Thank you, Mr. Speaker. With this being our last day in the Legislature and Remembrance Day coming up on Monday, I’d like to dedicate my statement today to Remembrance Day.
There will be a service in Hay River sponsored by the Royal Canadian Legion. I have been very proud to participate in that service in past years. This year, as well, my colleague MLA Robert Bouchard and I will be proud to lay wreaths at the cenotaph at the Legion Remembrance Day service and read the scriptures for that service as well.
After I mentioned this week earlier, having left home at such a young age and coming from a family of veterans, I adopted the veterans that I learned to know and love in the Northwest Territories and in Hay River. Sadly, many of them have now gone on, have passed on and are fewer and fewer now, and we remember so fondly spending Remembrance Day services with them. I can’t name them because I would surely forget some, but their families know who they are and they are still dear to our heart.
As we commission the Highway of Heroes on Friday with our Minister of Transportation, and as we look for ways to remember the proud tradition and service of the Canadian military in peacekeeping and in war actions, I hope that we will all take the time to live up to the commitment that we make that we will remember them.
Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I was glad to hear our colleague from Hay River South talk about Remembrance Day and remembering those who have gone off to battle to give us the freedom that we enjoy today. We have a lot of holidays during the year. Christmas and Easter I always thought as two of the most important ones, but I always thought Remembrance Day was another day that we should always make sure that we pay respect to those that have given their lives so we can enjoy the lifestyle that we have today.
I spoke to students in Inuvik a number of years ago and I talked about the fact that we look up to hockey players and actors and songwriters and rap stars and I think sometimes we have our priorities mixed up. My heroes are those that went to war and sacrificed their lives so we can enjoy the life that we live today. When you’re younger, you don’t pay much mind to it, but as you get older and you have children of your own, grandchildren of your own, you realize that this is an opportunity that so many of these young gentlemen were not able to have, men and women.
I was reading an interesting article called Letters from the Front and it was excerpts of letters that they had written to their families back home. One line always got me, and that was a 28-year-old private sent a letter home saying, “I give my life willingly for my country, knowing that it was given in a righteous cause.” That was the attitude that so many of them went with. They were scared, the letters talked about the fear that they had, but they still went because they felt it was still the right thing to do.
I think, not only today but as we go on and the memories get older and older, we should teach our children and grandchildren, those who come behind us, to never forget the sacrifice they made. They even made the sacrifice so that people can go out and give white poppies, which a lot of Veterans don’t agree with, but we have that type of freedom because of the sacrifices these gentlemen and ladies made, so let’s never forget that. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Item 4, reports of standing and special committees. Mr. Hawkins.
