Thank you, Mr. Speaker. A common concern in my constituency is damage done by extreme power surges of electricity coming into the homes. One constituent has been discussing this problem for some time with the NWT Power Corporation time after time. NTPC has tried to solve the problem, with no success. It may be a part of the problem is the lack of qualified professionals who can truly diagnose what’s going wrong and fix it in the community, Mr. Speaker. This constituent had to wait a long time for a specialist to fly into the community, evaluate the problem, only to watch the individual climb the power pole, tighten the connection and tell him the problem was fixed. He knew that was unlikely, and sure enough, the power fluctuations continued and he had more damage to his appliances done. Maybe the Power Corporation doesn’t have the resources to hire qualified and knowledgeable professionals.
As a resident of a small, remote community, I know this first hand, the damage done by power surges. This is rarely an issue in larger centres as they get the power failures just as we do but rarely have such extreme fluctuations in their power. This is yet another example of the lower quality of services to our small communities, Mr. Speaker. This should be corrected and NTPC needs to ensure that it reimburses its customers in small communities for appliances that are damaged by poor quality of electricity. This requires them to do proper evaluations of the damage. I hope they have qualified people to do that.
Mr. Speaker, this should be fair and easy to NTPC customers to make complaints about the service, but I couldn’t find any information on how from the Power Corporation on its website.
Mr. Speaker, I will have questions for the Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Power Corporation at the appropriate time. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Jacobson. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.
