Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m pleased to recognize my niece Kathy Makela, who is visiting from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Kathy is a lawyer with the Native Law Centre there.
I’m also pleased to recognize the presidents of teachers’ federations from across Canada here today. Carol Jolin, president, Association des enseignantes et des enseignants franco-Ontariens; Mark Ramsankar, president, Alberta Teachers’ Association; Dianne Woloschuk, president of the Canadian Teachers’ Federation; Susan Swackhammer, first vice-president of the Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario; Norm Gould, president of the Manitoba Teachers’ Society; Peter Fullerten, president of the New Brunswick Teachers’ Association; Guy Arseneault, vice-president-elect of the New Brunswick Teachers’ Association; James Dinn, president of Newfoundland and Labrador Teachers’ Association; Shelley Morse, president, Nova Scotia Teachers’ Union; Gayla Meredith, president, Northwest Territories Teachers’ Association; James Ryan, president, Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association; Ann Hawkins, first vice-president, Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association; Rian McLaughlin, president, Ontario Teachers’ Federation; Gilles Arsenault, president, Prince Edward Island Teachers’ Federation; Bethany MacLeod, president-elect, Prince Edward Island Teachers’ Association; Colin Keess, president, Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation; and Carol Sherlock, acting president, Yukon Teachers’ Association. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Mr. Abernethy.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to recognize the members of the Minister’s Advisory Committee on Anti-Poverty who have joined us today. They’re the individuals who have worked together, worked hard to consolidate all the information from residents across the Northwest Territories in the development of working together on an action plan to reduce and eliminate poverty in the Northwest Territories. So, I’d like to take this opportunity to both recognize and thank Bronwyn Watters and Julie Green as well as Mark Heyck.
June is also Senior Citizens Month and June 15th is World Elder Abuse Day. Although today is not June 15th, Members of the House have joined me in wearing purple today to recognize this important issue, and I’d like to take this opportunity to recognize a few members of the NWT Seniors’ Society who have joined us here today: Merlyn Williams, who is the president; Joyce Williams – both Merlyn and Joyce are constituents of the Great Slave riding; Margaret Marshall; Bill Reid; Joan Hirons; Bill Adkins; Darryl Bohnet, who is also a resident of the Great Slave riding; Dick and Loretta Abernethy, who happen to be my parents, welcome; Joe Walsh; Carole Robinson; as well as Jeff Renaud, CEO at the Avens, A Community For Seniors; and Kimberly Doyle, the executive director of YK Seniors. Thank you all for joining us today.
Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. Mr. McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to recognize Mr. Gerry Wood. Gerry is an MLA from the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly in Australia, representing the riding of Nelson. He’s been the MLA since 2001. He’s been visiting, sharing some of his stories, and we had an opportunity yesterday to visit and tell him about how we conduct business here in this Legislative Assembly. So, welcome to Canada and welcome to the Legislative Assembly.
I’d also like to recognize Mayor Mark Heyck. Welcome, Mark.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to recognize all the visitors that we have in the gallery today. I guess our tourism numbers are going to continue to rise, as a bunch of folks are visiting us from across the country. Welcome to Yellowknife and welcome to the Northwest Territories.
I also wanted to recognize Merlyn Williams, the president of the YK Seniors’ Society. I also wanted to recognize a former Bantam and Midget hockey coach of mine – he was a real inspiration for me as I was growing up – and his long-time involvement in minor hockey in Yellowknife, Mr. Joe Walsh. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d also like to recognize some constituents from Weledeh today: Joe Walsh, who has just been mentioned; also Lois Little I see up there, and Carole Robinson, Joan Hirons. There may be others. Welcome to the House.
Mark Heyck, our mayor. It’s always great to see him here when he can get here. I’d also like to recognize the MLA for Nelson, Mr. Woods from the Northern Territory. It’s really great to have him in the House as well. Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s a pleasure to see so many seniors here today. I would like to recognize specifically one from the riding of Frame Lake, Yvonne Quick. It’s always good to see Yvonne here. I want to just mention, as well, Carole, Loretta, Wendy, Joe, Darryl and there are many more up there who I can’t see.
As an ex-teacher, I would also like to specifically welcome the presidents of the teachers’ associations across the country. Welcome to our home. Welcome to our territory. I hope you have a grand time. I’m sure that Gayla will show you a grand time. Gayla Meredith is the president of our NWT Teachers’ Association and is hosting all the other presidents.
