Thank you, Mr. Speaker. How much is the Taltson project going to cost? Where is it going to go? Who are we selling the power for? Mr. Speaker, people in this House have been asking those questions for two decades. In 2004, Joe Handley said that a line to the diamond mines was expensive; it was going to cost us $170 million, Mr. Speaker. Well, Mr. Speaker, if we could get a line to the diamond mines from Taltson for $170 million, I'd build it tomorrow. However, Mr. Speaker, what happened in 2014 is after spending $18 million in studying, we found out the diamond mines didn't want to buy our power, Mr. Speaker, and they were not willing to enter into a longterm purchasing agreement. So we scrapped that iteration of the project. And then we looked to see if the southern provinces would buy our power, Mr. Speaker. And the Minister announced in this House well, they weren't really interested because they had some hydro projects on their own. And so, Mr. Speaker, for two decades we have been asking for a public business case on the Taltson Hydro Project, a clear evidencebased business case to see whether our power corporation can actually make a profit off of this project, Mr. Speaker, because if they don't, all of our rates are going up, Mr. Speaker. We need a clear, evidencebased decisionmaking project that tells us how much power are we trying to sell, who are we selling it to, Mr. Speaker. If it's not the diamond mines and it's not the provinces, I don't know who it is, Mr. Speaker. And at what rate are we selling it?
Mr. Speaker, the reality is our current power rates are more expensive than it is to burn diesel, and mines have to make a decision. Is it really worth their shareholder investment to get into Taltson power and is there even a route to where they're going because we have, for 20 years, been trying to figure out where exactly this transmission line is going. Is it going north, south, east, or west, I don't know, Mr. Speaker, and I hope the Minister of Infrastructure does before she goes and asks for any more money from this federal government. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member for Yellowknife North. Members' statements. Member for Tu NedheWiilideh.
