Thank you. Are there any further questions under regional operations? Seeing none, please turn to page 92.
Environment and Climate Change, regional operations, operations expenditure summary, 20232024 Main Estimates, $7,708,000. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you. We'll now turn to the regulatory assessment and authorizations, beginning on page 95 with information items on page 96 and 97. Questions. Seeing no oh, Member for Frame Lake.
Okay, thanks, Madam Chair. So we covered some of this, I guess, in the Member's statement and questions earlier today. But where are we at with having any kind of policy work with regard to prevention of public liabilities? I know committees, you know, tabled a report in the House about that, motions were passed. But and I guess some regulations may be developed under the Public Land Act but we're still operating under a reclamation policy that was developed by the old Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development that was endorsed by our government at the time of devolution. But, you know and I understand this is an area with perhaps some shared jurisdiction with the land and water boards as well, and we had some input into the stuff they'd done, but is there actually ever going to be a policy statement or something from this government about how we try to prevent public liabilities? Thanks, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Minister.
For that detail, I'll turn to the deputy minister. Thank you.
Thank you. Deputy minister Kelly.
Thank you, Madam Chair. There's quite a lot of work that's going on right now working with the land and water boards but also internally. The Public Land Act regulations are ongoing, and there's drafting occurring of those at this particular moment in time. We're fully secured, and there's a guidance document that's being drafted based on some advice that's been provided by EY. There's also a riskbased evaluation tool. And I would also point out that in the contaminated sites work plan we've spoken about previously, there's a number of deliverables within that will assist with that issue and concern. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Member for Frame Lake.
Yeah, thanks. I don't want to get into a debate here but we're not fully secured on some of these sites. You know, Prairie Creek being an example. We don't hold full financial security because a crazy arrangement that the federal government got into with the company and that it still hasn't been sorted out as far as I know.
All right, I'll ask a more pointed question. Reclaim is a model. It's almost like proprietary developed by some consultants but it's a methodology of calculating reclamation liability based on a whole bunch of rather complicated spreadsheets, unit costs, and so on. That hasn't been updated since 2017, at least that's the model that's on the ENR website and it seems to be publicly available. What work and with escalating, you know, engineering, construction costs, and so on maybe even some of the unit prices might we might have some more accurate stuff. But is any work being done to actually update the 2017 model. Thanks, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Minister.
For that detail, I'll turn to the deputy minister.
Thank you. Deputy minister.
Thank you, Madam Chair. So we have worked recently with a consultant to on unit costs due to inflation. And my understanding is that this tool was originally a federal tool that came over with devolution, and the federal government is doing some work on it in Nunavut where they use it and we will definitely be involved and hopefully be able to use the amendments that are made to the tool there. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Member for Frame Lake.
Yeah, okay, thanks for that. I'd just rather not have to wait for the feds to do something that may not happen. But I want to turn to the integrated resource management assistance program. It's contribution money found on page 96, and it's totally flatlined, actually for everything here. Maybe it went up in 20222023 a little bit. But, you know, I guess this government had some sort of a policy or approach where agencies or departments could go to FMB for forced growth and clearly ENR either didn't go or wasn't successful. And I'm not going to ask them which one. But there's no increases here, particularly for ERMA. This is, you know, important stuff where those governments that don't have land rights agreements can actually access funding to allow them to participate in environmental management, decisionmaking, comanagement stuff. So when was the last time this was increased, and why was it is it not increased in 20232024? Thanks, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Minister.
For that detail, I'll turn to the deputy minister. Thank you.
Thank you. Deputy minister.
Thank you, Madam Chair. This is federal funding that comes with the SIMP and audit funding, and we will be engaging with them in a discussion about the next ten years of funding. We had evaluated the program and updated it based on recommendations. And a change that you see here is due to unprocessed contribution agreements and a workshop that was not requiring funding as it was held virtually. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Member for Frame Lake.
Yeah, okay, I guess I look forward to successful negotiations with the federal government then to increase this because I think it's really essential work that some of these folks do. So I don't think I have anything else, Madam Chair. Thank you.
Thank you. Are there any further questions under the regulatory assessment and authorizations? Member for Great Slave.
Thank you, Madam Chair. And I promise my colleague I just have one short question. Given that the oh, and I'm not going to get the terminology right but the Tlicho had asked for the allseason road or the road to have the big environmental assessment done on it for the Slave Geologic road. And I'm just wondering I know this is a little bit far out. But how would something like that, a scale of environmental assessment that size, would that cause us to then need more resources in this area of the department, or does it just because it would be sort of federal with the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board and whoever would be sort of doing it from the Nunavut side, does that not then does that incur any further cost to us as a government? Thank you.
Thank you. Minister.
Yes, so we don't know like, we don't know right yet. But for the participation, I'll turn to the deputy minister. Thank you.
Thank you. Deputy minister.
Thank you, Madam Chair. So the departments are all participating right now with existing resources and but they're just at the stage where they're starting so we'll we can't answer the question about any additional funding. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Member for Great Slave.
Thank you. I'm just going to reach a little bit further and ask then, in a normal process like this, does the federal government kick in extra money for such an important sort of nation building and critical mineral project? Do we anticipate that perhaps there would be federal funding that would be coming towards us given that it is quite important to Canada's critical mineral strategy. Thank you.
Thank you. Minister.
Thank you. So this is a new process, but we've been encouraging the federal government to give money to the Indigenous governments to do this. Thank you.
Thank you. Member for Great Slave.
Thank you. And now I have a whole bunch of questions but I think I'm outside of the scope of what this budget item is about so I will stop there. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Are there any further questions from Members under regulatory assessment and authorizations? Seeing none, please turn to page 95.
Environment and Climate Change, regulatory assessment and authorizations, operations expenditure summary, 20232024 Main Estimates, $10,758,000. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you. We will now go to wildlife and forest management on page 99 with information items on page 100 to 102. Minister.
Thank you. I'd like to switch up our witnesses, please. Thank you.
Sergeantatarms, please escort the witness from the Chamber and bring in our new witness. Minister, please introduce your witness.
This time I'll get it right. Dr. Brett Elkin. Thank you.
Welcome. Okay, Member for Kam Lake.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I'm looking at the forest management line item which has about a $5 million decrease in that line item. I'm wondering if the Minister can speak to what areas of forest management are receiving that decrease given that it's got kind of the forest and trees and all that side of it and it also has the fire side. Thank you.
Thank you. Minister.
So, again, it depends on the fire year how we allocate or use the money. But for further detail, I'll turn to the deputy minister. Thank you.
Okay. Deputy minister, Dr. Kelly.
Thank you, Madam Chair. So we have a base budget for fighting fire in the NWT, and then we need if we have to go over that budget, we have to get supplementary funding for it. So depending on the fire year, the cost for things like aircraft or for fire crews and last year, for example, extending the fire season, you'll see that those numbers fluctuate. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Member for Kam Lake.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I'm wondering if I understand the piece about coming back for a sup, but I'm wondering what is is this kind of the standard base because it is different from the main estimates from last year even, and if we know that we are having more fires and a longer season why that wouldn't be maintained? Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Minister.
For that detail, I'll turn to the deputy minister. Thank you.
