Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Member for Nahendeh, Mr. Menicoche.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask Mr. Premier some questions about the devolution consensus agreement that we have signed. Devolution is mostly known for decision-making and control of resources. However, Chapter 7 has a big human resources component, more specifically with regard to transfer of jobs. I’d like to ask the Minister… Well, just quoting from Chapter 7, it says, “We want to have a knowledgeable, experienced and stable workforce as of April 1, 2014.” I know there are roughly 150 jobs in Ottawa. I just want to know how our government is working towards that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. The honourable Premier, Mr. McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I guess the big number in the Devolution Agreement is the amount of money. Obviously, we want as many people or federal incumbents that are in those jobs to come over. But at the end of the day, we make the decision of how many jobs we will have. Obviously, we will be making job offers and the agreement requires us to make sure that every federal employee that comes over is no worse off than they are now financially, and we are required to adhere to that for three years. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I’m a little concerned about the human resource plan to fill these positions. I know that the agreement speaks about offering the current federal incumbents and in Ottawa, six months prior to April 1, 2014. I’m concerned that I’m hearing that not many of them will actually come here. So how are we planning to fill these positions?
Also, I’d like to hear the Premier’s experience when Arctic Airports transferred in 1995 and, as well, when Forest Management was transferred to us in 1987. What was the experience there of transferring federal employees north? Thank you.
I think we’ve had very good success with devolution in the past. As I’ve mentioned, we’ve had about… I think every program that’s with the Government of the Northwest Territories was a federal program at one time. At every instance we’ve been very successful at getting the incumbents to come over. I think the airports transfer was very successful as well. I think we’ve got some of the best airports operating around. The reason we’re using six months is so we can get an early indication from those who are not intending to come as part of the devolution, so we can either go out to competition or fill from within. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
A lot of these jobs, of course, are in lands and resources. I imagine most of them are technical and specialized positions. We haven’t seen the list. We’re still working, of course, with our Cabinet colleagues to pay attention to this.
What is the current strategy to look at these positions? Is there a plan B for those positions that people don’t want to transfer north? What is the plan B for our government to fill those positions? Thank you.
We also learned a lot from division of the Northwest Territories, where Nunavut had transition agreements with the Government of the Northwest Territories. So we are looking at the possibility of doing that. We are also fully committed to decentralization. I expect that we’ll be able to handle the human resource requirements during the transition so we can continue to function without missing a beat. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Menicoche.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I think that’s my concern, is we don’t want to be missing a beat on April 1, 2014. What is the strategy for our government to ensure that these positions are filled from anybody from Ottawa who doesn’t want to come over? I know it’s the Northwest Territories; in fact, I would encourage them to come over. But in the event that does not happen, I know a lot of them have families and they’re entrenched in Ottawa. So what is that plan B? What is our strategy and is there a team set up to review this and come up with a good plan to fill those positions here in the Northwest Territories? Thank you.
We do have quite a number of committees that are working on all these different issues and we’ll be providing that information in the very near future. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Moses
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I was very glad to hear the Minister’s statement, the Minister responsible for the NWT Power Corporation, and the work that he’s doing, and the agreements that he’s signed for the liquefied natural gas, looking to address the energy needs in the fuel needs that we have for our community of Inuvik. So I have a couple of questions of clarity and to get some specifics.
I’d like to ask the Minister how long, the agreement that he signed, how long is the agreement for. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. Minister responsible for the Power Corporation, Mr. Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I believe the term is five years with a clause in there that would allow us to renegotiate, should a source become available that’s closer to us than is currently the case. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, with the agreement signed, when can the residents and businesses start seeing the prices drop with the transportation and the delivery of this LNG to the community of Inuvik? When can we start seeing that type of energy coming into the community? Thank you.
Thank you. As I indicated in my Minister’s statement today, what we’re aiming for is to be as fully functional as we can by this fall as it pertains to being able to use liquid natural gas and generation of electricity. Thank you.
Thank you. I was just trying to get a specific date because I will be getting questions, I’m sure, from constituents. So this fall we’ll be keeping an eye on it.
When we start getting this flow of LNG to the community of Inuvik, can the Minister outline where this LNG will be stored and is there enough storage space for the LNG when it gets to the community of Inuvik? Thank you.
Thank you. It’s going to be close to the generation site in Inuvik. They’re currently looking at clarifying and finalizing the details on the tankage and vaporization equipment that is going to be required, but it, of course, will be as close as we can actually get it to where it’s going to be used. Thank you.
Thank you. Just in regard to following up in terms of storage space, right now we have a synthetic gas storage that can only last and hold for five days, should the Dempster shut down or ice roads, those kind of things.
When we set up this facility, how long will the LNG be there and how many days storage will we have for the community of Inuvik? Thank you.
