Robert Hawkins

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m going to be speaking on the Deh Cho Bridge and the need for an independent audit and a process regarding a number of the problems.

All I can say is, if FDR was alive today, I’m sure he would describe the Deh Cho Bridge as this: The Deh Cho Bridge is a project that will live in infamy. Why? Because it has been cursed with problems. I may describe it as a ship of our great territory. I would say that it appears to have been launched without the bottle being broken, cursed from the beginning.

We all know that the 1,045 metre structure was supposed to be the pride of...

Mr. Speaker, certainly I will be supporting the motion. I was proud to be able to second this.

Quite often, we often think of education as such an amazing thing and here we have an educational renewal document that many educators are telling me that they’re concerned about the lack of input. If we want to do it right, we have to make sure we get off on a good foot. Any home builder will tell you that you can’t construct a good, sound, quality home without building a solid foundation. I consider this 10-year plan, this renewal, should be a solid foundation, one that is so firm and so strong it...

Thank you. So, then, there are deficiencies. Okay, so how much was the negotiated contract negotiated for with the folks in Fort Providence in partnership with Ruskin? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My first set of oral questions was, if I may define it as chapter one on the Deh Cho Bridge today. Now chapter two, I’d like to talk about the deficiencies and certainly the outstanding deficiencies left on the Deh Cho Bridge. I see the Minister is flipping papers so I’ll do a little bit of a stretched out intro.

The issue is such that we need to fully understand what the deficiencies are. So, I’d like to ask the Minister about some of them in particular, but let’s start off by enlightening the public. With the list of deficiencies, although I don’t have them, would the...

Mr. Speaker, the Auditor General looked at a certain area. The Levelton Report looked at a certain area, but it never looked at investigating on who worked to derail the project, who released information, who harassed the lender, of that type. Those are the things the taxpayers deserve answers to. We have 200 million reasons to ask ourselves, did someone try to scuttle this project from day one. That’s the question I am after, not one of those things. The Department of Transportation looking at themselves I highly doubt that they will look at themselves under that type of scrutiny.

My question...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement today, I talked about the need for what one could call an independent audit on the Deh Cho Bridge and certainly the process. We definitely need an independent audit that has teeth. Of course, as many of us will remember, there seemed to be always questions about internal information being released at a weird time, and certainly rumours about people calling the lender and harassing them about the incompetence of both government and the bridge management. That didn’t play well on to the government when we were saddled with the $200 million end...

As part of developing the Northwest Territories’ policy approach to hydraulic fracturing, representatives of the Standing Committee on Economic Development and Infrastructure joined a delegation led by the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment on a tour of the Bakken shale formation in Saskatchewan and North Dakota, between September 29th and October 4, 2013.

The delegation, made up of the Minister; Members of the Legislative Assembly; staff from the departments of Environment and Natural Resources, and Industry Tourism and Investment; the Northwest Territories Geoscience Office; the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Undoubtedly, I have no issue whatsoever in supporting this particular motion.

We must seize upon every single opportunity to help solve this problem. This is not the panacea for this issue, but yet it is moving the file forward. Enforcement of liquor laws is a necessity. We cannot miss any opportunity to do this. We must not get distracted by the fact that, yes, this is a new adventure that we must be heading into, but we must see it as truly an opportunity to do something for this particular problem.

Abuse of alcohol certainly has been well stated, well written and will...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. How much is left in the reserve to address all these deficiencies and would the Minister table publicly a list of all the deficiencies so we know what we’re dealing with? Thank you.

Thank you. There are a lot of deficiencies and I understand are still outstanding on this particular bridge. As such, that’s why I was asking for it publicly. I don’t have a copy, but I can certainly start with one of the deficiencies to enlighten him.

As I understand, right now the scour rock issue at the Deh Cho Bridge is still outstanding and I thought it was being addressed through a negotiated contract. Would the Minister be able to confirm if there was a negotiated contract to solve the scour rock problem and, as such, is it still in place? Because I certainly have seen not one but two...