Robert C. McLeod

Mr. Speaker, I give notice that on Monday, November 2, 2009, I will move that Bill 5, An Act to Amend the Commissioner’s Land Act, be read for the first time. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Some of the communities have applied for Building Canada money for specific projects that they’ve identified in their communities. For example, I think Aklavik used their portion of it for the new sewage lagoon and they matched the dollars and some of the dollars came from BCP. They’ve also identified some money for road upgrades through the economic stimulus fund. So the communities will let us know what their priorities are and we continue to work with them on capital plans.

As far as Mr. Aumond said, we’ve shared findings of the report with the communities and we...

The Member is twisting my arm to get me into Aklavik, but I will make that commitment that I will make it into the Member’s community. With that, we probably will have staff. We’ll leave the chequebooks in Inuvik and then we’ll...Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair. Lutselk’e is forming a development corporation. They are not, as far as I know, making any attempt to become a settlement or a hamlet. They are looking into forming a development corporation so the money could start flowing to them. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, a lot of the programs that we have applications that have come through for the Building Canada Fund, I have yet to see any application from the community. Maybe we should encourage them to put an application in with some of their requirements, and then we can go and look to access some of the money. If there’s money available for doing some research, then we can pursue that too. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I would make the commitment to the Member that we will have a serious look at this and we’ll make sure that it’s well thought out before we attempt to put it on the ground. We’ll seek some input from a lot of the Members, because a lot of them do represent the small communities. We’ll get as much input as we can before we attempt to roll this out. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, we would like to see the local communities put more input into the houses that go into their communities. We are, for the basic shelter, just redoing that right now. We’re hoping to be able to roll that out pretty soon and we’re looking to get some input.

As far as the log homes go, there were a couple of pilot projects done in the past. At this point in time, it doesn’t make economic sense. If we can do it a lot cheaper than the pilot projects were done, then it’s something that we’re willing to have a look at. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I don’t expect to be thanked for an answer that is not what the Members are looking for, but sometimes we have to give those answers whether they are popular or needed or not. If it opens me up for criticism as to the position I am taking focussing on the youth of the Northwest Territories who will become adults, who will become seniors and they will be able to function better and be a better person for going to these games. I am not willing to make a commitment to fund the seniors multisport games out of the multisport game budget, because that mandate is for the youth and that...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wish that were true that the buck stops at my desk and I would be able to dole out the money to all those that asked, because we do get a lot of requests for funding. We do try and tend to look after the youth and try and get them out there and take part in a lot of these games. If there is a desire to fund adult games, I am not sure if that is where we want to go to, because the requests will start coming in from other adults.

We are always willing to have a list and see if there are ways that we can support all games. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, we are hoping to have something together very shortly here to share with committee before we go into the next session that would help address a lot of the concerns expressed by some of the MLAs from the small communities, especially the non-market communities. We are hoping to have something very shortly here put together. We will be able to share that with committee and get some feedback and input from committee too. Thank you.