Again, I’m encouraged by the enthusiasm of the Minister but this does require more than just the need or desire. This requires strategic framework. It requires a plan of action to keep this wave alive. I didn’t hear that in the Minister’s delivery here today. Would the Minister commit to put some type of strategy or framework strategy around our film and production industry so that we can keep this wave as long as we can in the North and be proud of the film industry that is created today?
ITI works very closely with my colleague the Minister of ECE in partnership to address gaps and explore ways to best support the film industry here in the Northwest Territories. We’re looking as we move forward at a joint annual report that will be produced jointly between ITI and ECE to identify new initiatives and progress made in the last previous year with regard to the film industry. We are working toward that. I do appreciate the Member’s concern and I do believe we are doing something about that.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I agree that annual reports are great, but annual reports tell you what you’ve done. I’m asking what you’re going to do. Can the Minister indicate if we have something we can do to protect the industry while we have it in our fingertips?
The Northwest Territories Film Commission has drafted a mandate that is supported by both ITI and ECE and I’d be more than happy to share that mandate with the Member. Also, as we go forward, I agree with the Member, if a strategic framework or strategy is required that is something we will need to consider.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. The honourable Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is for the Minister of the NWT Housing Corporation. I want to ask you how many vacant units are in the Sahtu.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The honourable Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation, Mr. Robert McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d have to find that information and pass it on to the Member.
I look forward to the reply from the Minister. I want to ask him, on the vacant units they have in the Sahtu, for example, I had a phone call from Colville Lake. There are a couple of vacant units up there. I also had a call from Chief Frank Andrew and there are a couple of vacant units in Tulita. I know there are a couple in Deline. I want to ask the Minister if his corporation has a plan on how to get people into those empty units. There are a lot of issues there, but how and what is the Minister doing to get people into those units?
I appreciate the Member telling me how many vacant units are in the Sahtu. We had a very aggressive vacant unit strategy a few years ago because of the investment that was made by the federal government. We had 135 units. We’re happy to say those are all full. We have a few new units that are going up. There may be a couple vacant in each community, but what we’re planning on doing is we’re hoping to get more and more people into those units as they qualify for some of our programs. We’ll move them in there. Compared to the situation of a couple of years ago, I think we’re down to very few vacant units now. We usually have them there for reasons to try and find suitable tenants to put in there.
When these phone calls came from the leadership in the Sahtu… I want to ask the Minister to provide me what it costs the Housing Corporation to keep them operating and functional and how long they’ve been vacant and how can we work together to hope to get my people into these housing units.
I’ll be happy to work with the Member in trying to do what we can about the vacant units. I know we are working with some potential clients not only in the Sahtu but across the Northwest Territories. We go a long ways in trying to get tenants into some of these houses, whether it’s a HELP unit or a supported lease unit or a home ownership unit. We try very hard to get them in there. Compared to the situation we had a few years ago, our vacant unit numbers are way down and these are usually there, so we can try to get some suitable tenants to put into these units.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We went to Colville Lake, Mr. Abernethy and I and Mr. Beaulieu, and we witnessed and saw the three empty units in Colville Lake. I know the Minister is working very hard to get clients in there. We certainly support that. It’s been a couple of years since we have had these empty units sitting there. We will work with the Minister to get these units occupied. There are a number of initiatives that we could look at to get the units occupied. I think it’s a crying shame that in Colville Lake there are units that have been sitting empty for so long. I’d like to ask the Minister, is he going to put something forward to us to say this is what we can do that meets the needs of our clientele in our communities to get those units occupied so people can have a house they can call home.
