Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m going to in the next 15 days advocate for the people in the Sahtu in terms of the equality of programs and services that this government here provides to residents in the Northwest Territories under our public governance system.
When I was in Norman Wells on a constituency visit I realized that 10 pounds of flour at the Northern Store ran about $37. People asked me to pick up some flour here in Yellowknife, which is about $10 or so for 10 pounds.
The inequality of this that we face in the Sahtu every day in terms of education because of the small communities that we have to go through the school system is not the same type of education we have in larger centres. We have to put up with it. We have to fight for the equality in terms of our students want to aspire to be surgeons or doctors or chemists and they just don’t have that level of support there of the other centres where some of the parents can support the children to go and get this type of education.
The same with access to health care. I’m very surprised that Colville Lake has, I think there’s a doctor goes in there every six months in terms of access to health care into the Sahtu and that we still have elders who live in our communities to be housed in Yellowknife or Fort Simpson or Inuvik. These elders, when they want to go to these long-term care facilities, have to pay their way to these facilities, which is not fair. So we’re looking for some of these types of services in the Sahtu.
When we talk about equality in the Sahtu or in the Northwest Territories, in the reality of it we’re not getting the same type of services in some of the larger centres. This makes me wonder when this government will start owning up to the equality of all residents in the Northwest Territories, because when we see other regions or other communities get more services than us, we have to wonder where the equality is, where are the fairness and justice of this government is.
I’ll be asking further questions to the Premier in terms of the goals that we aspire to undertake in the 16th Assembly.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The honourable Member for Yellowknife Centre, Mr. Hawkins.
