Norman Yakeleya

I understand the frustration from Liard residents and people in Fort Simpson about the road closure. I understand completely, because I come from a region that doesn’t have a road. I know the frustration the residents are talking about. I would share my frustrations with the Member here. We are moving on this road. We are looking at what we can do. We are looking at how we can get this road back into drivable condition.

We did have a road that was transferred by the federal government to this government. The standards weren’t up to par, so we are reconstructing roads right across the North to...

Mr. Speaker, if I were to reach out, I would have other MLAs question me.

Mr. Speaker, we have looked at the road. We have a plan in place. Again, with the weather being on our side, Mother Nature plays a big part in terms of how much work we can get done. We want to do rebasing of that section. We are looking at it. I will instruct my officials to come back and look at the options. This is going to cause us a lot of hiccups during this season. We would have to look at a bypass that would at least be less disruptive to the travelling public of Nahendeh. I will get back and keep the Member...

Mr. Speaker, we’ll have to wait for the bridge.

I will call my officials this afternoon, and we will, hopefully, have some discussions on the bypass road and see what type of work is being done so far. If a bypass road is something that we have to do, we will do it for the travelling public. However, I would like to first speak to my officials, and I will keep the Member informed in terms of the options that he’s talked about today.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The challenge of Highway No. 1 has certainly been a very frustrating point in our work on Highway No. 7 with our department and our contractors. Work is being done in terms of Highway No. 7 reconstruction. We are digging up that part of the section. What we want to do is take part of the section, dig it up, put the proper basing in there to rebase the road, and then reconstruct it to a passable section of road. We are looking at options in terms of how we can keep traffic moving between Fort Liard and the other communities, so we will take the Member’s suggestion. If it...

Mr. Speaker, the Member is certainly correct on that: the Crown corporation is owned by…. We are the shareholders. My one responsibility in the Cabinet is to work on behalf of the shareholders in trust in terms of the corporation. If the legislation was to change and how we do business within our Crown corporation changed, we certainly should be having the discussion with the House Members from this side and from the other side in terms of talking about how to restructure our corporation. Certainly, Mr. McLeod, under the Minister coordinating the Energy Committee, we are looking at all options...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We are in phase 2 of the general rate application presently, and we’re just waiting to conclude that. We have our general rate applications every three years.

Mr. Speaker, certainly the Member raises some very interesting, good ideas in terms of our service and what we can do to help the consumers in terms of the carbon emissions in relation to their issue with the vehicle registration. I will be happy to sit down with the Member to talk with him and bring forth other ideas we could implement in our new system to help our consumers in the Northwest Territories with the vehicle registration system.

Mr. Speaker, the understanding from the lead Minister, the Hon. Bob McLeod.... The Ministers’ Energy Coordinating Committee will start as soon as possible. We do have the terms of reference and are ready to go to work. As soon as we are done here, we are ready to go to work taking action on the motion that was passed in terms of looking at the restructuring in the Northwest Territories.

I will also let the Member know that I also come from a community that has high power rates, high energy issues. In terms of our communities, certainly the energy committee will be looking at the merits of a one-rate zone. We’ll be having discussions with Members from the House to look at the best options and what avenues we have available for us to implement whatever recommendation we agree would see a rate zone stabilized or a rate zone that would be satisfactory to the people in our communities.

Mr. Speaker, someone once said that the North has two seasons. The first season lasts about nine months and is called the winter season. The second season is very short, lasting only about three months. This short season is called the road construction season.

This road construction season, reconstruction, drainage, surface and grade improvements are proposed across the entire surface-transportation system. This work is already underway to improve our aging infrastructure and maintain a safe and reliable system. In the North our construction season is very short, and to get things done we have...