Kevin O'Reilly

Thanks, Madam Chair. Yeah, I want to commend the chair and members of the committee, that included myself, for the hard work that went into this. We had a lot of support in getting these presenters before us and in compiling the report. And, you know, why is this important? You know, our government has assumed tens of millions of dollars of unnecessary public liabilities as a result of measures that were not taken to prevent contaminated sites. And, you know, the biggest one is just, you know, five or seven kilometres down the road here, the Giant Mine, where our government is now contributing...

Merci, Monsieur le President. My questions are for the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment.

I outlined some concerns with the recent socioeconomic forum held in December. I received several commitments that this would be an inclusive event. Those promises were not kept. How can we get everyone on board to improve benefit retention when the Minister continues to exclude key players like Aurora College, NGOs, and the NWT Association of Communities. Can the Minister explain why the participants included only GNWT staff, the mining industry, and a few Indigenous government staff at this...

Merci, Monsieur le President. I move that the chair rise and report progress.

Merci, Monsieur le President. I'm well on record as to the systemic issues with ITI's approach on public engagement on the mining regulations, and this has been repeated again with this disconnected socioeconomic program review. The command control model for public engagement and regulatory capture are alive and well in this department, as proven again by this event.

So can the Minister tell us what she is doing to ensure public participation in the development of resource management legislation and regulations and the decisionmaking itself? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that. You can't call it a forum when you purposefully exclude some parties; I just don't get it. But there was a very large, and no doubt expensive, report commissioned on socioeconomic agreements and was released only after this event with no public fanfare. It clearly shows that our current approach is failing to secure and retain benefits.

So can the Minister explain why that report was not or why the people that did the report didn't present it at the forum; why it was only released after the event; and why there's been no news...

Merci, Monsieur le President. I attended a socio-economic forum on December 5th, 2022 put on by the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment as part of its work to review socio-economic agreements. The GNWT has six such agreements in place covering large resource development projects. These negotiated arrangements provide for commitments around employment, training, contracting, monitoring, northern preferences, and more in unenforceable agreements which are apparently the main tool for benefit retention. These agreements could become legal requirements for larger mining projects that...

Merci, Monsieur le President. I wish to table the following three documents: 2022 Mineral Resources Act Regulations Targeted Engagement Surveys for Prospecting License Holders; the second one, Mineral Resources Act Implementation Engagement Tracking Log dated November 25th, 2022; the last one, Mr. Speaker, a letter from Kevin O'Reilly, MLA, on Public Participation in Resource Management to the Ministers of Environment and Natural Resources; Industry, Tourism and Investment; and Lands, dated January 13th, 2023. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Merci, Monsieur le President. I accept that, and of course I'm a little bit excited but, you know, it's question period. I don't actually expect to get answers. But aside from that recent onehour public discussion with Alternatives North on socioeconomic agreements at the invitation of the organization and ITI wouldn't actually allow the event to be recorded I'm not aware of any public engagement on this massive report that the department commissioned.

So can the Minister tell us whether there will be any public engagement on the socioeconomic agreement program review in the report? Mahsi, Mr...

Merci, Monsieur le President. My question is for the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources.

The Department conducted a fiveweek public engagement on a new Forest Act that concluded on December 28, 2022. No report on that work has been released to date. The summary of policy intentions document made no mention of a public registry or what information would be made publicly available. To better understand what information is currently public and the number of authorizations and decisions made under existing legislation, please provide the following:

The number of instances where decisions...

Merci, Monsieur le Président. I want to thank the Minister for that. And I'll advise my constituents that if they have problems with storage containers and so on, they should contact the Minister's office. As bad as conditions are in Lanky Court, the statistics bureau figures on specific housing problems reveal that about 10 percent of NWT houses have mold and/or insect pest problems. This strikes me as a pandemic, Mr. Speaker. What public education and awareness measures does Housing NWT or community housing organizations take to raise awareness of these problems and give advice on actions...