Rylund Johnson

Yellowknife North

Statements in Debates

Debates of , 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 152)

Thank you, Madam Chair. I was not part of the committee, and so I'm just trying to catch up on where we're at with this. But I want to note that the act, where it's starting a new complaint process does the director first has to decide whether to even disclose the identity of the complainant to the operator. And I would say in many cases, you probably don't want to do that. And if I'm going to file a complaint against my day home, I'm probably going to ask to remain anonymous. And I know that anonymous complaints processes are often used in other jurisdictions in day homes to protect the...

Debates of , 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 152)

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Selling 60 megawatts in this territory is no small feat. You know, we're definitely going to need quite a few mines and they're going to need to operate for multiple decade with longterm power purchasing agreements to sell 60 megawatts of power. And I didn't hear how much the project was going to cost, and I didn't hear how much we actually expect that power to cost. I'll note that a lot of these operations can look to Alberta that sell at about $0.12 a kilowatt hour power, which is a lot cheaper than what we could ever hope to get to.

Mr. Speaker, I'm hoping...

Debates of , 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 152)

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We've been at this Taltson thing for about two decades now and tens of millions of dollars in engineering studies, and I guess my first question is can the Minister tell me how much this Taltson Expansion is going to cost? Thank you.

Debates of , 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 152)

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Sorry, I know we call want to go home but I would like to just make some comments about the final budget as we are passing it and the commitments that the Minister made in this House previously.

Initially, I said my support on this budget was contingent on two things. That was some more money for our community governments and some more money for our nonprofits. Unfortunately, I had to vote in favour of the carbon tax to get the money for the community governments as I just did but I'm happy to see that additional approximately $1.8 million combined with $600,000 in this...

Debates of , 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 152)

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. You know, I don't actually know whether we should build Taltson, and I don't think I should even have an opinion on it. I think the power corp needs to have a business case, and it needs to be evidencebased, and we need to crunch the numbers to see who's going to buy our power, for how much, and if it makes sense then most certainly we should do that. And, really, it is an evidencebased decisionmaking, and we shouldn't be here on the floor of the House asking basic questions such as how much is this whole thing we've been talking about for decades actually going to cost...

Debates of , 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 152)

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I didn't hear how much the project was going to cost, which seems like a pretty fundamental thing you would want to know, is how much is this project going to cost. We have an MOU to build it. We were asking the federal government to give us money. Certainly we must know how much we're asking for, Mr. Speaker. But apparently not.

Mr. Speaker, one of the reasons that this project has fallen through in the past is that we just can't quite get to a rate of power that is competitive with the price of diesel, and so mines do not want to enter into a longterm power purchasing...

Debates of , 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 152)

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. How much is the Taltson project going to cost? Where is it going to go? Who are we selling the power for? Mr. Speaker, people in this House have been asking those questions for two decades. In 2004, Joe Handley said that a line to the diamond mines was expensive; it was going to cost us $170 million, Mr. Speaker. Well, Mr. Speaker, if we could get a line to the diamond mines from Taltson for $170 million, I'd build it tomorrow. However, Mr. Speaker, what happened in 2014 is after spending $18 million in studying, we found out the diamond mines didn't want to buy our...

Debates of , 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 151)

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'm happy to second this motion. I've spoken to this issue a number of times in this House. Presently, right now, if you own a million-dollar home on the Ingraham Trail, you pay the exact same fees and you are under the exact same rules as a multigenerational cabin in the Inuvialuit settlement region. Mr. Speaker, land seizures is the same thing, and they clearly are not the same conversation. We need to separate those out. Mr. Speaker, there are a number of ways we can treat rightsbased cabins. There is a number of creative solutions, and it's going to depend probably...

Debates of , 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 151)

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Speaker. You know, I think what would be helpful in making it an election issue is just a few facts. And so whenever we talk about extended benefits in this territory, it's extremely complicated as the Minister's well aware. We've got Metis benefits, we got NIHB benefits, we got GNWT benefits, and we got a new extended benefits program rolling out as we speak. So I'm wondering if the Minister could take back and perhaps do an analysis of what this would actually cost and who presently do not have access to some sort of contraception coverage. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Debates of , 19th Assembly, 2nd Session (day 151)

Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the Honourable Member for Thebacha, that Committee Report 5119(2), Standing Committee on Government Operations report on Indigenous Representation in the Northwest Territories Public Service be received by the Assembly and moved into Committee of the Whole for further consideration. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.