Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This morning I met with the leadership of Deline. They want to work with this government. They understand the tight fiscal restraints and limitations we are under, and also that there are a certain amount of projects that can be done in this government.
Over the last Assemblies I have heard from many Members from this side of the House who have very good ideas how to work on some of the projects in their community. Sometimes we wonder if the government on this side is listening because we’ve passed information to them and somehow it gets lost or we get resistance. We can’t do it because it doesn’t quite fit the system or doesn’t quite fit the criteria.
The Minister of Health and Social Services and I visited Colville Lake. We were trying, and we finally did it. With the Minister’s help, we put washrooms in the health centre.
When I hear Members talk about other situations in the North that our communities and small, isolated communities don’t quite have the same type of infrastructure or programs and services. The communities know best how to fix their solution but sometimes the policy doesn’t recognize that. It says, we have to do it for everybody else, everybody has to be the same. It’s not the same.
Only when the Minister of Health sat down with the leadership in Colville Lake and got some straight answers, and Colville Lake said, we could do this under budget and in a timely manner. If you went to PWS it would be too late, too long, and a whole bunch of policies would be put in place. I thank the Minister and thank PWS for allowing this to happen. We allowed to let go some of the control of our communities to give them the dignity and partnership to say, you know best in your community how this is to get done. It will get done. When we hold tight to the community, like Colville Lake says, we want the government’s hand off our throat. We want to breathe. We know what to do. Give it to us. Case in point, the transportation airport in Colville Lake was done 95 percent because the community was allowed to do it. Thank you, government, for doing that. I hope we can do this throughout the next three years. Mahsi cho.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The honourable Member for Hay River North, Mr. Bouchard.