Thank you. In Inuvik we’ll have full diesel redundancy. So the storage requirements are going to be, at this point, 90 days and we’ll rely on being able to manage the supply in bringing the replenishment within that 90 days. The reason we say that we can manage with the 90-day supply is that we do have full diesel redundancy so that should there be a weather closure or something else untoward happen, then we would be able to still have no break in service. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. The Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to follow up on questions from my colleague Mr. Nadli to the Minister of ENR on the Protected Areas Strategy and see if we can seek some clarification for the very, very confused partners that are out there wondering what’s going on with GNWT positions.
Last spring this government decided it wouldn’t comment on the recommendation reports and started to block their release. I’m told GNWT asked that work in the Deh Cho be moved to the land claims table, even though all parties agreed at the beginning of this work that these are not claims issues, a position reaffirmed by regional First Nations in recent letters to the federal and territorial governments.
So my first question. Will this government continue on the long-agreed process to develop and get in gear to supply its comments on the recommendations, reports and have them publicly reviewed? Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The Minister of Finance, Mr. Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a number of hours booked with ENR tomorrow at eight o’clock in the morning and I will confirm that issue, but let me just restate our commitment to the long-term over this process.
We’ve been involved for years. We’ve continued to, and we’ll continue to, be involved in the process. I would like to point out, as well, some of the political changes in the Deh Cho, for example, tend to confuse the issue as well when you start having overlap issues with ADK and other communities, and now the K’atlodeeche, in fact, as well, has indicated they’re pulling out of the Dehcho. But in spite of that, we are going to be fully committed and the Premier gave that commitment to the grand chief, as well, a number of weeks ago. Thank you.
Thank you. The Minister has told me by letter that the GNWT will work with Canada to conclude Edehzhie, which I appreciate, but then with respect to all of the other areas, National Wildlife Areas proposed, the GNWT appreciates the significant work undertaken. What does that statement mean? Thank you.
Thank you. As I indicated in previous questions, there have been meetings recently with the grand chief and some of the leadership from the Dehcho. There was an agreement to bilateral process to make sure we are fully engaged at the land claims and land use table, which would allow us to resolve some of these outstanding issues. We are committed to concluding Edehzhie and, as I indicated as well, I met, when we were down in Ottawa for the Northwest Territories Days, with Minister Kent and raised the issue of the funds that are currently identified for the candidate areas and the need for us to work out an arrangement to make sure that funding continues on past the implementation date for devolution. Thank you.
Thank you. I hope and I appreciate the work that’s being done there to clear up this confusion, and I hope to confirm that. The Minister has also told me in a letter that final decisions on the boundary and establishment of a protected area will take place after devolution. Again, what does this mean? This is clearly a stall statement. What does this mean and has this also been taken care of in recent statements, negotiations with our partners? There are other partners, of course, besides Frist Nations out there. Mahsi.
Thank you. I do understand that there is some consternation out there. I met with the folks from Ducks Unlimited, where they voiced their concern on behalf of the people they’ve been talking to and who they represent. We’ve heard it here in this House today. We’ve seen it in the press where some are trying to imply or impute that somehow after devolution, that this government, which I think is a leader when it comes to environmental issues and alternative energy, wildlife issues, land issues, water issues, is somehow going to turn its back on what the people of this territory have been clear that they want it dealt with for the last 17 Assemblies and it is causing needless fear and consternation.
So after devolution, when we’re fully through this process, we’re going to continue on with our commitment. We’ve negotiated these bilateral agreements with the Dehcho, for example, and I would point out once again in the Deh Cho, for example, the fact that there’s been political decisions made in terms of communities splitting away from the Dehcho Process and wanting to have their own areas. There is now overlap issues, there is debate between communities over candidate area and sizes. So we will work with the parties, all of them, including non-government, and I want to reassure folks that we are committed to this process and I will be, in fact, in this House tomorrow doing a statement on the Protected Areas Strategy to provide hopefully even more comfort. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Minister’s remarks. I can’t say I’ve got much comfort yet, but I’ll look forward to that statement.
Another statement from the Minister in his letter, “The GNWT will be promoting the use of northern tools for any future areas.” This sounds like a unilateral decision to me and ignores the partners and considerable work done. I wonder, does this mean there is no support for the National Wildlife Areas in the federal dollars that are available now, but will disappear if we don’t take them up on this? It sounds like the Minister will not support National Wildlife Areas and the flexibility that they bring. So what is the meaning of the Minister’s statement this time? Mahsi.
Thank you. It means, very simply, that there is a federal process and they have put some money aside for candidate areas, that devolution is being negotiated, that we as a territory have tools that we’ve talked about but not used very well and there may be other tools we need to in fact develop as we manage the land and resources.
