Michael McLeod

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Does a utility company not have to have a hearing before the rates are increased? I think that was my question, Mr. Speaker. Do they have to go through the Public Utilities Board to hold a hearing and not wait for the concerns of the citizens? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, yesterday I spoke to the concern from Inuvik residents about the increase in the natural gas price. One of the statements I made was the Public Utilities Board and said there was lack of evidence over concerns and had the members been living in the Northwest Territories, then I am sure they would have heard the concerns. But that is another issue for another day. I would like to ask the Minister of the Public Utilities Board, how is it that the supplier of natural gas can raise their rates without a public hearing where citizens can hear their...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I don’t know if this is the right time for it with all these guys being up here, but I want to speak about the federal government’s attitude towards the Northwest Territories.

---Applause

Mr. Speaker, we recently heard about all the cuts that were made. A billion dollars cut for youth groups and for volunteer groups, adult literacy groups and for women’s groups. Mr. Speaker, these people put a lot of work into the job that they do. Why should we have them sitting like little pups under the table waiting for some scraps to fall off. We have money constantly leaving the...

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I guess, first of all, like everyone else, I should commend the commission for going out and taking the time to visit the communities and hear what the community concerns are. I am not totally convinced that all the factors were looked at when the report was compiled, the final report. However, we’ve had five commissions on electoral boundaries since 1978. The smaller communities, especially the smaller communities such as I have in my riding, have been very clear in terms of what they need to see, the concerns. It’s always seen as a case that the...

It's not like we've got ten, fifteen thousand people to look after.

I look at the ridings of some of the Members here and I see the Member for Nunakput has a wide geographical riding. He has to go all over. Same with the Member for the Sahtu. He has a lot of communities he has to cover.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There are other processes that are available. People have the ability to file as interveners. The municipalities can do this, Individuals can do this, so it is not clearly demonstrated in every occasion that there has to be a hearing. In this case, there have been a number of issues brought forth by the municipality. There are also a number of issues by residents. The MLAs for that area have raised an issue. All of this information has to be compiled and looked at before there is confirmation that there will be a hearing. At this point, the Public Utilities...

Yes, Mr. Speaker, we will do that.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, today I would like to rise to speak on the increase in natural gas for customers in Inuvik. It’s become a real concern to the residents of Inuvik because they feel like they have a forum or a hearing to express their displeasure over the increase in the price of natural gas. The supplier is allowed to make a reasonable profit, but a lot of people up there think that it’s an unreasonable request that they are putting forward, a 16 percent increase when they had to deal with another increase last year and the supplier is saying that they are going to be...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We have already had some early discussion on this. We’ve had some face-to-face meetings with industry. We have had some discussions on some of the options with different stakeholders. So we have already embarked on looking at how we can deal with some of these initiatives. Of course, this coming winter is going to give us a better understanding of what we are really up against. Are there ways we can look at alternate routes? Are there ways we can consider some other options is something we will have to decide.

I want to point out though that we have already, along with...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I don’t have a firm number on what it would cost to build an all-weather road. We have been working with a joint venture company, stakeholders that utilize this winter road and had looked at a number of options including an all-weather road. I think there were 18 different scenarios that we were looking at as options. They narrowed it down to two or three. We haven’t scoped it all out. An engineering firm has been hired to do some of the early assessments. We certainly will work with them and support them, but I don’t have a firm number at this point. Thank you, Mr...