Robert Hawkins

Thanks, Mr. Speaker. I too wish to acknowledge and recognize a couple constituents. First off, Ms. Julie Green, a well-known person here in Yellowknife for her many activities. Thank you very much for your hard work. I believe Grant Gowans is still a constituent of Yellowknife Centre, if he hasn’t moved and, of course, if he’s still up there. Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’ll just speak briefly. A few weeks ago I raised the issue of wanting to see further support from the department through the Arctic Energy Alliance for doors and windows. Since that time I’ve learned that there is an extremely small, I wouldn’t want to even call it meagre because that would sound like there’s something, but there is an extreme sliver of support for insulation, and I think we could be doing a lot more. I have yet to hear back from the Minister as to what the department plans to do or how they plan to move forward on that initiative.

Again, as I talked...

I want to assure my good friends from the Sahtu that I’m not wanting to take away from their road. I think the Mackenzie Valley Highway merits stand on their own. This road would provide close community access to major infrastructure and connect family, food, people, everything. You name it, it comes with all the fantastic benefits.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m going to ask questions to the Minister of Transportation. Just before I do that, of course, I’d like to send a little hello and a shout out to Patrick Joss who is watching our proceedings here all the way in Ulukhaktok. It’s really exciting that we have people watching.

Speaking of people watching, many of the people I had talked to in Gameti wanted to know when the Tulita winter road would be worked on as a capital project and when would money be put into the capital plan so they can eventually see the Tulita winter road connect from Highway No. 3 all the way to at...

Is the Minister able to speak to the issue of when we think it will be repaired? I mean, I can do my own math at $40,000 a day. The territorial resident needs to appreciate and understand are these parts available, are we going to see the NWT Power Corp run on diesel for how long? That’s part of the issue here, is we’ve got a dedicated service, which only has parts that probably can be sourced from one or two places in the world, who knows where, and we need to appreciate how long and how complex this is. So can the Minister speak to the availability of this? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to use the opportunity to ask some questions to the Minister of the Northwest Territories Power Corp about the latest damage and repair process that’s happening. As I see news reports point that it’s costing the NWT Power Corp over $40,000 a day additional to run that operation, that burden is going to fall on someone. Maybe the Minister can highlight what’s being done and how we’ll recover some of that process to make sure that that cost isn’t falling on the NWT residents.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Once again, I say to my very senior Member across the way, who probably didn’t hear me for various reasons, I don’t know why, I’m saying let’s create a tax holiday for infrastructure investment that’s new. I gave a targeted sector such as the communications sector a way to help stimulate new growth. I’m not talking about lowering the business tax on any other sector, for any other reason on anything. I’m talking about creating any investment climate, such as a tax holiday.

Quebec can do it. They have the courage to attract new investment. Let’s target sectors that work...

I appreciate that because I’d hate to see the Minister wrong twice, so I’m really glad we got through that.

The Quebec government has worked very hard to create a taxation scheme that develops and accelerates private sector investment in their economy through strategic sectors they’ve targeted, such as industry, manufacturing and data processing hosting. They realize focused tax opportunities create investment.

What is this government doing about creating investment in targeted sectors for growth? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Minister can say what he wants, but the fact is this Member is trying to do something and the Minister is trying to defend the status quo. The point is we have to encourage investments, outside investment, in order to create growth and jobs. That’s all I hear is lip service from this government. Here’s a real opportunity, Mr. Speaker.

Will the Minister go back to the table and say how can we target markets to encourage investment in the Northwest Territories? As far as the Mackenzie Fibre Optic Link, we are paying for it and we don’t tax ourselves. We want outside...

Governments have been very generous on tax holidays and I see his point about, well, let’s just put one particular issue on the table, but often we hear, well, we shouldn’t single out an industry. So now I’m hearing we should single out an industry. So I’ll say, would the Minister be able to create a tax environment that invests in communication equipment? He so rightly highlighted the $80 million investment in the Fibre Optic Link. Well, here we are drawing the attention of the world. Why don’t we expand a little further so that attention of the world gets investment in our communities...