Rylund Johnson

Thank you, Madam Chair. I have no issues, obviously, with land titles fees. Obviously, that is a fee, and I hope that office continues to charge them. My issue is specifically corporate registries, and very specifically the corporate registries' online system. I'll get to the point. It costs $4 to look up any corporate entity in the Northwest Territories. Most jurisdictions have waived this fee as an effort to transparency to see corporate records. These are public documents. It's a principle of good open data and open government to not put things behind a pay wall. Would a number of under...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am quite confident that both the Ministers of MACA and Lands would be quite curious to know if their departments are being amalgamated, so I look forward to the outcome of those discussions. Additionally, in that same speech following being elected as Premier, there was a commitment to mandate public surveys for all priorities for each department. Has that work been done, Mr. Speaker?

To be honest, I don't much care what the name of the department is, but I believe, when the Premier makes a commitment, it's important that it be followed through with, especially if it's solely within her authority. Additionally, during that speech, the Premier committed to requiring a gender- and equity-based lens be applied to any new program or service delivery in the GNWT. When can we expect to see that implemented?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As we return to this House in the midst of COVID-19, I can start to feel something in the air again, and that is the entrenchment of the status quo creeping back in. However, when you are in the eye of a hurricane, you often cannot feel the whiplash around you. I can feel a sense of complacency sneaking into this House. There will be another wave of COVID-19. We are heading into one of the largest depressions in any of our lifetimes. Let's not also forget that we are in the midst of a climate emergency, which will cost alone on our infrastructure billions of dollars...

Thank you, Madam Chair. I am getting down to the weeds in these sections because I have some very specific issues with them. One of my issues, as I have raised with the Minister, is that the land titles office does not let you search by the name of a property owner. You have to find the lot address and the legal address and then find who owns it. I get that there are some personal privacy issues, but what other jurisdictions have done is they have allowed all corporate-owned land to be searchable by name because those same privacy concerns do not apply to corporate entities. I, for example...

Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes. I guess I will look forward to that conversation. I think if you can give the office marching orders to bring their systems online, they will tell you how long that will take. If it takes a few years, I can live with that, but clearly it's something we should get started. Similarly, this is one of those weird sections of Justice where we have our personal property registration, a very underutilized system. We have regulations of securities trading, as expertise, we struggle to keep/have in the Northwest Territories. Can the Minister update me if there is any...

Thank you, Madam Chair. That is exactly what I was looking at. I just think it would be one of these helpful transparency things if corporations' records were not behind a pay wall and I could go in and I could search any corporate entity and track their legal history, as I can do with most jurisdictions. Similarly with the land titles office, at one point, we were going to close down the land titles office during this COVID-19, essentially not allowing anyone to transfer real property. Can the Minister commit to bringing land titles online so that they can conduct their business even during a...

Thank you, Madam Chair. I think that gets to the heart of what the BDIC is. I think, in the past, we've seen a number of boards that have kind of not used it as a development corporation. It has a number of subsidiaries under it that simply lose money year after year, and perhaps the corporation's purpose is to be a make-work project, but I view it as something that should be really a world-class development and investment corporation. I think there's a significant element of venture capital missing, finding other private equity firms. I guess, can the Minister update me on plans to work with...

Thank you, Madam Chair. I think the Minister would be very surprised at the number of businesses that don't operate with insurance. It's largely up to the business to decide whether to take on that risk or not. There are all sorts of businesses that decide not to have general liability insurance. It's an interesting decision by the GNWT to essentially step in and mandate that these operators have to have insurance. I can see reasons for it in certain cases. Perhaps the Minister can commit to review that section. I think, especially now, there are plenty of tourism operators who are paying very...

Thank you, Madam Chair. Another concern of mine is in regard to online map staking. I think this is a huge step, and I know that we are in the process of developing the software, but I am wondering if it's possible to speed that timeline up or if the Minister could provide an update of when we expect that to be in existence. Thank you, Madam Chair.