Michael Miltenberger

Our specific involvement comes when MLAs travel with Ministers on trips, usually abroad, and there have been a number of those and there are outstanding claims that we’re still waiting for from an MLA that we hope will get cleared off so that we can end this session and the mandate of the 17th Assembly on a clear note.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Great Slave Lake, that Bill 72, Supplementary Appropriation Act (Operations Expenditures), No. 2, 2015-2016, be read for the first time.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would just like to take a few moments of the House time to acknowledge, recognize and pay tribute to the award recently bestowed on Sonny McDonald, Order of the NWT.

Sonny McDonald was a long-term employee of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources. For 17 years he held the fort on the Mackenzie River Basin Board, as we slowly got our thinking clear, and left just before we finally negotiated an agreement with Alberta, an issue that he always brought up to me as something that was undone and needed to get busy on.

He’s also very well-known internationally as...

Thank you, Madam Chair. There was a hard look taken at this, as there are a lot of our expenses as we look at our fiscal challenges, and it was determined that what is before the House is what the Hay River Hospital could make work with the resources that are available. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The most immediate one is the 10 percent we’ve talked about and taking advantage of what was budgeted and what we anticipate or know we are going to be paying here in the foreseeable future, leaving us enough room should there be any kind of subsequent increase. If we budget a dollar and we get it at 80 cents a litre, I’d have to ask Mr. Kalgutkar to do the math for me to give us an idea, or Mr. Aumond, to give us an idea, but this is how we’ve accommodated putting this money into conservation was on that gap.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The hydrological prediction and looking into the future is not an exact science. It’s tied to many variables that you don’t know from year to year. What we do know is that over the years the snowpack has diminished, the glaciers are melting, the rainfall patterns are changing and we’re now into year four of a drought. Around the world what used to be reliable weather patterns have now disappeared, so we are anticipating this is the second year, which is why we’re doing things like putting out the expression on solar and wind and we’re working to invest to get off of...

As we have discussed over the years, we have to do both. The mitigation initiatives that we have to reduce our carbon footprint to get off fossil fuels will help do our part in terms of lessening the pressure on the climate change and warming temperatures, but we also know that those types of activities don’t bear fruit for 30 to 40 years. We’re also going to be spending more immediately and more greatly on the adaptation that’s going to be required with things like erosion, permafrost, the money we’ve spent in our lifetime here just on replacing failed piles and all those other related costs...

It’s early days, but absolutely we’re going to be spending in the many millions of dollars as we get started, and if it’s the whole community, all the low-lying areas, the relocation, the lock, stock, and barrel relocation of the community would be very expensive.

We had those discussions with Finance. The costs are all there, separating out what we want to attribute directly to weather and climate change versus the more normal occurrence. We’re looking at that. But clearly, as I said yesterday, there is a need for us to capture that more accurately so that it doesn’t overpower or blur into other areas of normal government operations, and it is, as the Member has pointed out, getting to be a fairly high number.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Monfwi, that Bill 71, Supplementary Appropriation Act (Infrastructure Expenditures), No. 3, 2015-2016, be read for the second time.

This bill makes supplementary appropriations for infrastructure expenditures for the Government of the Northwest Territories for the 2015-2016 fiscal year. Thank you.