Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, and thank you very much, honourable colleagues, for your comments, your thoughts.
Mr. Speaker, right off the bat, I am disappointed to hear from the honourable Minister of Infrastructure that this is not something that the government is in a position to support. I just want to be clear that to people who may be concerned about the potential cost of an audit like this: the resources of the Office of the Auditor General are independent of this government and this government's budgets, and indeed, the prerogative to even accept this motion, should it pass, would be up to the auditor general, as well. As an independent audit office, they are able to choose their own work and pursue their own reviews.
As some of the honourable Member mentioned, the value of a third-party audit really speaks for itself. We, as a standing committee, have reviewed several performance audits and, of course, the annual report on the government's public accounts, which we reported on earlier today. This is an opportunity to have an independent, fair, and transparent process that looks at all aspects of the project. The honourable Minister spoke that the Auditor General has reviewed the financial performance of the ITH project in the public accounts, but that's just an accounting exercise, a financial audit to make sure it meets accounting standards. It is not a performance audit.
The words spoken today in support of the motion were very clear that there are things we can learn from this project. While I have full confidence that the Minister and the department he represents in this House, and further, the contractors who are working on this project and our federal partners took this very seriously, and worked diligently to ensure it met all of the standards they laid out for in the agreement, having a third party verify those results just will further strengthen the case for transportation corridors. When the government is undertaking major transportation corridors in highly expensive regions of Canada, and asking the federal government to pay for them, why not have an independently verified audit of one of those projects to back up our business cases? This is not an attack on contractors, an attack on governments, or an attack on infrastructure projects. This is in support of those projects so we can find out the best practices for projects like these and ensure we can continue to deliver on projects like these.
So I don't agree with the Members who have spoken in opposition to this motion, saying it will reflect poorly on the people involved in this project. That's not what this is about, Mr. Speaker. This is about good value for money and best practices, and I believe that we will be able to achieve that better with a third-party independent review than with our own internal processes.
The strategic oversight committee the Minister spoke of, they are internal to government. They do not produce things that are publicly transmitted unless the Minister chooses to make them public. At this point, we've heard progress updates about the project. The highway, I might add, is closed today due to operational concerns, so people are asking questions. This is an attempt to resolve those questions and to show that the Minister's confidence in this project and that everything was done properly is, in fact, correct.
I urge everyone to support this, and I urge my colleagues across the aisle to change their minds on this. Mr. Speaker, this project was also initiated in the 17th Assembly, and a peculiar feature of our unique form of consensus government is we don't look backwards into the full range of operational details that previous Assemblies initiated, which is another reason this is calling for a special audit, to look into something that wasn't properly in the mandate or the responsibility of this 18th Assembly.
The Minister held a grand opening, and the project was substantially complete. There's enough there to start looking at it. Further, the motion does not call for an immediate audit. It calls for an audit when is practicable, as has also been pointed out, so to Members who were concerned that we are putting the cart before the horse, the motion clearly states that time should be taken until all the facts are known, and all the details can be produced by governments, to be reviewed by the auditor general.
Furthermore, why don't we just undertake it with our own committees, Mr. Speaker? Well, this project overlaps the mandates of two of our standing committees, and as a result, it would be very cumbersome to try to fit that into the standing committees' normal area of review. Furthermore, the scale of such an audit, or such a review, would stretch the resources of this Assembly, which should be properly focused on policy development, policy review, and legislative review, as well.
So, rather than take away from our own internal resources, we are calling on a third party that is independently funded to provide the kind of oversight that the project of this scale and this magnitude deserves.
Mr. Speaker, I just want to conclude by saying that the concerns that we have all heard as Members perhaps can be responded to by the Minister or by his staff or even by Members of this House. We just need that certainty that comes from an independent third party audit that will ensure we have the best possible facts, evidence, and best practices and good value for money so we can continue to build these projects to justify the investment or to make our investments more attractive to build critical transportation infrastructure from the federal government and continue to do our due diligence as legislators to work with the Office of the Auditor General and review these projects as they come forward.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That concludes my comments in this debate. I would like to request a recorded vote. Thank you.
