Jackie Jacobson

Mr. Speaker, it’s my honour and privilege to recognize Ms. Jean Gruben, one of my constituents from Tuktoyaktuk, in the House.

Mr. Speaker, I’d like to recognize my sister in the gallery today, Judy Payne.

Mr. Speaker and colleagues, today I will support the second reading, only because of the debate and the opportunity that I’ll have a chance to.... There are a few good things in my riding that’ll be coming out of this. There is the access road for my community of Tuk. These are little problems in the south which are big problems in the smaller communities. Access to gravel: we haven’t had gravel in five years. Water source: there is a water shortage in my community right now. Sewage lagoon: decanting problems earlier and earlier every year because the community’s.... Our graveyard’s full. We...

Mr. Speaker, in my Member’s statement I asked the Minister of Health about my x-ray machine in the community of Tuk, if she could look into the problem and get back to me early next week and let me know how much longer this will affect my community.

The committee also wishes to point out that the re-establishment of training and certification for aboriginal languages interpreter-translator programs would be an important step towards language terminology standardization, which is a vital aspect of language revitalization.

Committee recommendation: The Standing Committee on Government Operations recommends that the GNWT implement and plan training and certification of interpreters and translators and establish a registry of interpreters and translators for all official languages.

The Standing Committee on Accountability and Oversight tabled...

Mr. Speaker, today I’d like to bring up a problem that we’ve been having in our community of Tuktoyaktuk since February of this year. Our x-ray machine has been broken down. The residents have to fly to Inuvik to get an x-ray done, and that’s not acceptable in this day and age. We have to get a timeline on when that machine will be brought back to town. I’ll have questions for the Minister at the appropriate time.

Mr. Speaker, I’d like to thank the Minister of Justice, Mr. Jackson Lafferty, and the RCMP staff for working with me and the Hamlet of Sachs Harbour to get the detachment opened up. The two members in the community now are there on duty as we speak and serving the people of Sachs. I welcome them to Nunakput. And, again, thank you to the Minister and the community of Sachs for not giving up on this issue. I would like to thank the mayor, Bob Eldridge, and Andy Carpenter Sr. for all the hard work they have done.

Mr. Speaker, what is the role of the federal government with respect to the construction of new roads in the N.W.T? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, when I was the mayor of Tuktoyaktuk, and since elected to represent Nunakput, I have continued to press the government to recognize the critical need to get going on construction of the access road to Tuktoyaktuk’s Gravel Source 177.

Mr. Speaker, this road is required for several reasons. The extensive granular resources at source 177 are required to support municipal infrastructure to Tuktoyaktuk instead of relying on expensive transport to pour in materials on the winter roads from sources near Inuvik. The road will allow Tuktoyaktuk residents and businesses to access employment...

Mr. Speaker, given that the road to the Arctic coast is a priority of this government, the federal government has the responsibility for new roads in the N.W.T. Now we have access to federal infrastructure funds for N.W.T. transportation and municipal projects. Can the Minister please commit to looking at work that we could include under the agreement to initiate the priority of a section of my access road into source 177? Thank you.