Thank you, Mr. Speaker. For the past few months the Yellowknifer newspaper has supplied us with a new and I think very valuable feature, and that is with the assistance of the RCMP and their crime statistics, a snapshot of a very, very real side of life in Yellowknife. It has the number of assaults, break-ins, impaired driving, public drunkenness and shop lifting complaints handled by the Yellowknife RCMP detachment. The headlines are disturbing. There were 528 calls for RCMP service in the two-week period between May 3rd and 16th, Mr. Speaker. Thirty percent of these involved alcohol. That is more than 20 a day. We know that hard drug use is rapidly escalating, and enforcement authorities would say in Yellowknife we have a drug and alcohol epidemic.

This community though, is demonstrating that it knows there are problems, and it is showing that it wants to do something about it. It is getting involved, and it is taking leadership. The Community Wellness Coalition and its Citizens on Patrol -- or COPs -- program, are working to deal with the street issues of alcohol and drug abuse. The Salvation Army, the YWCA and the Native Women’s Association are working to come to grips with alcohol and its devastating effects, and they are to be congratulated for their efforts. Now is the time for this government to show that it too can and should be getting involved with alcohol and its abuse.

I was very pleased to hear Premier Handley’s commitment in mid-April that this government is finally going to rewrite the Liquor Act. It is 75 pages, Mr. Speaker. It is one of the more complex and regrettably one of our more outdated pieces of legislation. My personal view is that most alcohol abuse problems don’t occur in bars and drinking establishments. They happen in homes and at house parties where spousal and family abuse takes a tremendous toll, especially on kids. They happen in motor vehicle and boat accidents, where people are hurt and killed. Alcohol abuse happens at workplaces and jobsites, where it cuts productivity and threatens safety.

Mr. Speaker, previous governments of the NWT I think have been in a state of denial regarding alcohol abuse. Positive strides have been made regarding tobacco reduction. Can’t we do the same with alcohol? I think we are on the verge of doing that. Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to conclude my statement.

Speaker: MR. SPEAKER

The Member is seeking unanimous consent to conclude his statement. Are there any nays? There are no nays. You have unanimous consent to conclude your statement.

Bill Braden

Great Slave

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In a newsletter that I recently distributed to my riding, Mr. Speaker, I proposed that this government should consider taking a review to a new step in that we would be probably looking at two acts governing the way we control liquor. Mr. Speaker, one act would provide an effective business framework for the supply, the taxation and the pricing of alcohol. The other, and the far more significant one, the one we really need, is to legislate an entirely new approach for the prevention, awareness, enforcement, treatment and community empowerment, a social approach to the way we manage alcohol. My constituents have repeatedly told me that frontline social issues, many of which are impacted by alcohol, can and must be dealt with head on by this government. I look forward to a territory-wide review, which is long overdue, in the way we manage liquor here in the NWT. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

---Applause