Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, at the midpoint of this Assembly, 33 bills have been passed, compared to 52 in the 17th Assembly after two years. My question for the Premier is: why is the pace of legislative change so slow in this Assembly? Mahsi.
Masi. The Honourable Premier.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We are not a factory. We operate in a Legislative Assembly. Legislative proposals and draft bills before Cabinet are confidential documents which I cannot speak to, but we have a significant number of initiatives making their way through the system for introduction in the remaining two years. We had a slow start in year one with respect to introducing legislation due to a number of factors, the late election, and the focus on the development of the mandates by this House, but in year two, we are definitely picking up speed, Mr. Speaker.
The evidence just does not support what the Premier has said there. We are not picking up speed. We are about to start a three-and-a-half-month recess with one bill to contemplate. One bill. It is not as if this Assembly started from scratch with legislative proposals. In the transition report, there was a section about completing devolution and implementing a made-in-the-North regulatory system. That was available more than two years ago when the Premier was Premier. Why is it taking the government so long to bring this legislation forward for review?
Legislation can take a long time to develop, and we have a number of very large initiatives under way to bring forward in the latter two years of this Assembly. The revised mandate of the Government of the Northwest Territories identifies 14 larger pieces of legislation for introduction in the 18th Legislative Assembly that we have been working very hard on.
I wonder if part of the reason for the slowness is whether there is a lack of capacity among the legislative drafters to produce all the legislation that we have contemplated pursuing during this 18th Assembly. Is capacity the issue?
At the rise of the House today, we expect that the 18th Legislative Assembly will have passed an additional three financial bills. As the Member indicated, this brings the total number of bills passed by this Legislative Assembly to 36, with another bill introduced and before special committee for review. In past investigations, we have determined that capacity is not an issue, and we will undertake to review that again to ensure that is not the case.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife Centre.
Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Premier if he will work with the Caucus to convene a short sitting in December so that additional bills can be introduced for review prior to the budget session. Can he make that commitment? Thank you.
Historically, the final two years of an Assembly are often the heaviest when it comes to a government's legislative agenda. The 17th Assembly had a very large number of financial bills compared to previous Assemblies, as well as ten devolution-related bills making comparison to the 18th Assembly difficult. I believe that we are on track to deliver on a fulsome and ambitious legislative agenda for the 18th Legislative Assembly. I am prepared to review it and to see what will be required to make sure that we can complete our fulsome and ambitious legislative agenda. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