Lastly, I’d like to recognize the mayor of our fair city, Mr. Mark Heyck. I think that’s about it. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There are so many people out there to recognize, I just want to say welcome to the majority of them, and I’ll focus my specific recognition to our seniors. For seniors from the Yellowknife Centre riding, I would first like to recognize Ms. Margaret Marshall, Mr. Bill Reid and Mr. Bill Adkins as well as I believe I see Ms. Wendy Carlos up there as well. If I happened to miss any of the seniors who are up there, I’m sure they can understand. I can’t quite see that far anymore. My eyes are starting to give up on me as the days go on. Welcome to everyone and thank you very much for coming today. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. I’d like to welcome everybody in the public gallery here today. Thank you for taking an interest in our proceedings.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I mentioned in my Member’s statement, the request for tenders closed on April 1, 2015, for the widening of the Dempster Highway. I’d like to ask the Minister, why is this contract not awarded yet? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Blake. Minister of Transportation, Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There are several stages of approvals that we go through when we’re dealing with the Building Canada Fund. The next step is to take all of the money that we have over the next 10 years and put them into bundles under $100 million, and we had submitted our first bundle to the federal government and right now it’s going through a review. We feel it’s very close to being approved.
Because the bundles have negotiated contracts in them, it was important that the federal government ran it through the Treasury Board. What we’ve done is we’ve been providing information to Infrastructure Canada. In turn, they’re providing it to the Treasury Board. So, we’re at the very final stages. Our Minister of Infrastructure has been in contact with Infrastructure Canada and is also trying to assist us to move that approval along, but at this time we are expecting approval on June 4th, actually.
As I mentioned, with the weather we have in August and September, it’s really important that we begin this work in June and July.
Will the Minister ensure that future contracts be awarded at least by the end of May in the years to come? Thank you.
This bundle that we submitted is four years’ worth of projects. Next year it will be approved, so we would be able to go through the tender process a lot quicker. We have tendered in advance in anticipation of approvals from the federal government. So, at this point, as soon as the approvals come, we would be in a very good position to make the awards. As soon as we get approval we’ll make the awards. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The Member for Nahendeh, Mr. Menicoche.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I just want to follow up on my Member’s statement on the housing issues in the community of Wrigley. I’d like to ask the Minister responsible for the NWT Housing Corporation what kind of follow up is being done from the results of the 2014 Community Housing Survey, which prove what my constituents are saying about the dismal state of housing in the community of Wrigley. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Minister of NWT Housing, Mr. McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We use the results of the survey to assist us as we plan our capital budget going forward. We do recognize that there is a need in a lot of smaller communities, especially in the Member’s riding. There has been a reluctance in the past for them to welcome public housing into the community, but we’re seeing that attitude start to change now and they realize that the best way to house a lot of their residents is to go through the public housing portfolio. So we needed those numbers to assist us with our planning. Thank you.
I’m glad the Minister, during our last tour which he attended with me in Nahendeh, knows that people were in favour of public housing. What is the Minister doing to beef up the role in Nahendeh communities that will result in more public and even better housing? Thank you.
We have a number of programs to assist homeowners especially in upgrading some of their houses, and I think in the Member’s riding we’ve had some fairly good uptake on that. A lot of them do live in private homes.
We did hear from a number of the Member’s communities, when we did our tour, that they felt there was a need for public housing. We had a number of units that we had put there on speculation that we would have suitable clients for and that didn’t pan out. So our plan is to convert whatever units we have there into public housing.
Again, we will look at the numbers and plan it as we go forward to possibly adding more public housing into the communities because we see that’s the direction that they feel is the best direction to go at this moment. Thank you.
Thank you very much. Just specifically it’s for Wrigley, the needs of better stock of public housing.
I’d just like to ask the Minister going forward, what kind of plans does he have with the department in addressing the concerns out of Wrigley? Thank you.
In the next couple of seasons I believe we have a couple of affordable housing units that are going into Wrigley. We would have to go in there and do a complete survey as to what the inventory is like in there. I think we have maybe eight public housing units in the whole community of Wrigley and I think we’ve got a couple of affordable housing units.
So, again, we will have to use the numbers from the community survey in assisting us as we plan our capital budget going forward. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Menicoche.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Even though there was a recent survey, I really believe that Wrigley has got to be reassessed.
Just in general, I know that we increased our borrowing limit. I’d just like to know, is the Minister going to approach Cabinet and see if we can get additional money from our borrowing limit to help address infrastructure shortages in the community?
We’re always looking for opportunities to secure more money from not only our government. We’ve been very fortunate in the last couple of years that this government has stepped forward and I think we’ve put almost $20 million into affordable housing units to try and address some of the challenges we face in the small communities, and also this government has stepped up in providing, I think, an additional $1.2 million to try and offset some of the loss that we’re facing with Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation’s declining funding. This government has stepped up and, again, any opportunities we have, if there are any federal opportunities for more public housing money through the Affordable Housing Initiative in the past and the Public Housing Initiative, I think it was called, we try to find every opportunity we can to secure more money that we can put into housing across the Northwest Territories.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is to the Minister of ITI. I want to ask the Minister on the Canol Heritage proposed Doi T'oh in the Sahtu region. The Minister has been aware that there has been work by the federal government remediation and contamination team. Their assessment report has been dealt with. There are discussions with the land claim organizations. There is a park management committee framework set up.
