Louis Sebert

Mr. Speaker, certainly, we are always looking at new ways of being more efficient. I'm rather concerned that moving officers around in the manner suggested by the Member opposite might actually involve a greater loss. RCMP budgets or, rather, our portion of it, which is 70 per cent, has been growing exponentially over the last five or six years, but I certainly will, as I mentioned earlier, undertake to the Member opposite to look at this whole issue. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

It is some time since I've reviewed the legislation, and, in fact, I may have never reviewed the legislation. I will, however, undertake to the Member opposite that I will review the legislation. I was under the impression that we would either have to enact new legislation in the form of a police act or something along those lines to allow the sheriffs to take on these additional duties, but I will certainly undertake to look into the matter.

Mr. Speaker, I don't know if I entirely understand the question. The question is whether G Division officers, who are in the RCMP, could replace other officers within the RCMP? Either way, it's still RCMP officers, Mr. Speaker. I may have misunderstood the question. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I can commit to reviewing the situation. I don't know whether I could really commit to having the sheriff's officers conduct the duties suggested by the Member opposite as I believe that would require a significant change of legislation. So I am prepared, certainly, to look at the overall issue, but I don't think I can make any commitment as to any certainty as to whether we would be increasing the duties that the sheriff's officers already have. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, connecting with the national or even international grid clearly would not be a short-term thing we could possible contemplate, as it would be a very expensive project to connect either through Saskatchewan or Alberta. There are costs, but certainly there have been talks at a very high level about that very project and we will be in talks with Saskatchewan as to the possibility of such a project proceeding; however, it is a project of great complexity involving several governments, also involving several Aboriginal groups on our side of the border and several on the Saskatchewan...

As the Energy Strategy is rolled out it's not going to be Yellowknife-centric; I do believe they are going out to regional centres. So we will be seeking input, and the other Minister involved also will be seeking input from the communities on just the issues that are raised by the Member opposite.

Mr. Speaker, the Power Corporation always works with the communities. Specifically dealing with the issue of Colville Lake, which was a bit of a test case or an experimental case for the corporation, we can advise that the cost of the solar battery system there was $2.7 million. Now, we're hoping that the cost of these types of systems will decline, as seems to be often the case with technology and, at that point, we perhaps could look at other communities. So, yes, we are willing to look at other communities in the future. I can't specifically say we'd be looking at the community referred to...

Certainly as the Energy Strategy unfolds we are going to be looking at new technologies. We are, in the corporation, always interested in looking at newer technologies that are more energy efficient and so on, but for now this 20 per cent cap was imposed for reasons of efficiency and safety.

Yes, Mr. Speaker, I can advise that there is in fact a 20 per cent cap. This was developed as part of the NWT's solar strategy and it was imposed for technical reasons to ensure the electricity remains reliable. More than 20 per cent solar makes the system unstable. Now, in Colville Lake it is about 20 per cent, but that was only after some very expensive batteries and sophisticated load control were installed at the power plant. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned earlier, the problem is that that this 20 per cent was not simply dreamed up. It was a figure above which the diesel system became erratic or undependable. Now, if we had a system that provided 100 per cent of the power needs and we no longer needed diesel that would be one thing, but it would seem to me that a system that went up to 40 per cent, say between solar and some other system, would exacerbate the problem with the diesel system.