certainly options and different ideas all come with a price tag. Like I said earlier, we are going to be really challenged fiscally to deliver on the projects that we have in front of us. We are going to be looking for money anywhere we can find it. Again, I think, when we are discussing mitigating opportunities on greenhouse gas on a project like the Tuk-Inuvik highway, we need to ensure that we are taking everything into consideration. I think that can happen. Again, I thank the Member for that. I look forward to further discussions on this as we...

We are fully intent on the project being complete in the fall of 2012. I wouldn’t speculate on it happening any other way. I think that is the intent. We are going to try to ensure that the project is complete and traffic is moving across that bridge in the fall of 2012. That is our game plan and we are going to try to stick to that. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate the Member’s comments. Obviously the Detah access road is an important item for the Member and we have provided, I believe, a $6 million program there. There are more needs for that road. We’ve got about I believe it’s between $500,000 and $700,000, and a little bit of carry-over for about a half-kilometre of work that’s left on that road. But going forward, I think, again, funding and finding sources of funding to carry out the remaining portions of work on the Detah access road is going to be something that’s important and we will need to find other...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The tolls were meant to pay for the bridge over the life of the bridge, being 35 years. It will be charged against trucks carrying freight north. There would be no toll on trucks going south but only coming north. That was the idea behind that toll. Thank you.

Certainly having the Deh Cho Bridge opened will mean I’m not taking calls from local businesspeople when water levels or ice in the river causes the Merv Hardie ferry to be put on the sideline and unavailable. That causes businesses here in Yellowknife and other communities north of that river crossing hardship. It causes consumers hardship. If you even look back to I believe it was two years ago, there was a fuel shortage here in Yellowknife. Just recently there were many bare shelves in stores across Yellowknife. It’s going to be a thing of the past once the bridge is constructed.

There are...

Thank you, Madam Chair. I certainly appreciate the Member’s question. We didn’t provide a dollar amount during my Minister’s statement earlier today. The amount is to roughly 5 percent of the total project cost.

It is my responsibility and the department’s responsibility to move the project forward with an eye to minimize any further costs associated with the project. There are some issues that may come up that are out of our control, but certainly anything under our control and guidance, like I said, costs are going to be closely looked at, and I can assure the Member that going forward we are...

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and I appreciate the Member’s remarks. Obviously we have worked really hard as a government to maintain an excellent system of parks here in the Northwest Territories. It is through ongoing effort that we improve the parks on an annual basis. We certainly look forward to working with the Members here in the 17th Legislative Assembly to ensure that our park system is maintained and it is a system that we can all be proud of.

Now, the Member talks about parks in the Sahtu region. First and foremost, our efforts are focused now on the Canol Heritage Trail and Doi...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wish to table the following document, entitled “NWT Business Development and Investment Corporation 2010-2011 Annual Report.” Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, please, Mr. Chairman.