I have had discussions with the federal Minister about the federal money that is there. This process, this protected area process was in place I believe before I became a Member 18 years ago and it works, the wheels turn very slow and fine. We’re at step five for all those other areas, which means there could be years yet if you look at the timelines and what we’ve done and how long it’s taken to conclude some of these further areas. We’re going to look at what options we have as a territory. We don’t want to be totally reliant on the federal government in the National Wildlife Area approach, and I’ve had discussions with Minister Kent about that money being left there and used there for either of us for Northerners, regardless of whether it’s a federal designation or it’s a territorial designation.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. The honourable Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.
QUESTION 241-17(4):
EMERGENCY SEARCH AND RESCUE PROTOCOLS FOR SMALL COMMUNITIES
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In my Member’s statement I talk about emergency search and rescue effort in Tulita last summer and the help of many people across the Northwest Territories. I want to ask the Minister of MACA if his department has this type of initiative that they can go forward in helping communities like Tulita where people just got together and did the right thing and people later on joined helping out with funding and other sorts of things. We need some help in our small communities. Is the Minister willing to look at some of these kinds of concepts that the Tulita people are asking for help?
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The honourable Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs, Mr. Robert McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. First of all I want to commend the people of Tulita and all the other communities that have good emergency plans. They seem to jump into action right away and they deal with the situations that are presented before them. We work closely with a number of the communities. We’ve been trying to work with them to update their emergency plans. As I’ve said in this House before, we have 16 communities that are updated. There are 15 we still have to work on updating theirs and there are a couple that we need to get them started on theirs. There is plenty of opportunity. A lot of emergency committees in the communities do take it upon themselves to raise some money for emergencies, but we will work closely with the community of Tulita and other communities to make sure they all have a good, updated emergency plan.
The community of Tulita and the people in the Sahtu, even government departments came and said, what can we do within these couple of hours we have. The hamlet did a fantastic job. The government showed up with resources. They allowed their people to come and help us. That’s the right thing to do in the small communities.
I want to ask the Minister, with regard to the emergency search and rescue funding, can the Minister bring forward a type of initial discussion paper to see how we can fund these emergency search and rescue efforts in our communities?
That’s just what communities do regardless of where they work and what they do, there is a need to come together and they come together. I think all communities should be commended for that. I will commit to the Member that we’ll look at this. There have been pots of funding available from the federal government that we have been able to tap into, but one of the programs is discontinued so we’ll have to see what they roll out for a new program. I commit to the Member that as a department and as a government, we try to find ways that we can access any kind money for the communities to assist them with their plans.
I look forward to the Minister’s proposal or discussion here. The emergency search and rescue needed some walkie-talkies, other equipment for ground search, water search, and that’s the type I’m looking for from this Minister. If he could work with his colleagues and look through his department and say, what can we commit to this emergency search and rescue kit that we have in any one of our communities in the Northwest Territories. Will the Minister look at that?
In a number of communities, as I’ve said before, they do take it upon themselves to do some fundraising for this exact piece of equipment. In some cases through the community government with the money that they receive from MACA as far as infrastructure goes, then they may have an opportunity to access some of that. We would have to work on it again and see what we can do to assist the communities again.
Communities, in many cases, take it upon themselves to try and access all this type of equipment, and we would assist them in trying to find the best pieces of equipment and giving them more of an advisory role. If there are opportunities, again, for any monies to be allocated, then we would have to explore that with Cabinet and committee.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Frame Lake, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to just follow up from the last answer that I received from the Premier on my previous set of questions. I appreciate the Premier’s commitment to vet things through committee before they come out into the public, so to speak. I appreciate that the Premier doesn’t want to get ahead of our processes or protocols.
I’d like to ask the Premier, there was a messenger service message which came with his name on the bottom of it on this Monday, March 11th, which stated, to prepare for the integration of transferring programs, our organizational structure will undergo some changes. It then laid out the departments that we are likely to see some changes in.
Can the Premier explain to me why this messenger service comes out and yet we have to wait for committee to provide input?
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. The honourable Premier, Mr. McLeod.
Maybe the Member could clarify. First there’s not enough information, now she’s saying there’s too much information going out. We want to make sure that we do this properly and we will commit… We had talked to the Members about those departments and we’re waiting for feedback.
If the Premier wants to think that I am conflicted that’s fine, he can think that. I don’t understand how we can have the information coming to a messenger service which goes to all GNWT employees and not consider that to be in the public realm. If it is already in the public realm. Can the Premier tell me what our new department structure will look like after April 1, 2014?
I’m quite prepared to do that, if committee obviously agrees with that, that they want me to go out and make these announcements to the public before I get feedback from them. In an abundance of caution, I will wait until I hear back from committee.
