Kevin O'Reilly

Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that but I was hoping for a few more steps in the public engagement. There's probably no doubt that critical minerals could play a positive contribution to greener energy technology to assist with the climate crisis but more work is needed on whether these minerals are the only or best solution. One of the questions at the workshop was whether we could mine our way out of the climate crisis. So I want to ask the Minister, can the Minister tell us what work has been done by this government as to whether we can mine our way out of...

Merci, Monsieur le President. My questions are for the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment. I want to thank her for the invitation that I got to the recent critical minerals workshop. I noted that the workshop was even mentioned in the Premier's sessional statement. Can the ITI commit to producing a public report from that workshop. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

I was scrambling looking for the motion about how to finish off the item we are on, but I think I have to move that the chair rise and report progress.

CHAIRPERSON (Ms. Semmler): Thank you. There's a motion on the floor to report progress. The motion is in order and nondebatable. All those in favour. Opposed. Motion is carried.

I will now rise and report progress.

Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that. I guess I will take it one step back. Does this government actually support the concept of participant funding in general for environmental assessment, and I'm hoping the Minister's actually going to say, yes. Thanks, Mr. Speaker.

Thanks, Madam Chair. Committee would like to consider Tabled Document 437-19(2): Capital Estimates 2022-2023. General comments Finance, Industry, Tourism and Investment, and Infrastructure. Thanks, Madam Chair.

Thanks. Maybe it's my total ignorance, then, about the Mackenzie Valley fibre link. I'd understood that there's some kind of P3 arrangement where Northwestel owns it and we're somehow or whether they were contracted to just build it, but I'd understood that we're somehow working with those guys to actually lease it out somehow or pay some sort of some sort of an arrangement, but we don't actually own the thing until 30 or 35 years or something down the road.

If we're paying $19 million for this 140 kilometer fibre link, why don't we own it outright and operate it ourselves rather than give it...

Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that. Clearly, people in Jean Marie River, particularly the Elders, like to be close to the rivers. That brings some risk with more extreme events which will increase with the climate crisis.

Can the Minister tell us whether there have been any discussions or plans to relocate or move some or all of the community of Jean Marie River, and what support is our government giving. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Thanks, Madam Chair. Thanks for that commitment because I've been asking for that since the start of this Assembly, and I was raising it as an issue in the last Assembly about the need for some kind of a roadmap for how all of this was going to work. I haven't seen anything. And I pay pretty close attention to this, as the Minister well knows. There has been no discussion of claim staking so far during the life of this Assembly in any venue that I've ever been engaged in or involved in. So I really do encourage that to start to take place in parallel with the development of this system.

I don't...

Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that response.

The community of Jean Marie River was particularly hard hit by flooding as we all know. Can the Minister tell us if and when the water treatment plant was put back into operation and what arrangements were made for clean water for the community before that. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Thanks, Madam Chair. Yeah, I'm not going to deal with where this is going. I'll deal with that when it comes to a sup.

What are we getting here for this? The reason why I'm raising this is in the last Assembly, we dealt with a lot of devolution legislation that we inherited. There was a lot of public registries set up. I know I've been critical of Department of Environment and Natural Resources in the past for their protected areas registry, the lack of information, the lack of rigor to it. But here we are spending $3.7 million on something for mining. And the other departments don't seem to...