The Housing Corporation works very hard to try to get people into units. However, we have to make sure that these folks are able to maintain the units and we’re not setting them up for failure. We are working that particular situation. I know we’ve tried to make some contact and I’ll have conversations with the Member about that. We work very hard to get tenants into a lot of these units, the ones that have been vacant for awhile. We don’t want any more vacant units. We’ve managed to turn a lot of them into public housing units just so we can get them occupied. It is still a bit of a challenge but we’re working very hard to make sure that these units are occupied.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister of Public Works and Services today. I’d like to address a question of how we can support our arts community across the Northwest Territories and in particular through a display of art in our GNWT infrastructure. In every community this government has buildings that are frequented by our public and by visitors. It’s a real opportunity to display art and add some benefits both to the economic side and to the identification of the Northwest Territories. I’d like to start by asking the Minister whether or not we have a policy that promotes the display of our NWT artisans’ work in GNWT buildings across the NWT.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The honourable Minister responsible for Public Works and Services, Mr. Glen Abernethy.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I don’t actually know if we have a specific policy about local artists’ art on walls in public spaces within our government buildings, but I will check with the department to find out if we have anything.
I appreciate the Minister’s commitment there. To some degree I think, I don’t know, the Minister doesn’t know. I don’t know that anybody in the House knows. That’s a reflection of the situation. I think we owe it to our people, our artists, to be on top of that and get a policy in place. Would this Minister commit to, if we don’t have a policy that he can share with us, if he would commit to looking into this and getting a policy in place?
It’s an intriguing idea and it might be a great opportunity for Public Works and Services and ECE and ITI to get together to figure out how we can get local artists’ products on walls. As long as we’re not talking about consuming floor space, obviously, which is incredibly expensive, but as long as it’s walls in public parts of buildings, it’s certainly something that we should be pursuing and I’m happy to take that forward and discuss it with my ministerial colleagues to figure out exactly how we can try to make something like that happen.
Again, thanks to the Minister for that commitment. I assure him I am not asking to put big holes in walls or anything like that or take up valuable government space. To a large degree we do have artwork here and there on our walls but not necessarily NWT artwork. Hopefully the majority is. To actually display local artists would be a real service and in line with government philosophy. I like the idea of the Minister working with other ministers appropriately. I wonder if he could also maybe work with artisans across the NWT and get some input there. I’m not suggesting he travel to every community or anything like that, but I think our artists typically have some really good and creative ideas. Would he be willing to expand that consultation a little bit, putting this policy together should we need it?
I think what we’re talking about is utilizing existing wall space in the public areas of buildings where we might have an opportunity to hang product from northern artists. I will work with my colleagues and we will have conversations with some of the local artist organizations in the Northwest Territories to get their input on how to best facilitate the placement of their art, artists from the Northwest Territories, in public areas of our government buildings.
Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, thanks to the Minister. I’m already getting suggestions from my colleagues here and one suggestion is airports. I know some municipalities take advantage of that. I know the GNWT does here and there. That might be a place to also include. When it does come down to it, without putting holes in the wall or anything, where there happens to be vacant space I see nothing wrong with making space available to artists for the display of performances and so on. Perhaps the Minister could include that in his consideration.
Agreed.
Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. Item 9, written questions. Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I seek unanimous consent to return to item 6 on the Order Paper.
---Unanimous consent granted
You may proceed, Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I was remiss earlier. I need to recognize Pages who have done a lot of work for us here today and last week from the Frame Lake riding: Jaida Brunet, Rachel Latour and Brent Betsina, who are working this week, and Erin Pirker, who worked for us yesterday. Thank you to all the Pages for all their hard work.
