Mr. Speaker, my question again is for the Minister of Municipal and Community Affairs. I continue to hear him making commitments to the Member from Yellowknife Centre, yet this project you’re talking about is in the Mackenzie Delta. It’s going to affect the people in Aklavik. It’s the community of Aklavik that should be consulted, not someone from Yellowknife Centre.
I’d like to ask the Minister: before you commit to consulting anyone, do you consult with the hamlet of Aklavik, the MLA for Mackenzie Delta and the people in Aklavik if there are any changes and any effects of this project by any way by this government? I’d like to directly ask the Minister: will you consult the communities affected first, before you consult anybody on any changes to this project?
Mr. Speaker, we have been consulting with everybody involved. For a number of years now, the concept of vulnerable water, vulnerable projects and one contract was something we wanted to do. We’ve spoken with the Association of Communities; we’ve spoken with the local government administrators of the Northwest Territories; we’ve spoken with every community that’s involved in this proposal. We will continue to do so.
I by no means want to have the Members expect that I would speak to one before the other. If there is going to be a briefing on what has transpired here, I’ll offer it to all the Members, and I will make sure the communities are informed of what is happening. We don’t anticipate making any changes at this point, as the Member has pointed out.
Mr. Speaker, the department has had the full support of myself as the MLA, has full support from the hamlet of Aklavik and the people of Aklavik to get on with this. We’ve continued to support this project on the understanding of where this project is at, but if there is going to be any delay, or basically any innuendoes of cancelling this project or redoing the whole project, we’re not in support of that.
I’d like to, again, ask the Minister that every effort be made to fast-track this project, get that water treatment in place. The community needs this piece of infrastructure. We’ve been waiting for two years now because of cost overruns and delays. It’s two years past the date we were told we were going to get it.
I’d like to ask the Minister again, knowing that he has support of the MLA and the community: let’s get on with it.
I’m trying to get on with it. We are quite excited about this new concept of bundling projects. We think we have to be creative and innovative as we move forward with some of our challenges facing some of our communities in terms of providing infrastructure. Designing, implementing, operating and all those things are some things that are challenging every community in terms of capacity and getting these projects underway.
This is a new way of doing business. I can understand some Members being concerned. However, negotiations are ongoing. The project hasn’t been signed off yet; we haven’t made the final decision. I need to take that to the next step. Whether that goes forward or not, I can’t say where that’ll end up at this point, but I will commit to sharing that information as much as we can with all the Members and the communities.
Mr. Speaker, the economic benefit of this project to the community is enormous. Whenever projects are bid in our communities, the benefit that flows to the local contractors for site work and labour work — in most cases that’s all we see anyhow, but for us that’s a boost in our economy.
Again, the construction contractors in this community are waiting for this project to take place. They’ve been waiting for some time. Again, I keep telling them all, “It’s coming; it’s coming.” I’d like to ensure that the Minister makes sure that we do stick on track, try to get this project on the ground this summer. It’s a crucial piece of infrastructure that we need in our communities.
Once again, I can certainly relate to the Member’s messages and some of his recommendations. We have had all the communities make those points and reaffirm those points on a number of occasions. We’ll do what we can. We are quite concerned about where we are with replacing water plants. This is a possible remedy to that, though. We’ll follow it up.
