Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I just want to make follow-up comments to questions from earlier.
When I talked about the winter road, it was mentioned between 7 to $8 million. I see that as being an investment for putting the road in like that. But overall, Mr. Speaker, my question would be to the Minister of Infrastructure. I think at this point in time, if we don't start looking for solutions then I'll be back year after year asking the same questions. I think it's important now that we look at maybe building -- when I talk about a pre-feasibility study, it would be nice if we could do that and look at a plan for 5 to 20 years. And when we -- if we do that pre-feasibility study, we could look also at the all-season road, winter road, perhaps even runway expansion, and also, you know, looking at a chip seal program for our community. But before we could even do that, my question to the Minister of Infrastructure: Can we look at -- get a commitment from her to start a process so that we are able to look at doing a pre-feasibility study on these four items I just talked about? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member from Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh. Minister of Infrastructure.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, pre-feasibility studies are not free. They do involve expenditure of public funds. And now the pre-feasibility study I was being asked about earlier was for a road across Great Slave Lake to the tune of, again, even just preliminary estimates, being 7 to $8 million every year because the road, of course, melts every single year, and now there's pre-feasibility studies for several other additional projects.
Mr. Speaker, again, on the fly, that's several significant expenditures of public funds for projects that I really don't have a good estimate on other than the one I've already indicated is quite challenging and likely not to lead to a reduction in cost of living. Happy to take the other ones away, look more carefully. There may well have been some pre-feasibility work done at some time. I don't know that standing on the floor so I will certainly make that inquiry and perhaps can start from there in terms of where we can go next. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, the reason why I'm bringing this up is to really try to identify how we're going to address the issue of the high cost of living in the community of Lutselk'e. So we could get together with the chief and council and talk to them about it, but we need a process to do that. And so I guess what I'm trying to say, Mr. Speaker, is that there needs to be a process now. We have to look at figuring out what the cost might be and plan for 5 to 20 years down the road. But right now at this point in time, you know, we could talk about it but to me, it seems like it's -- I bring it up, and I brought it up in the 19th Assembly, we talk about it, and it's been pushed aside. And at this point in time, we got to look for a solution. And we talk about building a relationship, that's what I'm talking about. So my question again is that can we start working together in partnership and bringing this issue up with the Indigenous governments in Dettah and N'dilo -- sorry, Yellowknives Dene First Nation and Lutselk'e Dene First Nation. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And, Mr. Speaker, with respect to a concern on high cost of living and looking for solutions, one of those areas where there's high costs is the fact that there's a lot of fuel that has to get transported to the community and a lot of that is being transported because the community right now of Lutselk'e is running on a diesel generator to generate all of their power. And yet, Mr. Speaker, I do believe there have been some initial scoping studies done about micro hydro facilities. That would reduce the cost of living potentially, certainly bring a more reliable, sustainable power system and one that would reduce the amount of fuel that's being brought in. So that is an area that might have some impact. I don't know for sure. But that's exactly the kind of thing a feasibility study might do. I understand the chief of Lutselk'e has some interest in this. I'm certainly happy to follow up on that. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Infrastructure. Final supplementary. Member from Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to offer an invitation to the Minister to work together with myself and meet with the YKDFN on their capital needs but also to go to Lutselk'e together and meet with the chief and council and have that dialogue and discussion and next steps going forward. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And I'd like to know if the invitation -- I'll put it out there for her to accept. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'm happy to return to Lutselk'e. It's always a good experience to be there, a very pleasant and beautiful community, especially if it's fishing season, but certainly happy to go back and further these conversations.
Similarly, Mr. Speaker, not that long ago myself and Minister Macdonald were able to meet with YKDFN, both chiefs, in the community of Dettah. Also happy to go back. I expressed at the time that more of those meetings would be good. It took a long time to find a time then. I don't want a lot of time to pass before we can do a follow-up on that meeting. So, again, very happy to be able to say that here, that we're looking forward to continuing the conversations that we began recently. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Infrastructure. Oral questions. Member from Range Lake.
