Michael Miltenberger

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.

Thank you. As I indicated in my Minister’s statement today, what we’re aiming for is to be as fully functional as we can by this fall as it pertains to being able to use liquid natural gas and generation of electricity. Thank you.

I can clearly commit to the territorial government’s, our government’s commitment to this process. There are discussions underway with the federal Minister in regard to the federal funding. We have not yet concluded the discussions, but the goal clearly is to maintain that funding and keep it available between ourselves and the territorial government so that the work has been done, and the money that was voted by the Parliament of Canada remains there for the use that it was voted for. Thank you.

Our commitment to that process remains unabated. We’ve had recent meetings with the leadership of the Deh Cho about making sure that we can conclude the land use plan, setting up bilateral meetings between the governments so that we can talk about and resolve issues. I’ve met for a number of hours with the leadership from the Deh Cho on the Wildlife Act to try and resolve their concerns about the Wildlife Act, mainly as it pertains to their land claims. We are fully engaged in that. At that same time, we’re in a transition period as the federal government is going to exit stage left in this...

What the outfitters used prior to the hunting ban was in the neighbourhood of a total of 700 tags, many of which weren’t used annually.

The intent of the various surveys, or the main intent, is to ascertain as close as possible what the herd numbers may be. At the same time as herd numbers, the herd health, cow-calf ratio, those types of things, all towards an eye of making sure we have sustainable herds that are healthy.

Those numbers have told us up until recently, for example, the Bathurst herd has suffered a precipitous decline and stabilized not up but down significantly. It hasn’t really increased from where it bottomed out about three years ago. We know the Ahiak-Beverly herd, the numbers look quite strong and the...

Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the following document, entitled List of Interactivity Transfers Exceeding $250,000 for the Period April 1, 2012, to December 31, 2012. Thank you.