WHEREAS diversification of energy sources away from increasingly costly and unpredictably priced fossil fuels is essential to controlling our citizens’ costs of living and business costs, fostering strong local economies and protecting the environment;
AND WHEREAS ministerial mandates direct that a new NWT Energy Plan be developed with the objectives of stabilizing energy prices in communities and reducing the cost and impacts of energy use upon the environment, and direct Ministers to take action to promote community-based alternative energy systems;
AND WHEREAS electrical energy prices alone are already scheduled to increase by more than 25 percent over the next three years, with potentially greater increases when fossil fuel prices rise further;
AND WHEREAS the experience of renewable energy initiatives to replace the use of fossil fuels in the past four years has yielded a proven record of reducing costs, creating jobs, supporting local economies and developing a new northern economic sector, with significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions;
AND WHEREAS the 16th Legislative Assembly established a fund of $60 million or $15 million per year to support the development and introduction of alternative forms of energy;
AND WHEREAS government funding for energy planning is being reduced from $6.5 million annually to $1.6 million for 2012-2013;
AND WHEREAS government funding for energy management is being reduced from $7.2 million annually to $3.5 million annually for 2012-2013;
AND WHEREAS government revenues have increased by 9.5 percent or approximately $132 million in this fiscal year;
AND WHEREAS demand from households, businesses and communities for alternative energy support programs is high, while programs are provided limited funds and are frequently oversubscribed;
AND WHEREAS this government’s plan to further subsidize the fossil fuel-dependent operations of the NWT Power Corporation, by spending a further $33.8 million in new taxpayer funds to reduce rate impacts upon consumers demonstrates the ability to make choices and find substantial new funds when needed;
NOW THEREFORE I MOVE, seconded by the honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, that the Government of the Northwest Territories reinstate funding at least equivalent to the budgets devoted by the 16th Assembly for programming in support of renewable energy generation and more efficient use of energy;
AND FURTHER, that comprehensive planning and implementation of new hydro generation and grid connections be reinstated towards the achievement of both reduced and stabilized power costs, and expansion of hydro zones to communities currently relying on diesel generation of electricity;
AND FURTHERMORE, that the government provide a response to this motion within 120 days.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The motion is in order. To the motion. Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It is time for this government to get serious about renewable energy and fully realize the potential to reduce our costs and support our people and businesses in a responsible way. This motion is about just that.
In the absence of real action, energy costs will go on soaring until we get down to it. We now have four years of experience with energy initiatives from the 16th Assembly. We have made many internal gains and learned many lessons about how to be more effective with energy expenditure. Now it is time to fund and apply this knowledge to the full benefit of our communities.
This experience, combined with a significant increase in our revenues of $132 million this year, indicates that conditions are ripe for action. What action? We are simply asking for implementation of proven technologies that exists in thousands of communities throughout Europe, the northern Scandinavian countries and elsewhere around the globe.
Currently, rather than addressing the situation, our government is letting the soaring costs of inaction accumulate in hidden ways in the form of ever-increasing energy subsidies and fuel costs. These costs are much greater than the 2 or 3 or 4 percent we would pay on a few million dollars borrowed to deliver new energy systems. Such costs include: more than doubling the $14 million per year we already subsidize electricity rates; greater than 50 percent rise in fuel costs since 2007, borne by our people, our government, our municipalities, our businesses, our environment; seniors fuel subsidies that don’t change in litres, only in cost; and so on.
Rather than wise investment towards reducing and stabilizing energy prices, we seem almost eerily content to allow these hidden costs to soar, costs that are robbing funds from the many important service delivery demands already existing and accumulating.
Our public wants and needs alternatives to fossil fuels in all our communities. Further, our people know that developing local and regional renewable energy sources will provide community jobs and local economic development, and will capture the multiplier benefits of dollars paid and spent locally instead of being sent south to businesses and jobs far away. They also know that other benefits will accrue, including environmental and social benefits to areas where our needs are so great.
If we were to commit a modest $5 million, only a fraction of what was decimated from this budget, that would be well under 1 percent of our debt limit that we fought so hard to have increased. I want to keep things in perspective here when we talk about those sort of numbers.
The budget has removed millions of dollars from the energy budgets – proposes to – in both environment and natural resources, and in industry and tourism investment, right when needs are the greatest. Choices are being made. This decision is unacceptable and we want a renewed commitment of dollars dedicated to providing stable and reduced energy prices in the NWT. We want to support and appreciate our indigenous and long-term residents, we want people living here to stay here, and we want to attract the kind of people who value sustainable living and a government that addresses this issue and the cost of living generally. Let’s get an appropriate level of energy dollars back in the books and directed towards effective delivery on community energy initiatives.
