Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I was trying to decide on a topic to speak to today, and I didn’t have one until I got in here and I heard my colleague from Mackenzie Delta mention dust. Right away I thought of the Dempster Highway, so I thought that is a good topic to speak of today. It is Friday and a lot of people from Inuvik will be driving out on the highway. I believe the ferries are in, so there will be a lot of traffic on the highways. I think the Department of Transportation relies on dust control, but this time of year all of their dust control melts; it is called “snow.”
I had the opportunity last weekend — I was in Inuvik — to go for a picnic, and I couldn’t believe the amount of dust that was there. There was a bit of dust control, but I blinked and I missed it. Mr. Speaker, when the dust clears, you realize that you have passed where you were going. It is an awfully dangerous highway. I don’t know what it is going to take for the department to realize that they need to do something about that highway. Not only for the travelling public, and it being the 50th anniversary of Inuvik…. We are expecting quite a few visitors for the homecoming. They are going to have to drive that highway, but we have to think about the safety and well-being of the people in the Beaufort-Delta who drive that highway all the time.
We hear some of the Members talk about your highways down here and how terrible they are. I have had the opportunity to drive them, and I tell you: you drive the Dempster Highway and you’ll never be complaining about these highways down here again. That’s all we are asking. We are not asking to chipseal from Inuvik to the border, even though that would be nice. I hope I am alive to see that day. I probably would have to live for a couple hundred of years to see that. We are not asking for pavement. All we are asking for is some dust control from Inuvik to the NWT border so that we have the opportunity to enjoy some of the same driving conditions you have down here.
We have the opportunity to actually finally see some of the beautiful country on the Dempster Highway — as I’ve said before, you don’t want to take your eyes off the road on that highway because you never know where you are going to end up. It has been proven before Mr. Speaker; unfortunately, we lost a few people to the driving conditions on that highway. I don’t think it was because of the driving. I think it was just the state of the highway itself. I’d like to see Transportation seriously look into it. If nothing is going to be done about it, then changes might need to be made within the department.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Item 4, recognition of visitors in the gallery. The honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Krutko.
