Mahsi, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, today I’d like to speak about some of the recent negative developments that the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board has been experiencing over the past couple of months. The federal government, as we are all aware, Madam Speaker, made a chair appointment without the consent of northerners and this government. Last April, the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board raised the issue of conflict of interest of the chair and in rebuttal the chair suspended the board operations, which could and has resulted in serious repercussions to mineral explorations in the form of jobs to northerners and potential future developments within the Northwest Territories being shelved by exploration companies, which we have already witnessed last week with the seven applications that were put on hold because of the petty quarrelling amongst many board members and the chair.

Madam Speaker, not only has the appointment of a non-northerner by the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, Andy Scott, and supported by our own MP, Ethel Blondin-Andrew, opened up some old wounds already within the unsteady

Mackenzie Valley Environmental Impact Review Board and now the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board, and also now in our bureaucratically bloated regulatory regime here in the North, but the federal non-northerner appointee is now pouring salt on the wound by suspending the board’s business of issuing permits in a timely manner.

Madam Speaker, all this mayhem could have been avoided had the federal government, more specifically Minister Scott and MP Blondin-Andrew, heeded the advice of northerners. What do we as northern residents and government representatives have to do in order to be taken more seriously by our federal counterparts?

Issues that are specifically northern related can and should be resolved by northerners in true northern fashion, which is by consensus and merit, and viewed as favourable by all northerners. This has to be considered sacred, not just out of respect, but because only northerners know what is good for northerners. I would encourage this government’s leadership to express our frustration and disagreement toward the legislative process and establishment of such an important regulatory body, and take responsibility and the leadership position to direct the board to act and work effectively and cooperatively on behalf of northerners and not put northern development on hold for personal agendas. Mahsi, Madam Speaker.

---Applause