Sandy Lee

But, Mr. Speaker, let me tell you, I have been through many, many briefings where the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation and the Community Alliance sees this as a great opportunity for them to partake in all the activities that are going on in North Slave area that they have not been able to take advantage of. They’re not near the diamond mines, they’re not near anywhere in the pipeline corridor, this is going to be a P3 partnership project where they will be able to get some profit out of this so that they can spend that money to invest in their communities. Anybody who questions about the value of...

Mr. Speaker…Mr. Speaker, let me conclude by saying, if I may, if I may conclude by saying…

That’s what governments do. Governments build schools, they build hospitals, they build roads. We don’t always ask what’s in it for us in terms of profit. These are public infrastructure and governments are supposed to do that.

Mr. Speaker, for anybody to say that we are sort of putting this in the front of the queue at the expense of another, has not done enough research. Mr. Speaker, people out there expect us to act on some of the things. This has been on the books for eight years. I will submit to you, Mr. Speaker, this is one of the rare projects that actually went through a...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I think there is a need for the government to do more and do everything we can to create job opportunities for summer students while they are here. It enhances their work experience as well as giving them extra resources that they could use to go to school, which his very important. Could I ask the Minister to vamp it up a little bit and get more proactive and ask the departments to look for opportunities. If they have money in the budget to spend, if they could create jobs to make sure as many students are hired as possible. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions today are for the Minister of Human Resources and it’s with regard to the summer student employment. Mr. Speaker, since the Minister made a statement a few days ago about the status of the summer student situation and the questions I asked yesterday or the day before about the fact that there appears to be a lot less summer students being hired this year than in previous years, I have received more phone calls from parents who really feel that this government is reducing the number of student jobs available. The Minister is indicating that...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That concludes the Report of the Standing Committee on Social Programs on Matters Related to the Child and Family Services Act. Therefore, I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Sahtu, that Committee Report 3-15(6), be received and moved into Committee of the Whole for consideration. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, we have one more, the last committee motion. I move that this committee recommends that the government provide a comprehensive response to this report within 120 days. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to report from the Standing Committee on Social Programs Report on Matters Related to Child and Family Services Act. But before I do that, I would just like to take a moment to say a special thanks to the hard-working committee of Social Programs.

Thank you, Madam Chair. The Standing Committee on Social Programs read into this House, for the record, the committee report. It dealt with issues arising out of our committee’s review of the amendment to the Child and Family Services Act. In our discussions and public hearings, we came to realize that there were lots of concerns that were brought to us by the members of the public, as well as within our committee. We chose to file a different report on that because we realize that some of those issues that were brought up were not within the…(inaudible)…of the amendment which was quite...

To say in all the three bullets here, studying the cost of living issues, it suggests that somehow this bridge will increase the cost of living, and this is why I had to do the whole song and dance about the fact that in fact the case is completely reverse, the case is completely reverse. This bridge will reduce the cost of living for the North and for Yellowknife and the surrounding area. We have to do everything we can, it will benefit everybody, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we have to do something to avoid a situation that we had earlier in the month when we are at risk of running out of...