Debates of October 18, 2004 (day 22)

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Along the theme of waste reduction and recycling in the NWT, we go through something like 25 million containers a year for various products; 25 million among a population of just over 40,000. It’s a remarkable number and it’s one of the reasons that a year ago this Assembly passed the beverage container recycling act. My question is for the Minister of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development to ask him about when we might expect to see this act implemented across the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Minister of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development, the Honourable Mr. Bell.

Return To Question 236-15(3): Waste Reduction And Recycling Legislation

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As the Member indicated, the legislation in the life of the last government was in fact the Waste Reduction and Recovery Act. The first program falling underneath that legislative piece of work was the Beverage Container Recovery Program and that’s what we’ve been working on. The Member will remember that we struck an advisory committee a few months back. I think there were nine members from environmental organizations, from communities, from industry, who sat down to discuss the program and come up with some advice to us on regulations and a methodology for development of the program. We’ve had the benefit of that input. My department has been working with Justice to develop those regulations. We think we’re pretty close now, and the next step is a call for RFPs to go out this month that will speak to how the regional processing centres and the community depots will be structured across the territory. We’re now thinking that by the end of March we can roll this program out and I’m certainly looking forward to that. I think it’s going to go a long way toward developing a recycling ethic in the territory. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Supplementary, Mr. Braden.

Supplementary To Question 236-15(3): Waste Reduction And Recycling Legislation

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That sounds very progressive. I know one of things that was of concern when we were putting this bill together was the ability across all the communities to put this into effect. Can the Minister give us some sense that, indeed, all of our communities will be able to act on at least some part of this new initiative? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Bell.

Further Return To Question 236-15(3): Waste Reduction And Recycling Legislation

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think we’ve determined that it would be cost-prohibitive to set up what we’re going to set up in the regions, these processing centres in every community across the North. I think what we’ve decided to do is establish community depots that will feed into the regional processing centres. It’s our intention that all communities will have community depots; whether they’ll all be up and running by the time this program is rolled out on April 1st, I’m not sure. A lot will depend on the proposals we get back as we go out now with an expression for that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Supplementary, Mr. Braden.

Supplementary To Question 236-15(3): Waste Reduction And Recycling Legislation

Mr. Speaker, one of the principles of the act is that both the manufacturers and the users of containers will pay for their use and that is, of course, from the manufacturing to the actual use and retail delivery and then the disposal. It’s a good principle. But it is something that, because there will be costs assessed at the retail and consumer level, is going to have an impact on the cost of these goods and materials. Can the Minister advise, either through the committee or his analysis, what will the impact be perhaps for the average northern family of the cost of implementing this? Is it going to cost us more to do our shopping and run our businesses because of this act? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Bell.

Further Return To Question 236-15(3): Waste Reduction And Recycling Legislation

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m still awaiting some of the input from the committee to determine what makes the most sense in the application of these fees. My sense is there will be an amount paid by consumers as they pick up these beverage containers which they will get back if they recycle. So I think the incentive is there for people to recycle in order to keep costs down. It also made sense, I believe, to have industry involved in the development of this program. The last thing we wanted to see was people finding a way to circumvent our fees by getting beverage containers from other jurisdictions. So we’ve been working with industry to better understand how we might prevent that. But I think the important thing here is that we have a well thought out program that makes sense and encourages recycling by providing an incentive. I think the monies, the rebates, coming from that recycling should do that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Final supplementary, Mr. Braden.

Supplementary To Question 236-15(3): Waste Reduction And Recycling Legislation

Mr. Speaker, through the course of this analysis and this work, will the Minister bring to the attention of the public and this Assembly any estimates or any projections on what some of those costs may be? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Bell.

Further Return To Question 236-15(3): Waste Reduction And Recycling Legislation

Thank you. I can certainly work with committee to do that. One of the unknowns here is how successful we’ll be at recycling. There is a cost to setting up this program and I suppose if we do a very poor job of recycling, then that program cost will be paid off much more quickly. If we really take up this recycling ethic in earnest, then it will be over a longer period of time. I hope that we do take that up, and certainly we’ll work with committee so we can analyze this and discuss, in fact, how well it’s progressing. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.