R.J. Simpson

Thank you, Madam Chair. So there's settlement lands. There's other types of lands that might be owned by an Indigenous government. And the Member's probably I know the Member's more of an expert on land than I am. I know that's his background. He came here in 1985 to work on those types of issues, so. And I can perhaps hand it to Mr. Yap for some further explanation of how the land if the Member would like. I know we're on his clock here. So, yes, I see him shrugging. So to Mr. Yap. Thank you.

Thank you. So I will hand it to Mr. Yap for a more detailed explanation. Thank you.

Thank you. Indigenous governments are bound would be bound by this act as well. And I will say that if municipalities and Indigenous governments were in the same position as the GNWT, they would then have to comply with other they'd have to abide by the surety bond section of the act, which would mean that they would have to have contracts that are bondable, which would have an impact on could have an impact on their ability to get people to do work in certain regions of the territory as well. Thank you.

Thank you. And there's been comments about protecting, you know, other protecting governments. The legislation's not about protecting governments, it's about ensuring that workers get paid. And the GNWT is not an entity that we're worried about being insolvent. There's not a concern that the GNWT won't pay their bills. There's you know, we hear concerns from the Members about when the bills get paid, but the issue isn't that they won't get paid. Thank you.

Thank you. Well, during that incamera discussion, I didn't say that this is a bad piece of legislation. I said that if I would have started if I could have gone back, I would have started over again in a different way because I see that the GNWT, being exempt from this bill or being having different provisions applied to it under this bill would not go over well with the Regular Members. And lo and behold, here we are in this situation where it was reported back as not ready.

There is you know, when we see that the Government of the Northwest Territories is being treated differently, that in...

Yes, I would.

Thank you, Madam Chair. We wish to deal with Bill 65 and Bill 84 as well. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Cabinet won't be supporting this. As one of the Members pointed out, there is a specific information in here and there's also very broad and general information in the subclauses I guess subclause (4). What we want this piece of legislation to be is something that people can look at and understand what lien legislation in the territories is, and what this would require people to do is go and now read agreements and before they do work for Indigenous government to determine whether there's any inconsistencies. They might just say, why bother. So I'm not quite clear what...

Thank you. No, but when it comes to the GNWT, there are other ways that we protect workers. So I know the Department of Finance has introduced new security requirements for bids and contracts earlier this year, and that will help protect small businesses, specifically those engaged in constructing GNWT projects, by providing adequate payment coverage through labour and material bonds. Thank you.

Thank you. And further to Mr. Yap's comments, this would not apply to settlement lands.

Engagement that was done with Indigenous governments occurred during the committee process actually. The chair referenced this. We reached out to a number of the Indigenous governments and organizations in the territory explaining the situation and requested feedback on potential inclusion of Indigenous governments or exclusion from the act. Thank you.