Michael Miltenberger

Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Inuvik Twin Lakes, that Bill 10, Supplementary Appropriation Act (Operations Expenditures), No. 1, 2013-2014, be read for the second time.

This bill makes supplementary appropriations for operations expenditures for the Government of the Northwest Territories for the 2013-2014 fiscal year.

This is a critical piece of work. It has a history that dates back to the previous Assembly. We have been working on it diligently. As the Member’s indicated, they see some of the work. Yes, as we move forward to the next stages we will be, as per protocols, working closely with committee in the proper sequence to make sure that they have their input at the front end of this process. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Monfwi, that Bill 8, Supplementary Appropriation Act (Operations Expenditures), No. 4, 2011-2012, be read for the second time.

This bill makes supplementary appropriations for operations expenditures for the Government of the Northwest Territories for the 2011-2012 fiscal year.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The ones that are most advanced, of course, are the Edehzhie and there are the other candidate areas mainly in the Deh Cho. The work is being done, as I outlined in my statement to the House, and we intend to keep moving. We do have northern tools that exist and we’re prepared to be more proactive in actually looking at using them and not just talking about using them. We will continue to have discussions with the federal government about the federal designation as well. As I indicated in the House yesterday, I have to have discussions with Minister Kent to that effect...

I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Great Slave, that Bill 6, Supplementary Appropriation Act (Infrastructure Expenditures), No. 1, 2013-2014, be read for the second time.

This bill makes supplementary appropriations for infrastructure expenditures for the Government of the Northwest Territories for the 2013-2014 fiscal year.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in the House today to update the people of the Northwest Territories and our Protected Areas Strategy partners on the implementation of the NWT Protected Areas Strategy.

The Protected Areas Strategy was established in 1999 as an overall framework to guide the work of identifying and establishing protected areas in the Northwest Territories. It was developed in partnership by regional Aboriginal organizations, the federal and territorial governments, environmental non-governmental organizations and industry.

A substantial amount of work has been done under the Strategy. Saoyú...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We’ve committed a significant amount of money to continue to do baseline work on an ongoing basis on the various herds. There are the major surveys, then there’s the intermediate work that’s done to check the health of the herd. We’ve done that over the summer, as I indicated, over last year and concluding some this year that I laid out in my Member’s statement yesterday. They’ve given us some comfort – more than comfort – some certainty about the herd numbers, to the point where we’re looking at going back to the co-management boards and the consultation processes that...

Thank you. It means, very simply, that there is a federal process and they have put some money aside for candidate areas, that devolution is being negotiated, that we as a territory have tools that we’ve talked about but not used very well and there may be other tools we need to in fact develop as we manage the land and resources.

I have had discussions with the federal Minister about the federal money that is there. This process, this protected area process was in place I believe before I became a Member 18 years ago and it works, the wheels turn very slow and fine. We’re at step five for all...

Thank you. As I indicated in previous questions, there have been meetings recently with the grand chief and some of the leadership from the Dehcho. There was an agreement to bilateral process to make sure we are fully engaged at the land claims and land use table, which would allow us to resolve some of these outstanding issues. We are committed to concluding Edehzhie and, as I indicated as well, I met, when we were down in Ottawa for the Northwest Territories Days, with Minister Kent and raised the issue of the funds that are currently identified for the candidate areas and the need for us to...

Thank you. In Inuvik we’ll have full diesel redundancy. So the storage requirements are going to be, at this point, 90 days and we’ll rely on being able to manage the supply in bringing the replenishment within that 90 days. The reason we say that we can manage with the 90-day supply is that we do have full diesel redundancy so that should there be a weather closure or something else untoward happen, then we would be able to still have no break in service. Thank you.