Kevin O'Reilly

Merci, Monsieur le President. My question is for the Minister of Lands about the slow progress outlining these planning outside areas covered by land rights agreements. Land use planning has been taking place in the Deh Cho for more than 20 years now. The last raised issue almost a year ago with the Premier in this House.

I'm not looking for excuses anymore but solutions and timelines. Can the Minister tell us the current status of the Deh Cho land use plan and why our government is holding it up. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Mahsi, Monsieur le President. I move, seconded by the Member for Kam Lake, that Minister's statement 16119(2) regarding Emerging Stronger: Planning NWT Social and Economic Recovery be referred to Committee of the Whole for consideration. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Merci, Monsieur le President. Now, I'm getting somewhere. This is great. No, seriously, though, I do appreciate that the Minister's willing to review the situation and she's going to get back to me in writing. So I appreciate that very much.

When I had an earlier exchange with her on this issue and I was told that, quote, from the Minister, "The YZF regional airport manager is continuing discussions in an effort to find a solution to alleviate the apparent challenge with these lease payments", that's great. But I'm not sure what else we can do besides prorate or reduce the fees.

But can the...

Merci, Monsieur le President. That's great to hear the passenger traffic is increasing, but I didn't actually get a response to my question, as usual, Mr. Speaker. I asked for what kind of analysis was done before the waivers were rescinded as of January 1st.

But while these fees are significant for taxi drivers and their companies, I'm not sure that they're a vital revenue source for this Government.

Can the Minister tell us how many dollars were collected by charging the airport taxi stand licence fees at the Yellowknife airport and at all airports across the NWT in the last year and then the...

Mahsi, Monsieur le President. Further on the theme of the pandemic, we all know that COVID19 has had impacts on small businesses and questions persist about how this government can help operators get through the hard times. The taxi industry is a prime example and I have a specific ask for how this government can help.

With the collapse of the tourism industry and discouragement of nonessential travel, the volume of airline traffic has dramatically shrunk. Air Canada is out of Yellowknife market entirely. WestJet is on reduced service passenger volumes and other air carriers are way down as...

Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that information. It's interesting that these fees were only charged in Yellowknife, and it's only $45,000. I don't know why we can't do something about this. But, of course, we all look forward to the day when the pandemic restrictions are lifted and that we can get tourism going again. But if we don't have a taxi industry, how are they going to be able to serve the tourists that arrive here.

So will the Minister give that service sector the relief that it needs now and reinstitute the waiver on or at least prorate the taxi stand...

Merci, Monsieur le President. My question is for the Minister of Infrastructure. Yellowknife taxi companies are looking for relief from airport taxi stand licence fees to get through the hard times. Can the Minister tell us what analysis, if any, was done on passenger traffic volumes before the decision was made to rescind the waiver on these fees as of January 1st, 2021. Merci, Mr. Speaker,.

Merci, Monsieur le Président. I want to thank the Minister for that. I really do hope that she gets back to us in the House about these questions soon and makes that kind of information available to the public, because as a Yellowknife MLA, I'm getting questions about this now.

So my last question, though, on this topic, Mr. Speaker unless I put up my hand for a third round is, you know, the cost of construction materials is going is escalating exponentially right now. A sheet of plywood has gone up at least three times in value.

What is our government doing now...

Merci, Monsieur le President. I don't think I got an answer to my question. Great to hear that there's going to be a GNWT team that goes and does this.

Do community governments, Indigenous governments, have the ability to hire their own experts, their own some of their own staff or staff that they already have in place, do the work, and then seek reimbursement from our government to move this along more quickly? Merci, Mr. Speaker.

Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that. I think he answered most of my last question.

I don't want to sound alarmist, but in my statement today, I expressed that back in 2003, I had doubts about these remediation standards that were developed by this government. I don't think that it was just a coincidence that residential guideline for arsenic was set marginally above the known measurements of arsenic in soils in the residential builtup areas of Yellowknife. So what assurance can the Minister provide to Yellowknifers that this is still a healthy...