Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yesterday in Committee of the Whole it was discussed about the fuel barrels left throughout the Northwest Territories. I’d like to ask the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources, does the department know how many barrels there are? I’m not speaking to every single barrel, but I’m speaking to the large volume of barrels we estimate are out there and the general location of the larger cache of barrels. I mean, we can always understand there will be one or two here and there, and those are difficult to track unless you stumble upon them.
I guess the question is: How many barrels do we estimate are out there and do we have the rough location as to where these environmental liabilities are out there?
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. The Minister of Environment and Natural Resources, Mr. Miltenberger.
Thousands, Mr. Speaker, and they would be invariably in areas where there were old abandoned sites either for exploration or some type of small mining venture from the days of yore, but a lot of it tied to exploration sites.
What is the plan of Environment and Natural Resources to address this environmental liability that has been left on the people of the Northwest Territories to carry this burden and to be financially responsible for it? In other words, does the Department of Environment and Natural Resources have any type of plan in place or plan for the future to address this liability of these fuel barrels sitting there on the land?
The issue has been flagged. It’s on our to-do list. We’ve been using the resources and capacity that we do have to look at the full rollout of our electronic waste recycling in addition to all of the other recycling programs that we’ve come into in the last few years. The barrel one, one raised in the House, as well, by the Member for Sahtu, for example, for the vehicles that have been abandoned are all things on our list that we intend to get to but not any time in the life of this government.
Well, that’s okay if the government doesn’t intend to get to it because they’re either not interested or too busy, but I’m not uninterested, and I’m certainly not too busy to bring up good ideas for the department to get to work on.
As such, would it not make sense for the government to consider putting a bit of fee, a reward or a bit of bounty on every one of these barrels?
By way of example, and I know the Minister likes examples, so for example, if we put a $100 fee or reward or return price on every one of those barrels, we could fund that out of our environmental recycling fund. That way we could help clean up some of this environmental liability and at that same time we get Northerners involved in this process cleaning up the land. It would be a way to do this with the department not having any plan at this point.
I would be happy to concur with the Member that he is a fountain of good ideas. We are 270 days left until the next election. We have our to-do lists, work lists that are fully subscribed to. We are working to implement all those plus some others that have been added on over the course of the last year or so.
The Member raises a very legitimate, good issue. The issue of putting a fee, a recovery fee on each barrel is there. It’s a question of the resources and the time. We have an Environment Fund that is being used and managed carefully to do all the things that currently are in place. To start taking out significant sums of money at this point without a clearly thought out plan would not be the wise use of those funds.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.
First off I want to say, I dare not argue with the Minister’s keen eye and good observation of the assessment of the work being done here. I certainly like to agree when he’s right.
My final question is: Would the Minister be willing to devote a bit of time and policy development in his department to take some assessment of this particular potential? We have people travelling on the land in different forms, be it on the lakes and rivers through their boats, be it on skidoos and other modes of transportation, and what a great way to reward people on their long trips out on the land by putting a little money in their pocket. Say, $100 a barrel. They could be bringing them back and we could be doing a good thing. All I’m asking for is a little policy development.
Would the Minister task the department to at least flesh out the idea to see the merits behind it?
I was making the comments about the Member being a fountain of good ideas because we all know he tends to hide his light under a bushel and he’s very self-deprecating and humble, so I wanted to give him that little bit of promotion to help with his battered self-image.
So I will add that to the list that I have as I meet regularly with ENR and we will give it the consideration it deserves. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. The Member for Range Lake, Mr. Dolynny.
