Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today I talked about getting a winter road into the community of Lutselk’e from Yellowknife. I have questions for the Minister of Transportation. I spoke about low water levels throughout the North and some uncertainty with the barging system. For whatever reason if the barge is unable to get into Lutselk’e to deliver the goods this coming summer, does the Minister have any sort of backup plan in place in case there’s anything wrong with the barges?
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The honourable Minister responsible for Transportation, Mr. Michael McLeod.
Mr. Speaker, the Member for Tu Nedhe raises a serious issue. We have many communities across the Northwest Territories that are served by winter roads and barging systems. Low water has become an issue for many of these communities, and also the warmer winters are becoming a challenge to service some of the communities in getting the ice bridges and winter roads in place, namely on the Mackenzie/Fort Providence and also in the Tlicho communities.
Mr. Speaker, I point out that if there was a situation, and right now it’s hypothetical, but if there was ever a situation and the barges couldn’t make it into Lutselk'e, that would make it an emergency situation and that would fall under the Department of MACA to take the lead on it and find alternate solutions to get the material or the goods into that community.
Having said that, I would point out that of all the communities that are served by a barging system, the ones on the Mackenzie are probably most at risk. Lutselk'e is probably one of the safer communities because it is on a lake and the lake is quite deep and we don’t expect there will be any challenges in that area. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I spoke about the approximately 125 kilometres of road that is usually in place to service the exploration at Thor Lake. I was wondering if the Minister will commit to work with the community and industry to complete the winter road from there to Lutselk'e, which has many benefits to the community: cost of living, stuff that they can’t normally get in unless they are able to fly it, and that’s the community members. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I think it was last year was the first time this road was constructed to Thor Lake and it’s opening up an opportunity there that wasn’t there historically. It’s something I’ve asked my officials to look into, the possibilities that this new infrastructure or this new allowance has put before us. We’d certainly have to make sure of the intention of the company that’s opening up the road, that it’s going to be there for the long term. This development is still in the exploration stage and we would have to investigate the possibilities and the challenges that opening up a winter road for the final leg of this would bring forward.
Historically, there are only two occasions, I think, that we have seen a winter road. One was from Hay River to Yellowknife quite a while ago, and it brought huge challenges with pressure ridges. Talking to some of the people who were around during those days, they indicated we’re never going to do that again. You would probably need to travel with portable bridges because the pressure ridges opened up quite a gap. There was a time not too long ago when one of the companies that were working on the arena in Lutselk'e constructed a road and, of course, that posed a lot of challenges, too, and was fairly expensive. Those are things we’d have to consider and look at ways to move this forward, but we are exploring the possibilities. Thank you.
I’d like to thank the Minister for that response. Mr. Speaker, in the community of Lutselk'e, I have been advised that there are people in the community that know the lake very well and that they’re able to assist in any such construction that this government or any industry was prepared to venture into. I was wondering if the Minister could commit his department to working with myself and members of Lutselk'e to maybe start to do some of the footwork that’s necessary to develop a winter road on the ice across Great Slave Lake. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, as I indicated before, I have directed my officials to look into this issue. The Member for Tu Nedhe has raised this as a concern, as something he wanted to see move forward, and we are exploring the opportunities. Of course, as we do that, we will take into consideration comments from the community and certainly include that as part of the traditional knowledge and that we’d like to have that discussion with the people who are familiar with the lake, familiar with ice and things of that nature. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.