I want to ask the Minister, what is his department doing in regard to working with the land corporations, the federal government and the remediation team to clean up the mess that’s on the Canol Heritage Trail?
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Member is correct; the federal government has made a commitment to remediate the area. They say it’s going to take five years. Sometimes they say one thing and it may take, in fact, longer than the five years that they’ve committed to. But the other issue here is we had wanted them to take the class 1 sites – there are four of them to be remediated – but the fact remains that they have that entire stretch of 222 kilometres, one kilometre on either side of it. It’s a big area and it’s going to require a lot of work to remediate.
We continue to look at that as an opportunity to put in infrastructure. This summer we are going to be putting in a cable crossing at the Twitya River. I had the opportunity to travel with the Member into the area recently. We are making those investments.
We’ve also worked with local organizations on some willow clearing on the first 25 kilometres. That work, I believe, has been completed or will be complete soon.
We’re continuing to move forward, but again, one of the big hang-ups for us is the remediation that the feds have committed to on the Canol Trail itself.
Just for correction, it’s 222 miles. I want to let the Minister know.
The remediation sites that need to be cleaned up, I want to ask the Minister, is this part of the transfer of lands from the federal to the territorial in the context of the territorial government taking over these lands? Is the territorial government in discussion with the feds so that these lands then can be transferred over to the territorial government so the Sahtu Dene and Metis can own, manage, develop and run the Canol Heritage Doi T'oh Canyon Park?
The federal government excluded the transfer of the entire section of the Canol Heritage Trail – and the Member is correct; it is 222 miles, not kilometres – reserved for the Doi T’oh Territorial Park from the final Devolution Agreement. Subsurface rights were, however, transferred to the Commissioner of the Northwest Territories. The Government of the Northwest Territories can still apply for transfer of administrative authority from the federal government, and the Government of the Northwest Territories will be seeking to have the land transferred for the Doi T’oh Territorial Park before the end of this projected timeline of five years that I mentioned earlier.
The contaminated areas, if you look at the report, it’s pretty thick but it’s very, very interesting. Just on the pricing of the fuel, one of the statements in the report says if they were to do the project, in costing out the project, a barrel of oil would cost about $1,000. You know, the expense of doing business in that area.
I want to ask the Minister, given what we know from the remediation assessment and the contamination and work that’s been done on the 222 miles of that stretch and what happened in the 1940s as of today, does the Minister, does his department understand the enormous step that we’ve taken to protect our lands and also the enormous amount of energy and effort it will take to clean up these specific sites along the Canol Heritage Trail? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you Mr. Yakeleya. Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The proposed park, of course, follows the now defunct Canol Pipeline built during World War II, of course. It includes several waste sites with abandoned buildings. I know the Member and I have toured some of those abandoned buildings, equipment and vehicles interlinked with an old roadway. These sites present hazards to human and animal health, including oil spills, exposed asbestos, structurally unsafe buildings as well as almost 650 linear kilometres of copper coated steel telephone wire. There’s a lot out there that needs to be remediated, needs to be looked at.
I think for us, we need to continue to impress upon the federal government the desire to have that remediated. I guess looking at it in a positive view it will be economic activity hopefully for some companies in the central Mackenzie Valley in the Member’s riding, to help remediate the Canol Trail. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Does the Minister have an estimated dollar figure as to what the possibilities are the federal government is looking at? I say this because at one time the federal government said, looking at the Canol and funding, it is almost close to what it costs to clean up that we’re still cleaning up the Giant arsenic mine here, and that’s the equivalency of cleaning up the Canol Heritage Trail, and that’s just on a hiking-type of discussion I had with the federal government representative.
Can the Minister tell me if he has any type of numbers?
The Member probably knows the area better than anybody, having spent as much time up there as he has. He would also know that there is an infrastructure there. Sometimes the only way to get in there is to hike in or to take a helicopter. The cost of remediating and cleaning up, you know, what are remote sites, is going to be very, very expensive. I wouldn’t want to hazard a guess today on what that would cost, but it will be a tremendous figure to clean and remediate the old Canol Trail.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to follow up on my Member’s statement on energy policy, and I direct it to whichever Minister takes responsibility for the current energy policy vacuum under which we are operating.
The government, as a regulator, needs to provide and be seen to provide a level playing field for businesses to be able to fairly compete and thrive.
How fair and level is the playing field when a private, highly regulated utility must bid against a publicly owned business directly and indirectly subsidized by over $100 million in recent years? And I mean this. On what basis has this Cabinet possibly met and decided that there’s a fair and level playing field here? Mahsi.
