Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Also during my campaign tour in the Sahtu region I spoke to many people in Fort Good Hope, and actually spent extra time there because of the amount of related cancer deaths in Fort Good Hope. When I left, there were people that were being diagnosed. As of yesterday, somebody else was diagnosed with cancer in Fort Good Hope. That’s about eight people. About nine people died in Fort Good Hope of cancer.
People are afraid of the water they are drinking. People are afraid of the water quality in the Mackenzie River and eating the fish that they have every winter, every fall and summer. People are scared because there were old federal government buildings that were condemned because of asbestos and people working in those buildings at a time when they were taken down and they weren’t using proper safety precautions. There are a lot of questions in Fort Good Hope. Why are there so many deaths related to cancer?
We need to give the people in Fort Good Hope, and any other community, some answers. Some time ago they did a study in Aklavik on the cancer. That study stopped. There is research for circumpolar on cancer. The Dene Nation has done some surveys. There are some groups out there that need to be supported and funded to bring the answers to my people.
When I was in Good Hope, not a very good picture to see a loved one die with children around them looking at their father on the bed and dying. We need to get some answers from this government. Whoever the Health Minister is, I’m going to hold them to account, that the people in my region need not suffer anymore, and to get down to the bottom of why people are getting cancer so much in Good Hope. Is it the water? Is it the federal government building that’s condemned? Is it the water in the Mackenzie River? We need to help each other and stop dying. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The honourable Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Moses.
