Bob Bromley

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We’ve heard the Minister of Finance’s priorities stated in his budget address today. Today I will take my two minutes and add some of my priorities, review some of my priorities that I will pursue in the upcoming budget debate.

At the top of the list is implementation of the recommendations of the Child and Family Services Act review. We heard more evidence of this urgent need on this morning’s news with the extremely sad report of a teen suicide and the coroner specifically urging action on the committee’s recommendations.

Action on housing. We urgently need a...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. At last week’s signing ceremony for the agreement-in-principle the Premier looked awfully lonely, flanked by only two of the seven Aboriginal government leaders who are necessary partners in this deal. We all heard the Premier’s invitation to Aboriginal governments to sign on as partners. Unfortunately, we also heard that the federal Minister responsible for Aboriginal people refused to meet with those very same leaders who want their concerns heard before becoming a part of this deal. Can the Premier explain to this Assembly why he agreed to be the one stop shop for...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and thank you to the Premier for those remarks. With the climate surrounding this AIP, it looks like a final agreement will be a very long time in coming, which has some positive aspects to it. One of which is that it gives us time to do the work that we know we need to do. For example, the staging of a full and meaningful consultation with all NWT citizens on how to build a new sustainable resource management regime. The requirement to enact mirror legislation is somewhat paternalistic and I think it doesn’t recognize that we have a lot of problems with that...

My second question is recognizing the Premier’s statement that this is a good deal for the NWT and NWT Aboriginal people, this is something I could take more seriously if indeed the Aboriginal governments were lining up to sign this agreement. Obviously, they were lining up with signs rather than to sign. As Aboriginals said in this building just before the signing and outside at their demonstration and elsewhere, their trust in this government has been destroyed. Now, if that’s the case, how does the Premier expect to lure these partners back to sign on when the process he has used apparently...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I speak today on the process that led to the devolution agreement-in-principle to take stock of where this leaves us now and consider where we go from here.

The Akaitcho and Dehcho governments will have nothing to do with an agreement they say threatens their treaty rights and resolution of their claims. Some say the process used to complete the AIP violates the terms of the Gwich’in, Sahtu and Tlicho agreements. The GNWT’s and Canada’s rush to sign the AIP has resulted in such confusion that concerns about content, process, or both remain unclear. Aboriginal opponents...

Thank you. Two First Nations say the deal threatens their Aboriginal treaty rights and threatens the just resolution of their land claims. Others are insisting that it fails to meet their settlement requirements for involvement. At the very least, First Nations governments are, or will be, major land and resource managers, as I mentioned in my statement. Setting out to conclude new management arrangements one at a time can only further add to the complexity of this regulatory regime. How does the Premier intend to meet with Aboriginal governments even outside the discussion framework of the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The possibility of this government signing an agreement-in-principle on land and resource devolution with the federal government is indeed exciting, but for the Premier to sign without the support of our aboriginal government partners would not bode well. Surely he realizes we will require willing and collaborative partners for our future success and that to proceed without them risks starting a long and contentious road indeed.

The Premier has assured us that this agreement completely addresses aboriginal concerns, that it will not affect existing or future arrangements...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to speak briefly to this motion. I think, first of all, I want to thank my colleagues for bringing this forward. I think the House knows that I have spoken a number of times on this issue, so I will be voting in support.

Mr. Speaker, this is really all about values and capturing those values as we go forward in our development as a jurisdiction. We need a comprehensive process, a process that is of the people, for the people and by the people and that strives to get at those values and capture them in a way that shows how they will be incorporated into our...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This motion is partly in response to the results of our educational programs, which have created a situation where we have students graduating with a diploma which does not prepare them for the post-secondary education that they wish to take on. Unfortunately, when I went to school we had vocational and matriculation diplomas and it was very clear what they prepared you for in terms of post-secondary. Today we don’t have that.

I know the Minister is aware of this and is working with committees and others, his staff, to make sure that we plug that hole, but in the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you again to the Minister. Again just referencing the statement, I note the reference to broad implications that we’re taking. We have taken broad action and, in fact, we are contemplating broadening the application of our reduction measures. I’m wondering if we will commit to seriously going after effective new actions that demonstrate significant net reductions in NWT emissions, especially relative to 1990 levels, and putting this government back into a leadership position. Just looking around the Territory, I see municipalities, the NWTAC and so on providing...