Bob Bromley

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I know the Minister is committed to water quality preservation, so he will understand how little we know about the state of our surface waters and the potential impacts of fracking contamination. We can’t permit fracking without knowing how it will eternally affect our waters.

Will the Minister commit to commissioning the research necessary to understand the threats and prepare for the need to act fast with supplementary budget requests if required? Mahsi.

Thanks for the comments from the Minister. It’s good to know that we’re on this.

Regulation of the exploration and production process is another critical matter. I mentioned the particular threat of failure of drill casings and contamination of massive amounts of water. We need a review of other jurisdictions’ regimes and evaluation of their suitability for our needs, then action to develop and put in place our own regs. Perhaps that’s part of what Mr. Minister was referring to.

Upon the release of the government response to our EDI report, will the Minister move quickly to contract and manage a...

Thanks to the Minister again for those comments. Sounds good.

I also appreciated the comment earlier from the Minister that there needs to be integration between these various strategies like the Anti-Poverty Strategy and so on. A challenging job, but I will be looking forward to that. I did appreciate that comment. That’s all I have on this page.

Some who haven’t affected bans are now realizing steep costs to people’s health, drinking water, climate, livestock, wildlife, municipal systems and so on. All this to mine an energy source that is destroying our global climate and the ability of our natural system to support life and cultures as we know them.

Healthy and beneficial energy alternatives abound. I will have questions for the Minister. Mahsi.

Of course, much of what I was saying here was picked up by the Minister himself during the 16th Assembly when I really agreed with him on this. I wonder what the situation… I don’t hear these sorts of kerfuffles in Botswana or Norway. The process seems to be straightforward, the benefits to the public who own the resource are very straightforward, the standards are clear and are met and, in fact, are standards held up globally. We don’t hear about the sorts of things that we hear right here in the Northwest Territories, where we’re left holding the bag and our people have been removed from...

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Just very quickly, would the Minister know off hand what amount was not transferred to ITI that was gained as interest? Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I’m just going to follow through the Minister’s comments here to focus my remarks. One percent over 2012-2013 in the departmental budget, obviously some serious work has been done here and I appreciate that.

I notice there is a good recognition of the need to reduce energy costs and greenhouse gas emissions, but I think there is, overall, insufficient effort and expenditures at addressing that priority.

The one thing that I think is an opportunity is that we need to work with our business and industry partners towards renewable energy projects that serve both industry...

Mr. Speaker, when you are on a roll, go for it. Will the Minister work with his colleague in Industry to, in fact, take our regional leadership to ensure they visit active frack sites as well as jurisdictions that have banned fracking, for whatever reason, to learn about those reasons and concerns and also to visit with Aboriginal people wherever they have experience with fracking, such as northeast BC? Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to follow up with my questions to the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources on some of the fracking regulations that we’re doing. I expressed an interest in having people visit actual frack sites. I am wondering, first of all, has the Minister ever visited a frack site where, in fact, a horizontal frack was actually underway. Thank you.