Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, these days, we are bombarded with news of doom and war and conflict coming from every corner of our country in the world. There are looming trade wars, military wars where civilians are being bombed, wars between political parties, wars on the street between drug lords and gangs. Everywhere life as we know it life is being torn down. In our own territory, everyone is worried that the government is broke, worried that our whole focus is finding programs and services and jobs to cut. It feels like our world is closing in and it's getting smaller and more fragmented. And with that, our hope and our vision for the future gets smaller too. We see other communities, other leaders as competitors, even enemies, and then we start to give up on our own communities and on ourselves.
Mr. Speaker, no one can thrive with that kind of mentality, and it's no way to lead a government. And I firmly believe that we don't have to operate that way, even with our current fiscal limitations. The only path forward, I'm convinced, is to build up. Yes, we need to be way more careful with our spending, and maybe some old buildings and programs do need to be torn down, but we need to be absolutely clear what better things we're replacing them with.
We are not broke. We need to be more careful with our spending, but cuts are not the goal. They're a means to an end. So what is the end? The point is to focus our limited resources on the things that really matter. A health care system where every resident in every community has access to quality primary care, communities where every resident has access to a safe home that they can take pride in, cultivating a skilled workforce and businesses that are really good at what they do.
Mr. Speaker, these are the priorities we've identified, and yet we failed to lay out any kind of plan to achieve any of them, so no wonder the public has totally lost the plot on what we're actually trying to build up.
Mr. Speaker, this work is too important for us to waste energy fighting and tearing each other down. It's going to take all of us staying focused on our positive vision for the future, opportunities to work together, and letting go of the things that don't matter as much. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member from Yellowknife North. Members' statements. Member from the Sahtu.