I look forward to the comments and perspectives of all my colleagues, and I will be, obviously, supporting this motion, and I would appreciate consideration. Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. To the motion. Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. First off, I will not be supporting this particular motion. I want to be clear, because I do support environmental initiatives and energy saving projects, but the difference is I actually support the ones that make sense, and certainly I’m not sure that this motion does do that.
I’ve supported, in the past, things like green bags, light bulbs, CFL adjustments, wood pellet stoves and boilers, promoting them. Even myself, I’m a proud owner of a wood pellet boiler. The thing is, I encourage people to use the opportunities and the tools that avail themselves to them to take on more energy efficient opportunities. I try to be a living example of that particular case.
From a pragmatic approach, I often try to remind people, though, it’s about making sense. We can chase every dream like the rainbow, but the fact is, some are just so unaffordable that we’re doing these things but they just don’t make sense.
I recognize the work that Mr. Bromley is trying to do here by saying, well, we need to spend more money on environmental initiatives, but the fact is, a lot of them just don’t seem to pay out. As I said earlier, I encourage everybody at every opportunity to make environmentally responsible choices to their lifestyle, and I let not an occasion go by without trying to encourage people to live better and smarter and do the right thing that not only is just for them but is for the environment as well.
Part of the issue that I’m raising here today from my perspective is the fact that these initiatives, by and large, need to have some type of payback on investment. Now, I understand the large moral conviction many people have, and sometimes that’s why we make these types of commitments. My wife and I bought a hybrid, not believing that it would financially pay itself out on the bottomline, but we felt it was important it was built on the moral commitment of the type of life and lessons we’re trying to teach not only ourselves, but teach our children. Sometimes, I have to tell you, our kids come home and teach us lessons about doing things better.
I feel that some of these actions that are environmentally focused, the responsibility also has to be the fact that we have to make sure that they’re useful and they actually do pay something back. Can the GNWT afford to spend more money on these energy projects without guarantee of any type of return on our investment? Often we hear the Finance Minister talk about how tight our finances are and how we just heard the status quo budget. I mean, status quo usually means no imagination but my fear is if they had gone with too many environmental projects that weren’t designed to pay back, I mean, who knows what that would cost us and what benefit over the long run.
In my view, we need to start setting achievable goals and meaningful dialogue on this particular case so we can help set targets when we decide that we’re going to make environmental initiatives and they’re actually going to be useful and pay back. We need to make investments that actually, like I said, have a return on investment.
Previous funding, in my view, certainly was not invested money wisely spent. I think a lot of the projects, although meaning well, didn’t actually show much in return. Sixty million dollars went out to about 20 projects and, certainly, they include some interesting goals, but we certainly spent some money on hydro facilities in Lutselk'e, Whati, Deline, Tulita, Taltson expansion, transmission lines, wind energy, solar power subsidies, and certainly a number of policy reviews. As many Members will remember, we also spent a fair bit of money on smaller projects such as solar power for swimming pools, wood pellet boilers in public buildings and the increased presence of the Arctic Energy Alliance in our communities. For $15 million allocated each year in the 16th Assembly, the question of general consumer – and I should say the taxpayer – is always asking, so what was delivered and did we achieve any actual savings on these particular things other than spending $60 million, in total that is.
So as many people know, the NWT Power Corp had to shut down some of their initiatives because they just proved unpractical and certainly not affordable. So would this just be another fund built with great ideals, focus on moralities of how we wish we could do things but they have no payback? When things are tight and we hear about how much more the Power Corporation is going to keep raising our power bills and costing us money, I mean, we have to rethink how we do business.
Yes, we need to spend money on new technologies and at times you’ll even hear me be a supporter of some that are new initiatives, but during these times of restraint, we have to actually worry about what actually works and actually makes money. If we’re just throwing money out the window, we should just be writing cheques to our citizens rather than just spending money on useless projects that don’t actually have a return.
