Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, during a time of fiscal restraint it's easy to few arts as an extra, a nice to have when times are good but a budget line that should be cut when we're tightening our belts. Mr. Speaker, I think it's time we stopped viewing arts as simply a budget line. It doesn't need to be something that's separate from our real priorities, like education, economy, health care, housing. It can be a way of doing things and a way of approaching problems with more creativity, more humanity, more connection.
Art is more than something that professionals do on stage when they perform for the rest of us. Art is how we express ourselves. As groups, it's how we express our cultures. And as individuals, it's how we express our own unique identities. A healthy person and a healthy community incorporate art forms every single day through written and spoken stories, through songs and drum dances, through the clothing we make with materials from the land, through the murals that brighten up our public spaces. It's how we keep renewing our connection to the land and the world around us.
Now, our priority in this Assembly is to build up a healthy workforce. So I think we need to make sure arts are integrated into every stage of education and training. We all know that to teach young kids the alphabet you have to sing songs and tell stories, but even as we get older, we continue to learn better through the arts. It's more engaging, it sharpens our brains, makes us more creative in our problem solving, and it makes kids want to attend school.
If we want to develop a dynamic and robust economy, we need innovation and entrepreneurship, and that can only come from training our people to be creative. And if we're looking for competitive advantage in the global economy, our niche could be in high value cultural products, cultural tourism, film, art, telling our stories to the world.
In promoting mental health and combatting addictions, the most effective ways to reach people to inspire hope and selfconfidence could be through arts and culture programs. In terms of our housing priority, there's a public housing complex in my riding which is full of boarded up units right next to a school. A local resident is spearheading a mural project to involve local children in painting those ugly boards. Mr. Speaker, I ask for unanimous consent just to conclude my statement. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So as I said, a local resident is spearheading a mural project to involve local children in painting up those ugly boards so the children who live in those units can feel pride in where they live and feel part of a community initiative. Mr. Speaker, we should not underestimate the power of arts in achieving this Assembly's priorities. Thank you.
Thank you, Member from Yellowknife North. Members' statements. Member from Range Lake.
