Katrina Nokleby

Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, I do understand what the Minister and the deputy minister are saying. I actually do not recall ever having a conversation with the Minister about Taiga lab and my opinion on it, so I would like to just put that on the record. Whereas the ability to do short-term turnaround testing, there are other labs in town that do have the ability to do testing in town. I do understand that Taiga owns a specific piece of equipment, but it's not to say that others could not own that piece of equipment and such. As well, the sanitizer and the waste-water sampling could have been...

Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate that the deputy minister keeps answering my questions ahead of when I am actually going to ask them. That was going to be my next question. I do recognize there are a lot of different programs here, and I am happy to hear that we are trying to be innovative when it comes to fur and how we can use that for our economy. I am personally trying to do my best to support our arts program and their use of fur. Yes, I would just say more as a comment that I would support more line items increasing in this area. Thank you, Madam Chair. I am done.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I will just look at page 74. I am looking at the disaster compensation line of just $15,000. The actuals in 2019 were only $4,000. Obviously, that would be one that, I am sure, is dependent on what happens in that year. Given the situation that's happened with the high water levels this past year and potential for this situation to occur in the upcoming years, do we anticipate that we are going to actually see more money needed here, or does the department think that any compensation that we provide will come under federal funding? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate the clerk responding to what was going to be my next question as to what was going to happen now that that wasn't going to happen. Can someone explain what this monument was for? Is this the one for the missing and murdered Indigenous women? Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm just looking at page 15 at the capital area development fund, contribution I see that there was no contribution made in 2019-2020, but $50,000 for the last year or so. Just curious to know if Mr. Speaker or the Minister could speak to where this money was used and sort of maybe to the efficacy of it, how well it did? Thank you, Madam Chair.

May I suggest the formation of an outhouse committee, and then you could have an open-to-the-public naming contest for that committee. No further questions, Madam Chair.

Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair. That is good to hear, and I am hoping, like before, we are seeing things that are special to us as the territories versus having to be in the same realm as Quebec and Ontario with their over-the-top tourism sectors versus ours. I just wanted to talk to you quickly about the tourism infrastructure fund. Last year, that was a great idea for keeping some small projects going into small communities, employing local businesses, building I think it was kitchen shelters, picnic tables, and such. I note that there is no increase to that over the actuals from either of the...

Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes. I think that's all great, and while it's going to be painful for the next little while, while things are only virtual, I actually see this in the long run as opening up the Northwest Territories and access to international access. As my colleague from Kam Lake was saying earlier on, in the long run, we'll actually probably have more people participating in our forums when we can return to a normal sort of open venue. Just one last comment. Again, back to science, I like science; I like facts; and I want to invest more in this area because, just because you say...

Thank you, Madam Chair. First, I just want to comment that the Minister's description of what this section has done was excellent, and I couldn't have said it better myself. I just wanted to start off by saying that. I think, perhaps, the Minister actually just has a semantics problem, and if she takes the word "petroleum" out of the title of this section, she should no longer have the problems. I am actually really excited to see the funding in this area because this is science. This is the scientists. As well, I've had the opportunity to spend time in the Inuvik office and see what they do...

Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate the deputy minister's comments around the collaboration. When I hear the Minister commenting that it's ENR, it's health, you know. I'm assuming and hoping it's getting to a point where someone is going to take ownership of the program because I do think that we don't want to end up in a situation where some of our social programs, it's: who does it belong to? I see the Minister nodding along yes to that, so I'll just do that one as a comment.

Back to the arts program and arts funding, I've mentioned this around other programs in different departments, but...