Yes, there are projects that actually make a good return and I’ve seen certain cases where pellet boilers in schools and even at the Legislative Assembly here had a refocus on how we use energy, but this is few and far between. Sixty million dollars didn’t pay for three pellet boilers; it paid for a lot of projects that didn’t work.
So that’s the type of dynamic I’m talking about. We have projects that we know can work and bring a return on the bottom line, and we have a lot of projects we hope will do something that have no effect other than costing us money.
I’ll return to some of the examples here. The Lutselk’e mini hydro turned out to have such mega costs, and even the Taltson expansion originally intended to send power to diamond mines was shelved. Even the price tag on Bluefish is somewhere around $37 million, although we continue to pour money into policy reviews, with very little return. The question is: How much more money?
I recognize Mr. Bromley’s point about continuing to spend money on power subsidies and that does become a burden on the system by and large and that’s not right, but we should be really asking ourselves what makes money in the sense of a return, because it’s important to use our money wisely. Yet again, what little money we seem to have. I mean, whenever you hear an initial project asked by anybody on the Member’s side, there’s never any money, but boy he’s got $60 million that he got covered up really fast by the last Cabinet and although it may not technically be in the Minister’s riding, it sure looked like it from our point of view.
So in spite of all these green initiatives and intentions, Norman Wells, as we know, and even Inuvik have lost their natural gas sources and the GNWT is now totally unprepared on how to implement a viable energy program to supplement the diesel.
I’ve been using many occasions to remind different folks that maybe the GNWT needs to do a full accounting on what the Inuvik gas problem will cost us. Maybe we should become an investor in the spur line just outside of Inuvik, and maybe we could own a new gas utility and be an investor rather than switching our assets over to diesel. There could be an opportunity that actually brings us money.
The argument for $60 million more investment, like many people ask, what will it do for the cost of living of the average person; a person who sits at the table, looks across and sees their kids and asks themselves how are they going to pay the power bill this month or how are they going to pay the heating bill? I have yet to see that really change anywhere.
The only people that are feeding, and I should stress feeding well, are the contractors who are getting the contracts to these particular projects and policy, because they’re eating well at $60 million.
So power rates, as I said earlier, will continue to rise and it’s going to be in the high twenties over the next three years when we add it all up together. I mean, what dynamic have we really changed? Some of our disincentive to some of these great ideas from working is the reality that our population is small and our communities are spread out. That becomes a challenge. If we want to make good commitments on good moral values, then that’s really what we should be saying, is we’re doing this, it doesn’t matter what it costs, but it seems like the right thing to do and that’s why we’re doing it. I mean, let’s say that. But to fool the average person by saying don’t worry, all these things have a return on the bottom line, I think we’re misleading the constituents out there because, really, a lot of them just don’t seem to have that type of return.
Another $60 million, in my view, unprepared; it’s just a blank cheque. I’m all for doing something right, but again the payback on any of these projects is skeptical on the best day, and I’m really concerned about that. Again, I’m about spreading the money around when it makes sense, and by all means we have to make sure that we get projects out there into our communities and to our regions that help people lower their costs.
Mr. Speaker, I don’t have to lecture you on how expensive power bills are in your communities, and I have to wonder to myself, the only time we ever lower the power costs in those northern communities was by reaching in the power rates. It was a policy shift. You know, that was a piece of paper. How much money did that cost in comparison to spending $60 million on a new process?
We have experienced many successes, and those small-scale successes such as the wood pellet boilers as I had pointed out do make sense. Maybe we should be focusing in on what we do well, and let’s continue doing what we do well until we actually can figure out how we can do something else well.
