Robert C. McLeod

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Thebacha, that Bill 44, Forest Act, be read for the first time. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I said I was going to have discussions with the federal government. I was going to have the meetings with the federal minister. I'm a man of my word, and I will initiate those discussions. I think, with the work that we have done in the last three years in the Assembly with some of the corrections we have made on the budget, I think we positioned ourselves very well to be able to match it. I take the Member's point, and as I've said a number of times, a lot of the work that we do here has set the table for those coming after us, so they will be in the position, if there are bigger...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Hay River South, that Bill 42, An Act to Amend the Petroleum Products Tax Act, be read for the first time. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I believe that there is adequate funding for the Mackenzie River Basin Board, and I think Members would expect me to say nothing less. They have $280,000 in annual contributions from all parties, $40,000 from the jurisdictions, and $8,000 from Canada. If they feel that there is a need for more resources, I am sure they will approach the appropriate ministers in the jurisdictions to make a case for more funding. Again, that is another one that I would have to follow up on, and I have not seen any requests from board representatives for our department to increase the funding.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Negotiations towards the establishment of a bilateral water agreement currently are under way with Saskatchewan. Saskatchewan is conducting a legal review of the intention document, and that review is ongoing. Negotiations will continue once that review is complete. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Our officials will ensure that the process is clearly and consistently communicated across all the GNWT departments and all regions of the NWT.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The GNWT, we fully support our employees in their efforts to access support services, so they can safely address the broad spectrum of mental wellness issues related to the impacts of residential school, but by doing so, we are bound by the lead provisions in our collective agreement. For example, for employees accessing counselling services in Yellowknife, they may access up to two hours of casual leave with pay to attend the counselling session. When accessing a recurring counselling session, there is a possibility of accessing up to a maximum of a one day of casual...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Yellowknife South, that Bill 43, An Act to Amend the Income Tax Act, be read for the first time. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I believe we are always monitoring the quality of the water, especially with some of the projects that are going on in the southern jurisdictions. We have the Mackenzie data stream project, and I believe we have monitoring stations in almost 22 communities, as far as the work of the Northwest Territories. I would encourage Members to go on I believe there is a website, the Mackenzie data stream website. We have a lot of monitoring stations on the Mackenzie, down the valley. As they propose to do some work in the southern jurisdictions, I think the importance of the water monitoring on our part...

The work of the board is to provide a state of aquatic environment report every five years, and they get the funding to do that work. My understanding is that the next version of the report is coming out in 2020. I would have to follow up to see if there are yearly reports that are put out. I was on the board's website to see if there was an opportunity to find a yearly update, but I can look at that. The report is due in 2020.