The Member for Kam Lake, the Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh, the Member for Nahendeh, the Member for Frame Lake, the Member for Yellowknife Centre, the Member for Deh Cho, the Member for Hay River North, the Member for Yellowknife North.
All those opposed, please stand.
The Member for Nunakput, the Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, the Member for Range Lake, the Member for Great Slave, the Member for Inuvik Twin Lakes, the Member for Hay River South, the Member for Thebacha, the Member for Mackenzie Delta, the Member for Sahtu.
Masi. All those abstaining, please stand. The results of the motion: eight in favour, nine opposed, zero abstentions. The motion is defeated.
---Defeated
Motions. Member for Mackenzie Delta.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I will be supporting committee's motion in this area. I have my reasons for supporting it: it is to be able to have a safe supply of cannabis to all residents of the Northwest Territories, not to only some residents of the Northwest Territories. I can assure Cabinet that, if this motion is not passed, you will be supporting the illegal trade of marijuana in small communities. There is no reason in the world, there's no reason in the world for an individual to fly all the way to a liquor store to be able to buy, and they can't even pick up marijuana for their friends, because of the limit that is there. So everybody has to fly in to a community to get their own. What is going to be the option? The option is going to be to either buy it online or buy illegally. So for the people who don't have Visas out there, and I've talked many times, when you have 40 per cent employment rates, you don't have many Visas flying around in the community, Mr. Chair, and if they were to get a Visa, if they were to be lucky enough to have a job and get a Visa and want to smoke legal marijuana, they will buy it from somewhere else. They'll order it places where they're not selling it for $10 a gram, because that's what the market, that's what the government sets the price at, and everybody else is going to set the price at the market rate. The illegal drug dealers are going to have a better sense of what the market is than the government.
We have to let the people start up vendors in the communities so they could stay within the market and they could provide legal pot to people, safe pot to people. There's a feeling that there are going to be stores, pot stores popping up all over the community. That ain't gonna happen. There's not enough business for that. Not going to happen. And if it does, at least they'll be paying taxes back to the government coffers instead of putting illegal money in their pocket.
If we approve what the government is saying, we are supporting the illegal trade of pot. There's no question about it. I think everybody knows that, but for some reason or another people are bound to the fact that they think that there's going to be pot stores popping up all over, and everybody's going to start smoking marijuana. That's not necessarily going to happen. That ain't gonna happen. There's a reason that it's being restricted to only certain communities; there's a reason that it's only going in to liquor stores. If it's not what the honourable colleague from Yellowknife North said, that the government wants to keep all of the tax dollars for themselves, then it must be what? I just can't understand, unless the other reason is a lack of understanding of what the lay of the land is as far as this product goes in the Northwest Territories. It is unbelievable. It ain't gonna happen. It we don't pass this committee, then we are supporting the illegal trade of marijuana. In the whole North, you will hear that, and that's how it's going to be set up. Everybody's going to know that this government is passing a bill that supports the illegal trade of marijuana by restricting it to only certain communities and leaving the small communities, the 27 other communities that we went out and heard from, that said that this is what we want to see. Mr. Chairman, I request a recorded vote. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Member for Kam Lake, the Member for Tu NedheWiilideh, the Member for Nahendeh, the Member for Frame Lake, the Member for Yellowknife Centre, the Member for Hay River North, the Member for Yellowknife North.
All those opposed?
The Member for Deh Cho, the Member for Nunakput, the Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, the Member for Range Lake, the Member for Great Slave, the Member for Inuvik Twin Lakes, the Member for Hay River South, the Member for Thebacha, the Member for Sahtu.
All those abstaining, please rise. The results of the recorded vote: seven in favour, nine opposed, zero abstentions.
Defeated
Clause 5. Mr. Simpson.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think it's telling when the mover of this motion has to characterize it in debate as a smokescreen in addition to other things. To address the strong feelings committee members are going to have says something about the nature of this compromise, quite frankly, the preoccupation with the Minister in debate over the last motion that failed, with Ministerial control and Ministerial discretion being unduly fettered.