I know this summer they launched a solar panel in Fort Simpson, and I applaud the thinking of this style of initiatives but, again, back to how much do these things cost and is there a real payback,
There is wide public support for alternative energies and I welcome that support on any type of project, but people always ask themselves is there a return on their particular tax dollar and that tends to be the issue. Investing more money in this particular case may be wrongly put. I mean, my colleague just keeps calling it a modest $5 million. It’s almost like it’s falling out of his pocket. He’s got so much money he can call it modest. From my point of view, $5 million is a lot of money.
If we want to invest money wisely, I’d say let’s put it into early childhood education. That’s where we’ll have a real impact on our future and on the environment, by being able to fully fund schools properly. Early childhood education, to me that is the energy of the future. That is the resource we should be stoking continually.
Local measures such as community gardens, I welcome and I certainly support those types of investments. I welcome further investment in recycling programs, and I’ve brought up even things like tire shredding and e-waste returns, different energy type of initiatives and sometimes recycling initiatives that we can get some payback from. But we cannot afford to risk $60 million of the taxpayers’ money without some type of measured result. People fear about what’s happening for the future as far as power rates. It shows how irresponsible can we be with this money.
So, in closing, I want to say I can’t support the reinstatement of this fund without some clear strategies as to how we can actually make real change that affects the bottom line. I’m not against energy initiatives, and that shouldn’t be mixed here and misunderstood. It’s about energy initiatives that don’t have a return on investment that affect the bottom line of the everyday taxpayer.
We often hear about how we try to do things for the cost of living and yet again the results bucket seems to be empty. I look, it’s hollow. There are no results there. Again, as I said earlier of course, is the fact that the only real change we’ve had on bottom line cost of living is the rejigging of power rates. It’s just shifted the burden around on people as opposed to really solving the bigger problems.
So if we have initiatives that make sense, I’ll be there and I’ll be there in spades tramping their value. But until then, I don’t want a blank strategy, a blank cheque going out with no idea. Like I said earlier, the only people winning and feeding well are the contractors. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. To the motion. Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s hard to know where to start after my colleague’s comments, but I am totally in support of this motion.
I fail to understand how voting against money to look at different energy sources is not going to impact my bottom line and my power rates, and everybody else’s bottom line in their power rates.
I have to say I was quite dismayed when I looked at this year’s budget and realized that we were going to be reducing our input into research on energy and energy projects, that we have pretty much slashed it almost to the bone. I felt that in the last Assembly our initiative to put $60 million over four years into energy projects and research and developing new projects, we were just starting to get somewhere, and I thought that we were making progress and we were finding alternate energy sources.
The Minister of Finance has a number of times stated in the budget that choices are being made. The government is making choices, we are making choices, he says, and absolutely we are making choices. One of the choices that this government has made is to subsidize our power rates to the tune of some $34 million. I fail to understand how that can be construed as a positive step forward. All we’re doing is taking money and putting it onto something which is going to carry on ad infinitum and forever. Our power rates absolutely are going to increase if we keep doing the same thing over and over and over and we don’t look to find a different way of producing our power. We are going to end up spending more and more money. It’s like banging our head against the wall and I really don’t want to do that. My father used to say quit banging your head against the wall, and he would say it feels really good when you stop. So I think probably we should stop banging our head against the wall and we should look to try and find different ways of producing our energy.
I think that this motion, albeit doesn’t have specifics in it and I wouldn’t want it to have specifics because I think there needs to be an opportunity for the government to identify how the money is going to be used on which projects and there’s a number of projects from the previous Assembly that were not finished, that were started and could be carried on with. There’s a number of other projects which are certainly waiting to be done. Fifteen million dollars in any one year needs to be put into the budget so the government can look at it and say this is where we need to go.
We have to start fixing the problem at the bottom. We have to start looking at how we produce our energy, how we heat our homes, what kind of power we have, and where it’s sourced, and we have to fix it at that level. That, in the long run, is the only way that we’re going to bring our costs down.
