Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a question for the Minister of Public Works. When Minister Ramsay and I were in Fort Good Hope last Friday, we were notified by the leadership of a fuel spill at the tank farm. When I did more research, I noticed there were two fuel spills, one on February 8th and one on February 22nd. I want to ask the Minister, what’s the communication protocol to let us Members know when there are incidents like that that have a significant damage to the communities. What is the Minister doing to straighten up his department to notify the MLAs right away? Why do we have to wait a month for us being told? Worse yet, to go into the community and find out firsthand.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Minister of Public Works, Mr. Abernethy.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Like the Member, I’m not a big fan of surprises. After the Member and I talked about this particular spill in Fort Good Hope, I had a long conversation with the Department of Public Works and Services to make sure that we put in a protocol so that MLAs are notified at the earliest convenience of when services are going to be affected as a result of things like oil spills in their community. We’ve got that put together pretty much so that we can make sure Members aren’t going into their communities to any surprises related to oil spills. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I look forward to that new protocol, because it was about 11,500 litres spilled in Fort Good Hope due to the damage of one of the faulty valves that were leaking. I want to ask the Minister if this is the case in other tank farms across the Northwest Territories where this piece of valve was fitted into our tank farms.
Mr. Speaker, we’ve done a number of upgrades to tank farms around the Northwest Territories, and one of the things that we’ve done is put a secondary safety valve on the ones that we’re responsible for. Unfortunately, at Fort Good Hope the two valves failed and we ended up with an oil spill of 11,500 litres. Fortunately, it was all contained within the berm so that there is no environmental damage. It has been cleaned up. The department and its partners are doing research, an investigation into the valves that leaked. We had sent out staff to all of our tank farms to physically take a look at the valves to make sure that none are leaking. Of the 20 we have in place, the only two that appear to have leaked are the ones in Fort Good Hope and we’re confident that we’re not going to experience any more leaks. But we are going to monitor them on a regular basis, daily, by the contractors, to make sure that any leaks that happen are known early to stop excessive amounts of fuel being spilled. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, the information I have in front of me is October 29, 2012, one litre of gasoline in Fort Good Hope is about $1.07. So we lost 11,500 litres of fuel. Thank God for the berms that they had built there.
Can he also communicate this to the Minister of Environmental and Natural Resources, that when there are spills of such a large amount, that the MLA is also kept up to date as to the environmental damages and what’s happening with the damaged fuel that’s in that area? Can the Minister inform me this will be done as soon as possible? I hope that we have a new policy by next week.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes.
Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. Final supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to also ask the Minister for a response in regard to the fault of this fuel spill. Was it the manufacturer? Was it the contractor? I’m hoping that with the operator that they do certain checks, that the operator doesn’t get dinged with a big fuel bill for cleanup. Has that been sorted out? Is the person who is responsible picking up the tab on this?
As I indicated previously, there is an investigation and research being done into this particular case. It is my understanding that there have been discussions with insurance companies and other individuals involved so the cost can be covered.
Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. The honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Blake.
