Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment. I spoke a little earlier today in my statement about the growing tourism sector and how well it is doing in terms of diversifying our economy. I would like to just start by asking the Minister: what is the department doing, or has the department reviewed the growing tourism sector with reference to how fast the sector is growing? How are they measuring it? What metrics are they using? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Based on, you know, a lot of comments that we have had from Members when we were in committee around data collection and stuff, the Department of ITI has definitely stepped up our progress around trying to get more data and build them into our business plans and stuff going forward, so there is more information for everybody.
For the tourism industry, we track how many people are coming to the Northwest Territories. You have clearly heard me saying in the House how much money has been spent and how much is spent by individuals from different demographic markets in the Northwest Territories. This is the type of information that is going to help feed into our 2025 tourism plan going forward. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I appreciate the Minister sharing some of that information. Maybe I will take that a little bit further and just ask: the Minister referred to good information and good data being collected. Can he share a little bit more with, you know, where would a budding entrepreneur find this information? Where and how is it being collected? If I was a new start-up business and I wanted to find this data so I could feed it into my business plan, how and where do I find this kind of information?
You know, depending on what industry or part of tourism that this operator would want to go into, be it fishing or big game hunting or aurora viewing, we have all this type of data within the department from the number of people who come to the Northwest Territories from different regions, as I have said, different demographics, the money that they spend, the number of viewing days that are possible with aurora viewing, these sorts of things. We continue to grow that database. I suspect that, if an entrepreneur wanted to get that information, which would be good advice -- and I think the Member is asking the right question, if you are going to go into this industry, you need to do your homework -- they can certainly just come directly to the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment to get that information.
Thank you to the Minister for providing that reply. Mr. Speaker, we know that there is a major increase of new operators, especially within the Yellowknife region. With that influx of new operators comes some questions and concerns about safety, and in particular, public safety, so I would like to ask the Minister: with regards to road safety, cold climate, conditions on ice, and even going out on trails, what kind of qualifications and training and licensing does a new operator require?
As I have said in the House before, we are one of the only jurisdictions, and few jurisdictions in Canada, that need to have a tourism operator licence in the Northwest Territories. We have had some concerns, I guess, is the way to put it around how some of these operators have been operating, particularly around the Ingraham Trail, so we have attached a safety plan that has to be presented to the department to be able to access your licence. So anyone who is operating, and particularly in the North Slave region, where the Member's riding represents, they have to have these two permits in place to be able to operate in the Northwest Territories in a safe manner.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I appreciate the reply from the Minister. The Minister indicated that he is aware that some of these concerns have been raised. He indicates that there is training required in order to get these permits. Let's say we have the permits now. What is the department doing to monitor the tourism operators to make sure that they are actually, in fact, doing what they should in terms of protecting public's interest? Does the department go and do random checks, or is there some kind of form of inspection that they undertake? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
As I have said in the House before, we have implemented where the licence owner has to have identification on their vehicle, a licence plate of sorts, to say that they are a certified operator in the Northwest Territories. We have upped our patrol, particularly around the Ingraham Trail. The safety issue there is something that we have been dealing with ever since I have been the Minister. There are different things. We are doing our pilot project this year around getting to operators into some of our parks during the winter season to get them off the road.
The Member clearly heard concerns from his constituents out on the Ingraham Trail about people just stopping their buses along the Ingraham Trail, turning their lights off for aurora viewing. This is a big concern of ours, along with a multitude of extra traffic that we have there with resupply of the mines. So this is a great concern of all of ours, and we are working on these things to try to improve customer safety, but also to provide a better experience for the visitors to the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nunakput.
