Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Minister Thompson, this is for the ECC department.
Minister Thompson, has the department, ECC, ever considered the impact the existing fire management policy is going to have on our Indigenous language, culture, and way of life? Did the ECC I mean, I'm just saying, what I'm trying to say here is that has the department considered the impact the existing fire management policy is having on Indigenous language, culture, and way of life?
Thank you, Member for Monfwi. Before we continue, Members, please refrain from using names. Just use the Minister or Members' ridings or department they're in charge of. Minister responsible for Environment and Climate Change.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we take that into account. We have our fire crews are very much Indigenous. We work with them. The fire crews and people we brought back were Indigenous. These people have been in the system for 20, 30 years or 40 years, and we've worked with them. I've had conversations with them. We've had that they talk about it. In the old days where people would use to like, burning was part of the ecology of the landscape. It would then help them regrowth and stuff like that. The problem is if we don't do those things, we get these tinder boxes that are that go on forever. And what we've seen in Hay River and that fire that went from Kakisa into Hay River was a tinder box. Within four hours that fire travelled. So these are all these things. We work with Indigenous governments. We have those conversations. And I'm very proud that ECC does have those conversations and the people that we bring back are of Indigenous heritage. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Monfwi.
Mr. Speaker, the reason why I ask is that anyone who lived and spends time in small communities, they would understand what we're talking about because Indigenous people, they have close connection to the land. You know, we it provides and sustain us. And even you, you understand that. Now we use the land for healing. That is the reason why I ask that question, is because we have close connection to the land.
But anyways, Mr. Speaker, the GNWT says it will take seven years for burned land to naturally replenish itself. Does that mean it will take seven years for any lost wildlife to also replenish their numbers given the state of our dwindling caribou herds across the NWT and considering that several caribou herds' habitats have been disrupted this year and in years past, does the GNWT calculate how many caribou and other wildlife are lost annually due to wildfire? How many years for caribou herds to grow back? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there was two or three questions in there so I will try to answer which ones they are.
Do we if it's seven years, does it have the impact on wildlife? I'd have to get back to the Member on that. I don't know that detail. I don't get into that detail. I understand the importance of fire and what it does to the environment. It's part of the regrowth. It has happened in the past. It used to be part of it, the way of life. I was actually talking to an advisor, an elder who lives on the land, and we talked about, you know, the importance of fire and what it did. And he talked to me about in the old days they used to find areas that were really dry and that and they would burn it so it would be regrowth and that. So we do look into those things. And if the habitat on the caribou, it is an asset, a value. So it's a value to us. We look at that. We try to fight the fires there as best we can because caribou are important, so is their environment. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, thank you. Since 2009, we have caribou restriction in place and our people need to know because we do rely on caribou. That's why I'm asking. And this is where they failed to work closely with the traditional knowledge. We do need those people. ECC needs to have to be working with the Indigenous government and traditional knowledge keeper so that they can be informed of what is happening with our caribou, and we do rely on that. So that's why I asked.
And, Mr. Speaker, okay, this is another question that I don't mean to be disrespectful in a time like this, okay. And I know it's too early to ask. And I don't know if MACA can answer me this or Minister of finance. And I want to know how much money have we spent to evacuations, and if all this money was spent to fire breakers, just like my colleague said here, knowing it is going to be dry season with less precipitation, we did we did not need to evacuate and respond to the fire as it started respond to the fire as it started. Thank you.
Thank you. I'm going to answer the caribou question. The other one is a different one, and I'll just go on to that later, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in regards to the caribou, the traditional knowledge, we work with our Indigenous governments about caribou. We talk about that. We talk about how we protect it. We talk about the environment. We see where the area is that we need to protect. What we need to do is make sure our caribou survives for generations to come. So it's just not now. Yes, we have had the mobile zone, but that there was what we worked with the Indigenous governments on there. In regards to the complexity of the questions about how much money is spent and that, we're going to have to take that as notice because we still don't have that information, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. A final short supplementary. Member for Monfwi.
Thank you. Yeah, with the climate change here now
sorry, the Minister took that on notice. Yes, I know, but it's taken as notice. So moving on, oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.
