Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question today is for the Minister of Justice. We look at some of the underlying factors that lead people into poverty and sometimes it’s not necessarily the case of their fault; it’s, rather, an outside source. And in this case I’m talking about the drug dealers and the bootleggers in the communities that continue to feed off of the weaknesses and the addictions that people have in the communities. My question today is for the Minister of Justice. What are their plans to increase the RCMP presence in the communities and whether or not they are looking at increasing their RCMP canine force by including possibly another member in that area for the north region of the Northwest Territories? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. The honourable Minister of Justice, Mr. Abernethy.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you to the Member for that question. Currently the “G” Division has two fully operational drug services in the Northwest Territories. One is located here in Yellowknife; the other one is in Hay River. These teams support the division, all the detachments throughout the Northwest Territories. The dogs and their handlers also visit communities throughout the Northwest Territories, both for showcasing what they do but also to conduct investigations. This is part of our promotional anti, sort of, prevention mechanism as well.
Recently the teams attended some community visits in Inuvik and then from there they actually went out to all of the communities in the Beaufort-Delta or as many as they could get to. The RCMP needs to examine if they still need the value of these services to see if additional services will be required. Once they have done this analysis, they will be able to tell us and submit a proposal for increased dog teams in the Northwest Territories. We don’t know what the results of that review are, but once we get it, I will share that information with the Member.
With respect to what we are doing in the Northwest Territories, the Department of Justice and the RCMP division are investigating options for improving community services. These are the types of things I talked about yesterday with Minister Yakeleya. We are increasing relief unit capacity. We are increasing the number and length of patrols in the communities, and we are adding RCMP community officers who would act as liaisons between the RCMP and the communities. This research is ongoing. This information is being collected. As we bring it in, we will be able to start answering those questions more fully.
With this government we are doing a lot of discussions and priorities around economic development. There is a growing trend that we see most often is when a lot of business happens in part of the country or in this case the Northwest Territories if the oil and gas coming up. Previous, when we had our little oil and gas boom around early 2002-03, there was an increase in drugs that wrought the community, and the same thing here in Yellowknife. Having that presence is very valuable and by looking into our investments into the Beaufort-Delta, I want to confirm with the Department of Justice if they are going to be bringing increased canine units or increased RCMP services there. The time to start taking action is now for years to come and not deal with it when something happens. I want to make sure that there is a plan in place starting today, so we can offset those in years to come. Thank you.
With respect to the dog team, like I indicated in my last response, the RCMP is going to do an analysis to figure out whether there is value to bring more dog teams into the Northwest Territories. If they do, they will submit their proposal to the GNWT and that will be shared with everybody.
With respect to additional RCMP, we are negotiating a contract now. Once the contract is negotiated, we can start talking to the RCMP about how many more we can bring in. If we can bring in any, we have to do a cost-benefit analysis on that.
But there are things that we are doing here in the Northwest Territories. For instance, the GNWT Department of Justice is working on a Community Safety Strategy. This strategy will assist us in decision-making and actions about the territorial and community level to make communities safer. The objective of the strategy is to identify issues, look at long-term goals, assess capacity, and achieve those goals and identify strategies with the communities to move forward. The strategy may identify a need for new legislation and initiatives, including things like the safer communities legislation. These are the things that we are working on to increase the safety. I need to continue working with my colleagues both on this side and on that side of the House and with communities. I am looking forward to doing that and to working with you on these initiatives.
In my Member’s statement I talked about how the people of the Northwest Territories got to become empowered and speak up against the drug dealers and the bootleggers in the community, but at the same time they also need help from the GNWT and the services that we do provide. I wanted to ask the Minister of Justice if there was a policy in place that would allow RCMP officers and canine units to do more police checks, not only on the roads but in the airports doing bag checks as well as in the cargo and the transportation systems. I am not sure how well those are being looked at right now. Is there is a policy in place that provides those kinds of checks? Thank you.
We can do those things. We have to work with the communities, as the Member indicated. The communities have to take some initiative to help report these things when they are happening so we can get members in.
Last summer the RCMP also conducted enhanced patrols of lakes and the Mackenzie River, and extended highway patrols took place from July 23rd to August 5th involving several communities and partners in the “M” Division with the Yukon. We are working with our territorial partners. The objective of the patrol was to enhance public safety and police presence through high visibility and check stops; exactly what the Member is talking about. Over the duration of the patrols involving a number of communities and campgrounds, over 338 vehicles were checked and they seized a large amount of alcohol and some drugs.
Those are the types of things we are doing. We need to do more of that. We need to work with the communities. We need to work with industry. We are looking to do that. Once again, looking for cooperation from our colleagues from both sides of the House. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.
