Robert C. McLeod

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'm very pleased to welcome my wife, Judy, to the gallery and to the Assembly, and she's also a constituent of Inuvik Boot Lake. Speaking of constituents, I would like to recognize Donna Rogers who is a constituent of Inuvik Twin Lakes. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

As I stated earlier, we'll take any opportunity to work with who we need to work with to try to take advantage of some of the empty backhauls that are going out. I can commit to them, and I'm sure our folks in the region are working with them. Again, we have the discussion paper that we released. We have a draft implementation plan that we're looking at presenting to Cabinet very shortly, here. Then we will seek further input into the implementation plan.

So a lot of work has gone into this. We had a number of respondents to our questionnaire. We had 109 people, I think, show up in a lot of the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in September and October of this year, ENR worked with two community governments and their contractor to identify and consolidate all their hazardous waste in preparation for transportation on the Mackenzie Valley winter road to an approved disposable facility. The following hazardous materials were a part of this package. There were a number of pallets of used oil, glycol, and this was from a couple communities, vehicle batteries, fuel, contaminated water. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the following five documents entitled "2017-2018 Water Stewardship Strategy Progress Review Summary," "NWT Cumulative Impact Monitoring Program, 2017-2018 Annual Report and 2017-2018 Project Results," pursuant to section 13(1) of the Natural Resources Conservation Trust Act, "The Natural Resources Conservation Trust Fund Financial Statements for the year ended March 31, 2017," and, pursuant to sections 16(2) and 23(3) of the Species At Risk Act, "Conference of Management Authorities Species At Risk Annual Report 2017-2018," and "Northwest...

As part of our waste resource management strategy, we had a number of conversations across the Northwest Territories. We had a lot of regional meetings, and we had some online questionnaires that people could fill out. We have produced a "what we heard" document. The reason I bring that up is a number of the items that the Member is talking about, some of the priority from the respondents was they would like to see bulky waste packaging and tires, appliances, vehicles, and that removed from their landfill. We continue to work with whoever we need to work with. We have to work with industry if...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, looking after the best interests of people in the Northwest Territories is what this government is all about. The impact on electricity cost is not known at this time. Any impact on NTPC cost is expected to be mitigated by the insurance claim.

I mean, first of all, this government did not want to burden people with a new tax. Had we used the federal backstop, which they were going to use regardless, it would have cost people in the Northwest Territories a lot more. I want to make that quite clear.

Through a number of our approaches to carbon pricing - and I do believe that our document is public. I know I have briefed committee on it. I have some feedback from committee on it, so I do know that we have a backstop that we are using. One of the things is the cost of living offset that we proposed to help offset some of that high cost...

Mr. Speaker, the NWT signed on to the Clean Growth and Climate Change Framework. Carbon pricing is actually an element of that. We didn't sign on to carbon pricing just yet. We have an MOU that we are in the final stages of drafting, or it is in its final stages right now. We have not signed that yet.

The Member is correct. We were against carbon pricing when it first came out because we knew that it was going to have a detrimental effect on people in the Northwest Territories. Once we realized that the federal government was going to implement this regardless of whether we were in or not, then...

First of all, that is a good thing. If these young people are getting the skills that they need and the contractor wants to move them to another community, I think that is a good thing. When we debate the capital budget, as we are going to be doing, you will find that there is a number of other projects for other communities. If contractors are able to secure that work, then they may move these folks there, and then there will be an opportunity, if there are other projects in their hometown, to come back home.

I always believe that's a good thing, and it expands their skills, their knowledge...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there is an interdepartmental working group. They analyze the capital assets coming forward from each department and make recommendations to the Deputy Minister Capital Planning Committee, and that is shared by the Deputy Minister of Finance and includes all deputies.

They review the recommendations made by the working group and either accept or vary the recommendations. Then they provide recommendations to the Financial Management Board, and the Financial Management Board will review the recommendations of the planning committee and either accept or vary...