The cost of living has been referenced a number of times. It’s going to be referenced a lot. Power is a huge part of our cost of living and it’s one that, you know, constantly goes up. We’re looking at a 25 percent increase or something in our cost of power over the next three years. I’m not looking forward to that, but if we don’t try to solve the problem at its source, it’s going to be another 25 percent in another 10 years or so.
So I really feel that this is a forward thinking motion. I think the couple of things in the whereases, government revenues have increased in this budget year. We are looking at a budget increase of 9.5 percent in revenues. So the government is choosing to use that increase in revenues in different ways. I feel that this is one way that we should be using it as opposed to be putting it into the subsidy.
So I am in support of the motion, Mr. Speaker, and I would encourage my colleagues to vote in support of this motion as well. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I got up early this morning, picked up my pen and paper and had my good cup of coffee and I started writing down my notes on what I wanted to say about this motion. The first thing I did was get a list of the energy priorities investment for 2010. The last government committed $60 million to the projects. Mr. Hawkins has made several references to this priority list.
I looked at it and I put it on the floor, and said this is where the regions are getting the projects. This is where we committed $60 million, and that money just came out of the air. This is where we’re going to put the projects.
Mr. Speaker, the high cost of living is in the northern part of the Northwest Territories, up in Ulukhaktok, Sachs, Paulatuk, Tuk, Tsiigehtchic, Aklavik, McPherson in the Sahtu. It becomes a little bit cheaper as you go down south. I looked at this and said, okay, where did the government spend the $60 million. The majority of the funding was spent just south, Wrigley and south. We had a few projects up in Tuk for wind power. We had Norman Wells, and looking at the natural gas conversion, if there ever is going to be a pipeline going to be built, that’s what they will be looking at. We have solar panel heating in our swimming pools in Tulita and Norman Wells. Deline has looked at the Bear River hydro for the last 16 years. Even in their plan on energy with the government, it talks about energy for the future. It talks about Deline looking at being in the construction mode. Hopefully in 2014 could see the first hydro power from the development on the Bear River being utilized for the Mackenzie Gas Pipeline for compressor stations or other future industrial developments. In 2020-25, building the corridor established by the Bear River developing power from the Mackenzie River could be explored for southern markets.
So we did talk about this. It is in the plan. There is a plan, but we have to update it, of course. I don’t know where the Mackenzie Gas Project is now today. So we need to update it. There is a transmission gridline going up the Mackenzie Valley beyond Fort Simpson, past Wrigley, Tulita to Norman Wells and they’ve got some other projects going up further there.
I see this as an opportunity if we ever, ever have a chance to get another gift like the $60 million, I certainly hope that the projects go beyond Fort Simpson. We certainly need the money in the Bear River. They’ve been waiting for almost 17 years to get a hydro project going there.
I encourage people, the Northwest Territories, to look at this and see for yourself and come to your own conclusions as to where the projects and the money went. It had its reasons. I say this motion here, if we ever have an option again, look at the projects and see where they can be invested to help our people. Look at Norman Wells. It’s a crying shame that this government here cannot say to Norman Wells we will help you. They desperately need our help. It’s going to cost residents in my riding and Norman Wells to covert, because Imperial decides they are going to shut their power, natural gas, off. These are real people, Mr. Speaker. Real people from the Sahtu.
Inuvik also has the same situation. This government should have had a few bucks in its back pocket to say we’re going to help you. You know? They’ve got projects going other places that we could have used. The Bear River hydro transmission line could have been built, could have gone up to Norman Wells and they could have had power cheap. They would have had energy in Tulita and Norman Wells. It’s about a $10 million hydro initiative. We could have put the power line in. We spent $13 million where? On Taltson? For what? We don’t even have a power purchase from the mining companies.
So we need to look at those things that make sense to our people. We need to think of some of the realities here. I think that if we ever get the chance… There’s a saying, if we ever get to do it again, what would I do. I’m hoping that... We’ll, I’m hoping I’m in Cabinet so I can make some decisions.
