Bob Bromley

Thank you again to the Minister for those comments. I think the Minister mentioned the economy. That’s an important part of what we’re about, I think, trying to build and strengthen our local economies. Having the local expertise available will really assist that.

A huge one for me is that we’ve started to see the light and moved into the new Medium Renewable Energy Fund. Now we’re starting to get into some of the bigger projects where some of the biggest gains are to be had. I’m wondering: is the Minister establishing the concomitant level of expertise within this department to enable us to be...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to follow up on the statement by the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources. I’d like to briefly start by saying that this is like a breath of fresh air. I think our public is totally ready for this sort of thing. I’ve had a lot of feedback that people do listen to us in the House. They’re interested in what we say. I’d like to pull a little bit more information from the Minister.

I notice in the second paragraph that there were almost 550 applications for new home heating appliances, mostly that they’re more efficient and so on. Has the Minister...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have previously spoken about the distressing standard and condition of the Dettah road. The road presents a direct cost to the people of Dettah and those who work or visit there, and there are safety concerns that result from the state of the road. The government well recognizes the need for reconstruction to resolve this dilemma.

Despite their proximity to our capital and the seat of government, this situation has festered to the point where the people of the community are developing their own response to try and deal with it. It is my understanding that through the...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I also wanted to speak up very clearly in favour of moving forward on this consolidated primary care clinic. I compliment the departments for moving forward and getting this lease established. I hope we can move very quickly on the capital items, assuming it is approved shortly here, and get operational.

One of the reasons I’m pleased this is moving forward and hope it moves forward quickly and efficiently is that we have a hope that this will resolve some of the situations we are facing at the Stanton hospital, where the emergency room deals with much that could be dealt...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I also have raised this and I raise it again here. I recognize that we’re within the general guidelines of other jurisdictions and so on, but the large capital projects don’t seem to fall into that formula of coming up with a percentage. Those are mostly operational dollars. We know that we have, relatively, a very high cost for infrastructure compared to other jurisdictions.

Another perspective on this is that because we have a modest size of population and availability of these very specialized talents, we often have to contract outside of the Northwest Territories for...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just before we conclude this, I wonder if I could slip in a question on the major projects area and where they are for the focus on the deferred maintenance program.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I believe I’ve raised this before, but I do have concerns about the high costs of our data management systems, which seem to involve very large capital costs. If I’m correct that it’s flowing in this department, technology service centre — oh, sorry; I had that wrong. That would be under the Department of Public Works and Services. I’ll hold the question until then.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My final question, and thanks again to the Minister for those comments. I’m glad to see we’re being progressive here. Some of the technology out there is pretty new and perhaps a little bit untried in the North.

I think it’s great we’re starting to test those systems and so on, but an important aspect of that is establishing a monitoring program on them to make sure we know how much the gain is and what the full benefit is to us with our dollars and to the public. Is there a program to ensure that some monitoring, especially on the relatively new technologies out there...

Thank you to the Minister for that commitment. I hope he shares it publicly in the House with us, because, again, I know the public would be very interested indeed.

Another question I had. One of the bottlenecks I think our public experiences is the installation and services for these new appliances. It’s often very difficult to find somebody in a timely way. We don’t have homegrown expertise here. Is the Minister working with Aurora College and other arms of government to try to get some progressive educational programs going to ensure that we have in all our communities expert renewable...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to express my appreciation to all the partners who are working to put this initiative together, and I want to thank the Minister and staff of the Department of Transportation for whatever they can provide in assistance to help it come to a successful end. Mahsi.