Norman Yakeleya

I know you have mentioned this in the House, that you hope to have some conclusion and resolution to this critical issue here. I’ve been hearing this for almost a week and a half or two weeks. I want to ask the Minister about concluding this issue with the Yellowknives First Nation if he can give me a date on hoping that both sides are satisfactory and a conclusion or resolution can be imminent and this issue can be put to bed.

There are many issues in the Sahtu regarding education. I just recently was notified that two students that did attend a Fort Smith course at Aurora College and one wanted to attend the NAIT program. Both dropped out and went back to the Sahtu and are now working. Mr. Speaker, these are two young men that weren’t able to pursue the post-secondary education. That’s a crying shame, Mr. Speaker, in terms of supporting our students. With regards to all these issues that can be raised in the Sahtu, the Minister will be getting an educational symposium proposal from the Sahtu to have education...

I will look at it and see if it eases my reference here. Okay. I have to read this before I have other questions I can speak later on to. That will be it for me.

Mr. Speaker, the Minister, in his ministerial statement, talked about education and I also heard some Members talk about the Mentorship Program here. I want to ask the Minister, I’ve been working quite diligently with him over a couple of years to look at a mentorship program in the Sahtu in terms of involving our real teachers in our culture, the elders. How do you get the real teachers into an education system to work with us and the parents? When will the Minister put forth a directive saying elders now have to be involved in our education system?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just a couple of questions. Have the Ministers had an analysis of reducing the costs in my region by having a bridge here? In light of what we’re going to increase the budget for the bridge, I think the Minister of Transportation said it has a negative effect on the cost of living to reduce the cost of living. I know at one time it made sense, but now we’re adding additional dollars to it. Is this still the case to reduce the cost in the Sahtu and in Behchoko or Fort Providence or even Yellowknife?

The issue I have with the implementation is with the... I guess you look at it in terms of once you settle your negotiations and start implementing, the lay of the land really changes in terms of how our government is going to be in terms of our working relationship. It’s going to change quite considerably. Have we had some discussions in the House regarding the implementation, the potential benefits or potential things we need to be aware of in terms of implementing our self-government agreements?

Plus, this department is at a number of tables here negotiating self-government agreements. That...

Thank you. I, too, also want to let the Minister know that I want to ensure that we have good sound footing in the finances in terms of challenges that we have to acknowledge and to deal with, but at the same time I want to ensure that what’s before us here, this is probably the best-case scenario of all the assessments of our finances with a number of sunsets. You know, we heard from the Department of Health and Social Services in terms of their sunsets of some of the programs that the federal government is not going to fund anymore and at the same time we’re going to provide some pretty...

Just about got it there. So I’ll ask the Minister about realizing the economic potential. Is the Minister willing to share with the House in terms of some initial estimates or just as to what he’s talking about? Is that saved for the negotiations when you have negotiations with aboriginal governments or the federal government? It’s an interesting subject, because just myself in the Sahtu region, there is economic potential for oil and gas, hydro potential, minerals, even the Mackenzie Valley Highway construction. They had an economic analysis done on that and it showed a good return on...

So the Minister is going to table a document on March the 1st and then this triggers a process where there’s going to be public discussion now in the Northwest Territories as to the establishment of an NWT Heritage Fund. Is it six months of discussion with the public or is it going to be something like the other discussion papers we’ve had regarding utility companies? So I guess I wanted to see as to when does the Minister see this discussion on the establishment of the Heritage Fund being concluded or to move to another phase?

I’m good for that page.