---Laughter
Real decisions to see where these types of energy initiatives can go. I know, Mr. Speaker, my friends across will have a lot of fun with that.
I want to say, in reality these types of projects that Mr. Bromley has put through this motion make sense. We need to serve our people. We have also done a lot of good things in the communities. I’m glad that we subsidized the power rates in our communities. That’s what we need to do. Sometimes we need to bite the bullet and say this is what we’re going to do. I’m sure glad that people recognize that it’s helping our people with the cost of living. It’s ridiculous to pay $2.46 a kilowatt in Colville Lake and they’re sitting on a natural gas field. They could do a lot if we had the energy and the money to produce that natural gas field for power in Norman Wells or their own community.
The energy initiative that has gone out to the different communities like Liard, geothermal, Yellowknife geothermal, the hydro at Bluefish, the wood pellets, Fort Simpson with the district heating, Fort McPherson district heating, all of these are good projects, but it’s a real crying shame that there’s not too much happening in the Sahtu except studies and studies and studies. Oh yeah, we have two solar panels for our swimming pool. Swimming pools are what? June, July, August and then that’s it. We need to put some real money into some of these community projects. The Bear River needs to go. We have to have the Bear going here. It will help us a lot. Just like we have Lutselk’e and Whati. We need that also.
I want to say that I thank Mr. Bromley for bringing this motion up to give us some discussion, some air time, and let the people know what we think about the energies in the Northwest Territories, where the priorities are, and what some of our passion is for our community to bring the cost of living down and to know this territory can do a lot of good. It could bring the power down. We could bring the rates down. Gear that money right towards where it is.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. To the motion. Mr. Nadli.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I speak in favour of the motion. Why? I think this motion is visionary and provides leadership. At the same time I think it creates options for what the public expects at this time. At this time in the North we’ve seen very dramatic rises in the cost of living, of course. As the economy improves, so does the cost of goods. Particularly energy costs. I think the public would expect this government would try to create some options and alternatives to the mainstream energy sources that we have at this point. In speaking to this motion I believe it’s visionary and provides leadership and that’s what this government is all about.
I have a vision at some point in the future that I’ll drive into my home community and I’ll see log homes that are built locally. At the same time they’ll have alternative energy sources such as wood pellets to heat the house. They have solar energy to provide lights for the house. We’d be looking at some biodegradable initiatives to ensure that we’re not leaving large imprints on the environment. I think this motion speaks to that. I speak strongly in favour of this.
Currently in our communities we have very nice, scenic communities along the bank. We have very nice scenery in the mountains. What contrasts with that is while we enjoy the aesthetics of nature and ensuring that our community complements nature, we have these loud, droning, diesel generators in our communities. That’s a really stark contrast. When I speak to kids about the environment, sometimes it doesn’t make sense for us to enjoy the beauty of the North in our small communities and be very environmentally in tune with nature, but then what contrasts is that we have these fossil fuels that contribute to greenhouse gas emissions. Of course they contribute to global warming. In that sense I speak in favour of this motion and will be voting for this motion.
Thank you, Mr. Nadli. To the motion. Mr. Bouchard.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My colleagues have made a good point on both sides of this argument. My thoughts are similar to theirs. The high energy costs in the Northwest Territories are going up. Some of the projects that have been invested in have not worked. We have wasted some dollars on some of these projects. My other concern is that I’m not really willing to give up either.
Right now there must be some potentials out there. I know from discussions with some of my colleagues, that biomass is one of the highest returns dollar for dollar. Your return on your cost of living would go down quite a bit. I’m going to support this. I’d like to see that’s one area that we invest our money into.
The other thing, talking about rate of return on our investments, we can’t put in the numbers of the carbon footprint that we’re trying to reduce, the future generations of the North. I think we need to invest some dollars into this energy, the green energy. They may not all be successful but we need to find some things that do work for us, help the residents currently, help the residents of the future, and help the future generations.
Thank you, Mr. Bouchard. Mr. Menicoche.
