Bob McLeod

We do have quite a number of committees that are working on all these different issues and we’ll be providing that information in the very near future. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I think we’ve had very good success with devolution in the past. As I’ve mentioned, we’ve had about… I think every program that’s with the Government of the Northwest Territories was a federal program at one time. At every instance we’ve been very successful at getting the incumbents to come over. I think the airports transfer was very successful as well. I think we’ve got some of the best airports operating around. The reason we’re using six months is so we can get an early indication from those who are not intending to come as part of the devolution, so we can either go out to competition or...

I don’t want to get ahead of committee, and I’ve committed to committee that we will bring the organizational design, and once we’ve had input from committee, I’ll be pleased to make it available to the public.

We put a significant amount of information on the website, and as we go forward with organization design, we will also provide that on the website. We will also provide for that as we go around to all of the communities in the Northwest Territories.

I would consider that as internal to the Government of the Northwest Territories. Every employee swears an oath of office and we consider it on that basis.

Maybe the Member could clarify. First there’s not enough information, now she’s saying there’s too much information going out. We want to make sure that we do this properly and we will commit… We had talked to the Members about those departments and we’re waiting for feedback.

That would be part of our planning process, and that’s something that we are actively looking at. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

We are a very effective and efficient government, and that is obviously our intention. It doesn’t make much sense to hire people to put them in one community and then make them move to another community. For that reason, we have been undertaking inventories of available housing, office space. Where it makes sense, we will do exactly that, we will hire people to move into certain communities. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I think, in the longer term, we can aspire to that, but right now we’re going to get the devolution deal done and we’re going to implement devolution. We have a good midwife; we can start moving on to provincehood.

We already, as the Northwest Territories, are part of Confederation. I think, if I can put words in the Member’s mouth, he’s talking about becoming a province. We have looked at it. Right now the last time we examined it, our revenues would decline significantly. We would get approximately two-thirds less than what we’re getting now if we became a province, plus we’d have to face a hurdle whereby we would have to obtain at least 50 percent of the five most populated provinces to agree that the Northwest Territories should become a province. Those are the realities that we have to deal with.