Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions today are for the Minister of Justice. The 15th Assembly ultimately killed the previous attempt at SCAN legislation in 2007. So my question is has the department revisited this legislative concept between that time in 2007 and now prior to the 20th Assembly, or are we just starting from square one? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member from Great Slave. Minister of Justice.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And I believe it was 2007 is when this was first brought forward, and in the interim period the department hasn't done a lot of work looking at SCAN. A lot of work was done back then and so there's a bit of a base that we can start from but as with anything, a lot changes in 16, 17, 18 years. So there's still a lot of work to be done but it will be informed by other pieces of legislation from around the country that have been operating for an additional, you know, 15, 16 years since then as well as court challenges that have been brought against those pieces of legislation. So we're not starting from scratch, but there's a significant amount of work to do and consultation to do as well. Thank you.
Yeah, thank you for that, Mr. Speaker, and thank you to the Minister. Sounds like there's some interjurisdictional scan -- no pun intended -- being done there. Can the Minister be specific about what preliminary work his legal staff is conducting with regards to SCAN legislation so that it will, in effect, be a scalpel instead of an unconstitutional hammer? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And as the Member alluded to, there is cross-jurisdictional scans that will be required. There's examination of the Charter challenges that have been brought forward. There's going to have to be discussions, obviously engagement, throughout the territory on this, engagement with other jurisdictions who have had the legislation. So there's a lot of work, and I don't plan on making this an unconstitutional hammer. There was a challenge in the Yukon recently. There was a decision rendered that one minor section -- or one section -- I won't say minor, of that SCAN Act was unconstitutional. From what I understand, it was a rarely used section of that act, and there is not -- there's not an appeal that's being pursued by the Yukon government so that's essentially a settled matter. And we're going to learn from that and ensure that the legislation that we do enact is tailored to the territory, is fair to residents, and achieves its goals in a constitutional way. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So I'm hearing that the Minister of Justice is wanting to tailor it to the territories, so I'm just going to build a little on that.
We've heard many times in this House from smaller community MLAs that folks in smaller communities have resorted to vigilantism to scare out dealers. So what kinds of considerations is the Minister instructing his staff to make this legislation do to make sure that it works well for both the needs of the capital and the needs of our smaller communities? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Well, we're a little early in the process to start giving direction on how to proceed. I want to see those jurisdictional scans, I want to see the research that is done, and then we can figure out how to move forward. But to the Member's point, I do want to ensure that this -- there's differences between a small community perhaps with no RCMP and somewhere like Yellowknife. And so it's going to -- you know, it won't be easy to find that balance, but I'm confident that we can do that. So the Member can rest assured that we will be taking into consideration the needs of the different sizes and types of communities in the Northwest Territories. Thank you.
Minister of Justice. Final supplementary. Member from Great Slave.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and thank you to the Minister for that. In my brief reviewing of this issue, I'm curious about some other tools. Will the Minister also consider looking at community safety orders or amendments to the Residential Tenancies Act that will provide fair and thorough processes that would lead to the eviction of suspected drug dealers. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And yes, the Residential Tenancies Act, it will be reviewed by this upcoming summer. That is stipulated. And we'll see what we can do in there. I want to look at every avenue that we have to ensure that we're protecting communities, not supporting drug dealers and drug houses, and finding every way to give communities and the RCMP the tools they need to protect communities. Thank you.
Minister of Justice. Oral questions. Member from Yellowknife Centre.