Committees don't propose motions half-baked. We consult with experts. In this case, we consulted with a legal expert. The legal opinion we received is that it is well within the boundaries of Canadian constitutional law to apply reasonable limitations on Ministerial discretion. This reverses that, and that seems to be the huge sticking point. I don't find comfort to see that a proposed two years has been reduced to six months. I think that's an attractive number for those of us who have been pushing the government to bring forward some sort of privatized rules sooner, but they could make that political commitment regardless of what was written in this legislation. I would like to think that they recognized the work that the standing committee did in advocating for this point and advocating for the need for regulations for private business and would do so anyway.
I'm not convinced that this is necessary. I'm not convinced that the wording of this, which seems to have taken what the committee's initial intention was and reworded it to protect the Minister's unilateral right, is reflective of what ought to be a process that reflects the need for privatization and respects the rights of Northerners to take risks. This is a paternalistic attitude, that we need government monopolies controlling our industries, we need to squeeze all the revenue out of legal cannabis into public coffers, and that, no, we're not going to let people take risks and fail because they will blame us at the end of the day.
That is not how entrepreneurs work. They are willing to take the risks, and they are willing to go out and do the research and get prepared for this. Many of them have. In our consultations, we heard from the NWT chamber which represents the entire territory, business community, the entire territory, and, the Chamber of Commerce of Yellowknife, they have been approached by people who want these opportunities, and this government is saying, "No, thanks. We'll keep all the revenues for ourselves." This motion is not going to change that, as much as they're trying to convince us that it will.
I again can't understand why we can't embrace our entrepreneurs, why we can't let them take the lead on cannabis. Why can't we give them the opportunity when our Liquor Commission system is far from perfect and there seems to be no willingness on the part of this government so far to really look into that? Look at the state of the Yellowknife Brew Pub, or NWT Brewing Company. It took them years to start making alcohol and working with the government to get them there. Are we really to believe in six months this government will be in a position to let someone open a cannabis store? I think not. I think the government has played its hand in defeating the previous motion and putting this one in place, which speaks to the public interest.
Mr. Chair, the plebiscite components of this legislation allow the public interest to be met through a plebiscite process that allows communities to control what goes on in their communities. The Minister doesn't need to decide for communities. The plebiscite exists. The bill has been amended to extend the window for plebiscites to ensure that proper notice is given. The Minister doesn't need to decide on behalf of communities, and that's what this is ensuring. The Minister needs to be in a position to accept that there will be people who will be qualified to sell cannabis as private retailers and should be allowed to do so. Obviously, that's not going to be the case.
It's a roundabout way of saying I won't be supporting this motion. Mr. Chair, at the appropriate time, I would like a recorded vote. Thank you.
The Member for Hay River North, the Member for Sahtu, the Member for Nunakput, the Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, the Member for Range Lake, the Member for Great Slave, the Member for Inuvik Twin Lakes, the Member for Hay River South, the Member for Thebacha.
All those opposed, please rise.
The Member for Yellowknife North, the Member for Kam Lake, the Member for Tu NedheWiilideh, the Member for Nahendeh, the Member for Frame Lake, the Member for Yellowknife Centre, the Member for Deh Cho.
All those opposed, please rise. Sorry, abstaining. Long night here. The motion is carried.
---Carried
Next, we have clause 5, as amended. Ms. Green.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I will be supporting this motion. I think, in the NWT, I noticed that for the people that I am familiar with where I grew up in a small community and that, many people started smoking marijuana to get away from alcohol because alcohol is devastating. Alcoholism is a devastating disease.
It was interesting today, in a news report, they talked about how the hospitalization of people as a result of alcohol is six times higher in the NWT than it is in the rest of Canada, six times, and we're worrying about spending a few dollars to close off one area of the liquor store that this government is sold on, the model that they're sold on, but they don't want to spend a few dollars to close off an area so that there is no co-location of alcohol and cannabis.
I ask this Cabinet: what does it cost our society for alcohol? We should be doing all we can to try to deter people from consuming alcohol. The people who have picked up cannabis or pot or marijuana in order to get away from alcohol are going to be forced to go back into an alcohol store to buy cannabis.
