Frieda Martselos

Thank you, Madam Chair. I don't think either one of you has answered my question. I said, is it going to be by need, or is it going to be by per capita, the $5 million distributed?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today I want to talk once again about the Fort Smith Regional Airport, to expand on the points that I raised last week. I felt that the answers I received from the Minister of Infrastructure were not clear or concise.

Mr. Speaker, I am told that, as a result of the narrowed runway, it is now more difficult to land planes in poor weather. As well, the new runway lights were placed on the pavement, which has made them more vulnerable to being struck by incoming and outgoing aircraft, whereas other airport runways across the NWT have their lights placed off the pavement top...

Madam Chair, I just want to make sure that I just wanted to say that this is an excellent priority. I think, when the decision-making was taken away from regions and communities, our people in the communities and regions do not want to come to headquarters for decisions. They would like to have those decisions made at their level. I think that's an excellent move, and, on behalf of all of us here, when we made this priority, I want to thank everybody in the room for that. Thank you so much.

I'm sorry, Madam Premier, but I'm just so passionate about this whole issue. It's just the concept. I said the AIP. We do AIPs all the time. It doesn't have to be AIP. It could be an MOU saying that we are going to be doing some of these things, and we are going to implement this. We have 19 or 20 or 33, I think it's 33, First Nations or Indigenous groups in the territories. I don't know exactly how many there are, but there are more than that. We get them to sign that we're going to end up doing this, at least have something so that people have an understanding that we're going to do this. If...

Putting the onus on Indigenous governments, on the leadership of Indigenous governments to move this forward is not acceptable. Leadership by the Government of the Northwest Territories to move this forward is acceptable. If you are going to wait for the Indigenous governments and you're going to divide and conquer, it's never going to happen. We have to make sure that we show leadership to ensure that this passes. Why can't we at least do something in the meantime, and you do AIP's for agreements in principle. Why don't we have an agreement-in-principle to implement the United Nations...

The settle and implementation treaty, land, resources, and self-government agreements is extremely important for the development of the Northwest Territories. We all talk very loosely in our discussions around the table of ensuring that Indigenous rights are respected, Indigenous people are looked after. We have to sort of walk the talk.

I am very passionate about the subject. I am going to go back to the two outstanding. One implementation is the Salt River claim, the outstanding claim of the NWT Metis Nation within my area, and the Dehcho claim, the Akaitcho claim. I mean we could go on and...

It's okay to talk, but I want to see it in writing. I think it's very important that it's written, a letter is written on behalf of the reserves, both reserves including Salt River, that the development of the reserve of the water and sewer in the lift station is supported at Salt River. Hay River has water and sewer on their reserve, but we don't. It's a new reserve, and that's part of the implementation of the reserve. There are no lots available for building houses. It's a very important part of their development, and I think that we have to ensure that happens. It's a great asset, not only...

I don't have anything written because I think I can speak from the cuff. I know that the 22 priorities were put together by all of the Members of this Assembly. I may not agree with some of it, just like some other Members, but I want to stress some of the things that are dear to my heart and some of the things that I think sometimes people talk very loosely about, the Aboriginal and Indigenous people of the North.

As a former leader for 10 years, I think that the settlement and the implementation of the outstanding land claims must be a priority if we are going to move forward. I feel that...

It was noted last summer by Northwestern Air Lease that the Electra water bomber now has to taxi all the way to the end of the runway in order to turn around, thus delaying fire suppression activities. Was this risk factor taken into account when the decision was made to narrow the airport runway?

So it's not by need; it's by per capita?