Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The most important element of building public infrastructure is gravel, from those housing lots, to public roads, to water treatment facilities, to schools. Without the access to a year-round gravel source, these simple infrastructure needs take years to complete.
Mr. Speaker, it is essential that communities have access to a gravel source so that they can meet these fundamental challenges. But, Mr. Speaker, add climate change to the mix and you have a whole different problem.
Mr. Speaker, with melting permafrost, shoreline erosion on our rivers and in the oceans, it makes it even a bigger challenge for communities just to maintain the existing public infrastructure and not have to also deal with the fundamental challenge of climate change. Every community in the Northwest Territories must realize that we’re seeing more floods, more erosion, more affects on public infrastructure and collapsing buildings, to collapsing highways and roads. Mr. Speaker, we, as a government, must ensure that we do everything that we can to protect public infrastructure in our communities and shore up the public investment that was made to put this public infrastructure in all our communities in the Northwest Territories, and ensure the well-being of the residents of those communities are being able to have access to gravel sources.
Mr. Speaker, I have been talking for years about access to a gravel source in Aklavik to ensure that they can deal with the fundamental challenge of public infrastructure. To build simple things like a water treatment plant or public housing unit that should take one year, takes three years.
In regards to improving access to improving public infrastructure such as the roads in the community, basically it takes three or four years of planning, but yet, Mr. Speaker, we have year-round access to a gravel source, which is the Willow River source, which is around 20 kilometres from the community. We will be able to expand the community infrastructure, improve the existing roads and airports in our communities. Mr. Speaker, at the appropriate time, I will have questions directed to the Minister of Transportation in regards to where we go with the access road to a gravel source in Aklavik. Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Krutko. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.
