Wally Schumann

Yes, the rail traffic has been affected, particularly around the High Level fire, not even the new fire that's around the Steen River area. There has been no rail traffic for over a week already. Infrastructure has been in conversation with CN Rail. They have been out there and checked out their asset. They are inspecting it, then doing a weight test on the rail tracks and bridges to make sure that everything is copacetic once they are able to open back up. As of today, none of their infrastructure has actually been affected by the railroad, but we are continuing to work with CN to stay...

The short answer is no. The reason for that is, based on the information that we are getting out of the Alberta department of ENR, whatever their title is in Alberta, this fire is out of control at the present time. It is not safe to be able to escort people through there. They have to get a better understanding of the fire's behaviour. We will be working, as I have said, very closely with these people to get a better understanding of when this will be able to be done. All is I know is today we have north winds down there again, the fire is right along the side of the highway, and it is plus...

As I said, the money that we applied for CanNor will actually give us some pinpoint ideas of what we need to do around that, but one of the big things, I think, that we are doing this year is that, as this House knows, we have gone out and secured the money to purchase four double-hulled barges that will help do the resupply in these communities. The procurement process for building these is under way right now, and we are anticipating, if all goes well, that we will have delivery of these by August of 2020. This is going to help with the existing fleet of the two double-hulled barges that we...

Yes, I would, Mr. Chair.

All our bulk fuel is purchased in the summer, as I've said. That's our normal practice for the marine summer resupply. The final price of gasoline and other fuels is based on the cost of fuel and the cost of shipment to each community. The changes in sale prices are based on these costs, and we won't know what those prices are going to be typically until the end of fall, until we gather all this information.

Also, on the Member's first note, too, another effort that we are doing to help address the situation is MTS plans to mobilize and stage all fuel and dry cargo in the Nunakput region and...

Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the following three documents entitled "2017/2018 Annual Report - Northwest Territories Agricultural Products Marketing Council"; "NWT Oil and Gas Annual Report 2018"; and "Annual Report 2018-2019 NWT Office of the Regulator of Oil and Gas Operations." Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, our government is following through on its mandate commitment to strengthen connections with our public and private sector partners to secure funding for strategic infrastructure projects across the Northwest Territories. Investments in our public highway systems help to connect communities, improve public safety, ensure the efficient delivery of essential goods and services, support tourism, increase our resiliency to climate change, reduce the cost of living, and create training and employment opportunities. Investments also help attract interest from industry in the exploration...

Our department and our officials are in constant contact with the City of Yellowknife with what is happening at the visitor information centre. One of the things that has happened since we shut down the Northern Frontier Visitors Centre and moved it over to city hall. I took a lot of questions in the House about how that is going to work out. Things with the city have moved along quite well.

One of the things that has happened since we have closed down the visitors centre is the number of tourists who actually went to the city's tourists information centre has almost doubled. The department was...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Normally I credit the Member for doing his homework, but there were three designs, actually, that we have received on this. I'm just teasing him. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

We received three concept designs as part of this planning process, and through that, we want to go to the next step to develop a schematic design over the summer in 2019, but this is going to largely depend on some of the technical work that has been recently wrapped up on this building. We are waiting to hear back on these geotechnical and structural reports. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The Department of Infrastructure did not pay for any off-specification fuel that we received, and the supplier arranged for the recovery of the off-specification fuel at their own expense and took it back.