What we're saying is: let's remove that temptation; let's do something about trying to reduce the cost to society of the price of alcohol. The only thing preventing this from happening is money. That's it, a few dollars that would prevent the government from agreeing with the motion and put up separate doors, separate walls and allow the sale of cannabis to be separated from the sale of alcohol.
If the government is saying it has to go into the liquor store, and it has to go into those seven liquor stores that are selling alcohol; we have no choice; that is the only mode that is best for the NWT, then put up a wall. Put up a separate entrance. All it is is a few dollars, and you may save a few lives. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, in case Ms. Green hasn't requested it already, I would like to request a recorded vote.
The Member for Yellowknife Centre, the Member for Hay River North, the Member for Yellowknife North, the Member for Kam Lake, the Member for Tu NedheWiilideh, the Member for Nahendeh, the Member for Frame Lake.
All those opposed, please rise.
The Member for Deh Cho, the Member for Nunakput, the Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, the Member for Range Lake, the Member for Great Slave, the Member for Inuvik Twin Lakes, the Member for Hay River South, the Member for Thebacha, the Member for Sahtu.
All those abstaining, please rise. The results of the recorded vote: seven in favour, nine opposed, zero abstentions.
Defeated
Clause 5 as amended. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you. Clauses 6 to 10. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Clause 11. A Member is requesting a break. We will take a short recess. Thank you.
---SHORT RECESS
Thank you, committee. We will now call the Committee of the Whole back to order. Starting with clause 7 -- sorry, clause 11. Mr. O'Reilly.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I am in support of this motion. I was in support of it even before the debacle of the last motion on colocation, where the government demonstrated irrevocably that they are not interested in harm reduction. I will continue to argue in favour of harm reduction, and I believe that this motion presents that possibility.
The intent of this motion is not to make life difficult for the casual user. It is to try and prevent casual users from becoming chronic users. It is aimed at presenting a level of deterrents to stop youth from becoming chronic users. The casual users are not our audience here. It's the chronic user who is going to jeopardize his or her brain development between the ages of 19 and 25, and what we are proposing here is a means of harm reduction. It is not the be-all and end-all. It needs to be done in conjunction with education, and it needs to be done in conjunction with support from the schools, educating youth about the risks of consuming cannabis, both casually and chronically.
There are a number of approaches that could be taken, but this motion, in my mind, leads the way to acknowledging what we heard in the southern tour about the need to help young people manage the risks to brain development by consuming cannabis, and it also responds to fears that parents have about their children becoming chronic users of cannabis.
It presents, I believe, harm reduction without a lot of effort on anyone's part. It is my understanding that enforcement of this entire act will be complaintsbased, so I don't perceive that having another enforcement tool would be onerous. It would, in fact, accomplish safety for our youth, and in the end, this bill is really about them. I would like to see a recorded vote on this. Thank you.
The Member for Frame Lake, the Member for Yellowknife Centre, the Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
All those opposed, please rise.
The Member for Deh Cho, the Member for Nunakput, the Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, the Member for Range Lake, the Member for Great Slave, the Member for Yellowknife South, the Member for Hay River South, the Member for Inuvik Twin Lakes, the Member for Thebacha, the Member for Hay River North, the Member for Sahtu, the Member for Yellowknife North, the Member for Kam Lake, the Member for Nahendeh.
All those abstaining, please rise. Three in favour, 13 opposed. The motion is defeated.
---Defeated
Clause 11. Does the committee agree?
Agreed.
Agreed, thank you. Clauses 12 to 18. Does the committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you. Clause 19. Mr. O'Reilly.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'd like to call for a recorded vote.
The Member for Frame Lake, the Member for Nahendeh.
All those opposed, please rise.
The Member for Yellowknife Centre, the Member for Deh Cho, the Member for Nunakput, the Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, the Member for Range Lake, the Member for Great Slave, the Member for Inuvik Twin Lakes, the Member for Hay River South, the Member for Thebacha, the Member for Hay River North, the Member for Sahtu, the Member for Yellowknife North, the Member for Kam Lake.
All those abstaining, please rise.
The Member for Tu NedheWiilideh.
Two in favour, 13 opposed, one abstention. The motion is defeated.
---Defeated
Clause 19. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Agreed. Thank you. Clauses 20 to 37. Does committee agree?
