Rylund Johnson

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I see $5 million here for the RCMP collective agreement. My understanding is that there's a bit of a dispute about how the collective agreement is going to apply to the back pay or retroactively. Can I just clarify whether this is the total amount we owe for the collective agreement or whether this $5 million is just one this fiscal year. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Madam Speaker, I wish to present to the House Bill 61, An Act to Amend the Ombud Act, to be read for the first time.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I see there's $5 million extra here for forest fire suppression. Can I just get confirmation what that brings the total forest fire cost to and whether this is the end of it. I know we were fighting fires very late this year. The sup sometimes takes some time so do we believe this is the end of extra money needed for forest fires this season? Thank you.

Yeah, thank you, Madam Speaker. I'm actually not sure that's legal, and I believe the Department of Lands is working on temporary guidelines when temporary structures can be set up on public land. But they first have to evict 900 people. So I'm not too sure about that. I guess my question is, I assume that we own some wall tents. We own a company that makes them at the very least. I assume we own a few cabins in the territorial government. Is the Minister willing to look through all of our parks and campgrounds and see whether there is some sort of infrastructure that could possibly be rented...

Mr. Chair, I move that this committee recommends that the Department of Finance take steps to digitize the public accounts and provide a timeline for implementation and anticipated costs;

And further, the digitized presentation of financial results should align with the administrative, economic, functional, and program classifications used in the budget and main estimates documents. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I'm seeking unanimous consent, again to waive Rule 9.4(4), so that this Committee Report 3719(2) can be referred directly to Committee of the Whole for consideration later today. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. A number of jurisdictions publish their public accounts before us, as noted in the committee report. I just want to comment that although I do think this should be changed in the legislation, it will take some years to get there. You have to work with the Office of the Auditor General, all of the departments, to make sure we can move our public accounts back. There are some departments, the power corp, the health authority who are notoriously late in getting their financial statements in. There is also a number of subsidiaries we own, you know, things like McPherson Tent...

Madam Speaker, I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Thebacha, that the Standing Committee on Government Operations Report on the Review of the 2022 Audit of Addictions, Prevention and Recovery Services in the Northwest Territories be received by the Assembly and moved into committee for further consideration. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I'd like to, again, rise in my opposition to clause 12 of this bill which will prohibit cannabis sales on polling day. I want to clarify how committee got here.

They started with a recommendation that said, from the Chief Electoral Officer, as recommended in 2015, this subsection in the Election and Plebiscites Act unfairly penalizes business owners. There is no data available to support a view that the sale of liquor, retail or in establishment, has any bearing in polling day turnout. Most Canadian jurisdictions have eliminated this requirement. And then, somehow, we...

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Chair. I just want to explain what this is actually asking. We just want a piece of information, which is presently when all GNWT's tangible capital assets are amortized over their expected life cycle, and in theory what that means is that you know when you have to replace it and then you budget accordingly. But it's quite clear that well, we all know that our infrastructure's in pretty rough shape so a lot of it has been completely amortized and is noted on our books as being "worth" zero dollars, and I would like to know what that total figure is, or committee thinks it...