Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I was going to ask questions about RWED and their commitment to Expo, but I think I’m going to jump on the bandwagon about this lack of gymnasium in Nahanni Butte.

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Mr. Speaker, I grew up in Fort Simpson and I know these communities very well. I can tell you personally from my own experience of growing there as a young lad we could either go to the gymnasium to play floor hockey or kick soccer balls, or we could be out on the streets breaking windows doing nasty things. So my question to the Minister is what is his priority for our children out there? Is it...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. At this time, I'd like to read the report of the Standing Committee on Accountability and Oversight. First I will introduce the members of the committee, which are chair, Kevin Menicoche; myself, Robert Hawkins, deputy chair; Bill Braden, Great Slave; Jane Groenewegen; Sandy Lee; Calvin Pokiak; David Ramsay; Robert Villeneuve; Norman Yakeleya; and the new Member, Robert McLeod.

Our staff are Doug Schauerte, Colette Langlois and Darha Phillpot.

Mr. Speaker, the standing committees of the Legislative Assembly of the Northwest Territories met from January 10 to 21, 2005...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am hearing the warmth from that cold Minister over there on the books; finally. It’s good to see that, thank you.

Mr. Speaker, these directives can be done today. I want to hear this Minister say today he’s got the power that we will work to make this initiative within this capital budget, within the next five years, we can do this. Show some leadership, Mr. Speaker, because that little gymnasium is the heart of a community. It’s a community centre, it’s for gathering places like tea dances; my colleague over here just said it is the heart of the community. Will...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and thank you, Mr. Minister, for talking about process. Mr. Speaker, I think this Minister can make the policy commitment today. Now, he said earlier about he won’t stand up here in the House and help direct these things, but I think he can. Being in charge of MACA, he can say our policy initiative will be to put gymnasiums in these communities. We talked about $1.5 million out of his words. Well, the government can stand by and watch the diamond producers and the diamond cutters waste territorial dollars, between them arguing over who is responsible who is going to...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the Minister because I can start to feel an answer coming any minute now. I can tell you personally that the RCMP do not go out there. My constituents have phoned when they’ve heard people shooting at outhouses. Nobody goes. I mean, do we have to wait for an accident to happen? That’s why I tried to work six months ago with this department to say let’s start identifying the land. This is land right along our highway. This is certainly an area that could be addressed. I’ve suggested that, geez, let’s have land management policies out there. I need an answer...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I rise with a serious concern with the Department of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development. Late last summer I had a meeting with a constituent who had brought serious concerns to me about having a legal cabin out along the Cameron River and the fact that people were bulldozing trees down, making roads, shooting guns at their cabin as well as other legal cabins and no one was doing anything about it. No RWED officer would be there, no RCMP officer would be there. Well, much later the Minister’s staff comes to me and says it’s not their problem to...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, can the Premier tell me from his position what kind of hammer do we have in place to tell these educational authorities to hire our northern students, because we have a policy on our books to hire these northern students? It can either be a hammer or it can be a carrot. I need to know because we have northern students who are graduating from our teaching programs who are working at Extra Foods and other places while southern hires are being hired. So what hammer or carrot is he willing to commit to today just to solve this problem? Thank you, Mr. Speaker...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I am going to direct my question with regard to teaching and graduate placements to the Premier. I feel it was the highest office that made this commitment and it’s up to the highest office to fulfil this commitment on hiring northern graduates.

Mr. Speaker, my question to the Premier is since the directive to hiring responsibility for teachers is with the education authorities, what steps has his government taken that these authorities are taking to heart that promise made by this government to hire northern graduates? I want to know what we are doing to...

Thank you very kindly, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we still need to address the problem by this Minister, which is people are clear-cutting roads from the highway to the water there. How are we going to deal with this? How are we dealing with the garbage being littered along these areas? They’re becoming mushroom party spaces. How does this Minister plan to deal with this? This all goes back to the question that I started to ask six months ago when he said it was MACA’s problem. Now that MACA says it’s RWED’s problem, again, whose problem is this that we’re going to solve? I’m talking about...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I truly say thank you, Mr. Minister, yet I’m still waiting for an answer. I asked, when am I going to get a response to this letter. I’m waiting again now, in front of the public. My constituents are waiting. Their safety is an issue. We have people ploughing down trees in reserve areas. Are we going to wait for the chiefs to come say why we’re allowing people to destroy our land? Someday that’s going to be their land out there. The Minister almost…He said the Department of Justice, DOT. I’m surprised he didn’t say Housing and Education have a responsibility over this...