Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Further to my statement on the supply chain, Mackenzie River Corridor systems and the Beaufort Sea communities, my first question to the Minister of Infrastructure is: how is the MTS ensuring that Sahtu, and other communities that are customers to the division, receive the resupply services that they require in this sailing season? What preparatory measures are the department taking? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Infrastructure.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This sailing season has already been posted online. Everyone is welcome to have a look at it. These are subject to change, of course, due to climatic change and other variables that we would be out of control of.
At this present moment we are planning to go to Norman Wells three times this year; June, July, and August. We are looking at going to Tulita twice this year, in July and August, as well. To inform Members of this House and the people of the general public, the terminal in Hay River is now open, accepting cargo for all communities across the Northwest Territories, and I encourage those who want to send cargo to get hold of our terminal or else book through our customer service desk. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thanks to the Minister for that information there. My next question is: what is MTS doing differently for this 2019 season to ensure a successful resupply? For example, federal resources for upgrades to the operational side of the division, and those types of things?
As all of the Members know, we have had a challenging year there last year with the issue that happened in the Beau-Del. We are focusing our efforts on high-quality and timely resupply services. We are going to have to focus on a number of efforts across the system, what we are going to have to do to ensure that we will be able to improve resupply. One of those particular measures is trying to get out earlier this year with our ships; that is why the sailing season has been altered a little bit.
Now, again, as I said, some of this is subject to stuff that is out of our control. The supplier of petroleum products has to run their schedule and get their stuff, and hopefully they are working closely with our department, which I know they are.
Something that I didn't even think about until today that could possibly hamper delays further in the season is something as easy as a forest fire that is happening high level, which potentially shuts down the rail system. These are things that we are going to have to work closely with.
Again, communication was a big thing that came out of the impacts of last year, and we will continue to work on those with all residents of the Northwest Territories.
The Minister must be a mind reader, leading up to my next question here. We are all quite aware of the drastic fires taking place in northern Alberta, which is in the rail system. Has the inventory for the communities been delivered and stored at the facilities in Hay River, ready for barging shipment?
Hay River has limited capacity to store all of the fuel that we ship up and down the system, so we have to work hand-in-hand with our supplier to meet the demands of our shipping season. We will continue to do that. It impacts our barge deliveries for the communities.
As I said, forest fires and stuff like that can have a large impact on the system. We are very concerned about the low waters this year. That is already right across the system, but we don't believe that will impact the deliveries to the Sahtu region, because that is before the Sansu Rapids. We are monitoring this situation very closely, and we will continue to inform this House as the season moves on.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Sahtu.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and thanks for that information there. Moving on to the last question, can the Minister elaborate a little bit on the long-range plans on the movement of goods and services and the MTS division? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
As I have said, this year particularly we have moved up our scheduled sailing dates and resupply for the communities. For long-term plans, we are working closely with the Canadian Coast Guard. We have reached out to them about how we can work more closely on the situation that could potentially arise in the Beau-Del again, particularly up on the Emerson Coast. This is something that we need to try to avoid, and we need to work very closely with them and their sailing schedule as well, to align with what we are trying to do, to resupply the communities.
I think that I have mentioned in this House before that we are having a strategic look at how we are storing our petroleum products, particularly in the Beaufort-Delta, and whether there is an opportunity to maybe expand on some of the resupply storage tanks in that area. I know that, in the Sahtu, for instance, we have enough fuel stored at Fort Good Hope and Tulita, and Fort Good Hope could actually support, if there was a shortage in that region, to Coville, and Tulita could certainly do the same thing for the Deline situation. However, up in the Arctic coast communities, it's a little bit tougher, and we need to have a look at what we are doing up there around our infrastructure needs and possibly what the challenges are going forward, if we are going to have to be able to have a larger supply of fuel in that region. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife Centre.
