Robert C. McLeod

The cost of fuel is one that this government has taken immediate action on to lower the cost of living in the communities served by the Petroleum Products Division. The Minister of Public Works and Services announced on Tuesday that, effective February 5th, the price of home heating oil was reduced by $0.09 a litre in Paulatuk, $0.07 a litre in Sachs Harbour, and $0.08 a litre in Ulukhaktok. With this reduction, heating oil prices in these communities have been reduced by approximately 20 per cent over the last year. We recognize that the cost of heating fuel and gasoline in our smaller...

I am willing to have discussions in how we can move forward with this. We have to take a number of things into consideration. We would have to look at the legislation to see if we are able to even entertain that idea, so as I commented before, I will have a discussion with the appropriate parties and see if there is an opportunity for us to move this forward. I take the Member's point, again, about the rent-to-own, but because it's an unsettled area, it kind of slows the process down a bit. But we will have those discussions. We will see how we can move the issue forward.

We are quite limited to what we can do in the unsettled areas, because some of that land might be claimed by the claimant groups, but we would be willing to work with the Member and work with the claimant groups to see if there are any options that might be available to us. But because they are in the process of negotiation, as I said a couple of times already, our options are quite limited.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'd like to welcome to the gallery today a constituent of Inuvik Twin Lakes and also my official agent in the past election, Mr. Denny Rodgers. I would also like to welcome to the Assembly my constituency assistant, Krysten Cardinal, and I'd like to welcome all the young folks into the gallery as well. I would like to welcome all folks into the gallery as well.

---Laughter

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

As Members have heard me say in the last two weeks that we have been here and even before that, the challenges that we're facing financially, I mean, we would love to be able to be in a position where we can help a lot of the communities with their challenges that they face. We have challenges of our own as a government, and it's one of the reasons we're trying to go through the exercise that we are going through, so we can be in a position to help our communities with some of the challenges they face. Plus, being able to invest into infrastructure which would create jobs in a lot of the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today and extend my best wishes to the 270 athletes, coaches, and managers from 18 communities who will make up Team NWT at the 2016 Arctic Winter Games in Nuuk, Greenland from March 5th to 11th, 2016.

For over a year now, young people from across the Northwest Territories have been preparing themselves physically and mentally for this opportunity. I congratulate all of the athletes who have persevered through the territorial selection and have achieved their goal of representing the Northwest Territories at this prestigious...

Our communities, they have stressed to us that they feel like they are challenged. We have given them opportunities to use some of their CPI funding that we distribute to them. I think it's up to 10 per cent that they can use to help with the O and M. Again, we won't know the potential impacts until we have a conversation with them as to the reduction in the Territorial Formula Financing.

We should note that the Deh Cho Bridge was actually not a P3 project. It was a negotiated contract where substantial design and construction risk was still with the GNWT. Before the P3 procurement starts, the GNWT undertakes a detailed risk analysis of the proposed P3 procurement compared to traditional procurement. This ensures risks are reflected in the procurement and all proponents are clearly aware of the risks they would be assuming as captured in the project agreement. To ensure that deficiencies are being properly managed, there will be no service commencement unless the design...

Following winter 2015 construction, as the Member said, there was some erosion and slumping area of concern were identified by Lands inspectors and Ledcor personnel. Northern Lights produced and acted on the remediation plan, and all the sites that were identified are being attended to. Ongoing monitoring is in place and with additional remediation being staged this winter in advance of the spring melt.

Lowering the cost of living is one of the agreed-on priorities of this Assembly. In addition to the efforts that I’ve outlined earlier in this exchange, all of the departments are being tasked with examining their business plans to look for opportunities to lower the cost of living for NWT residents. I expect that we will have some proposals that we will be able to put in front of committee during the business planning review that should help. We continue to encourage people to move North to grow our population. This helps with our Territorial Formula Financing, and the more money we have...