Debates of January 20, 2004 (day 1)

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to start by complimenting Mr. Handley on his sessional address and the messages that he has again sent to the Assembly and to the people of the NWT about the desires that we have to really be an Assembly that demonstrates how consensus can work, and how we can get on and really prove by our actions that we can and will do a good job.

This morning, as my colleague Mrs. Groenewegen indicated in her statement, we heard on CBC news that Minister Michael Miltenberger was suggesting that sweeping changes to health, social services and education boards and authorities were in the offing. My concern, Mr. Speaker, is not with the substance of the idea but, at this early point in our Assembly, with how it was presented.

Hearing of an issue, even in the most general ways, but of something with the scope and the range of this kind of news is not the way we want to operate. It compromises us, Mr. Speaker, as regular Members, when we hear about this kind of thing outside of our process or, indeed, as one of our Members did in the coffee shop first thing this morning. It forces us into a reactive mode and, as I’m doing right now, a critical mode.

I don’t want to work this way, Mr. Speaker. I want to be collaborative, constructive and, where I can, supportive. This is what consensus is all about. I know I speak for my colleagues when I say that we want to see this Assembly set a new standard for consensus. What we heard this morning, Mr. Speaker, does not meet that standard. I’d like to remind Ministers that their best sounding board, their first sounding board, is just down the hall in the offices of the Members and in our committee rooms. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Hear, hear!

---Applause