David Ramsay

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to thank the Member for Great Slave for bringing forward the motion that’s before us today. I agree with the principle of the motion. Being the chair of EDI, any proposed changes to registration from the Department of Transportation would be vetted through the committee. I think a lot of the concerns — and concerns I share with Members…. I am not going to support any increase, especially in the smaller communities, for operating a vehicle. That’s just something I wouldn’t condone.

If we do move to something like this, I could see folks who want to buy...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the Premier for that response. You know, as an MLA you get questions all the time from constituents, and one of the questions that I’ve been getting numerous times lately…. I would like somebody to explain this to me. That’s why I’m going to ask the Minister today to explain this to me and explain to the residents in the Northwest Territories. How is it that every time we turn around, conservation is pushed on residents? Conservation of power, conservation of energy.

The residents in our territory are doing what they can to cut back on power. They’re...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister responsible for the Power Corporation. Obviously, the world price of oil is down — actually 40 per cent in the last six months — and the GRA that’s underway, the General Rate Application, is premised on the fact that oil prices were inflated and the cost of doing business for the Power Corporation was such that they had to go out and get some more money from the consumers. That rate increase was pegged at 19 per cent. Given the fact that oil prices have recently dropped — today they are at about $74 a barrel — what will this do to the...

Mr. Speaker, I just want, maybe, to get the Premier to state on record: what exactly is his first priority? Is it the people of the Northwest Territories and the future of the Northwest Territories, or is it his constituents back in Inuvik?

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Premier. They get back to my Member’s statement from earlier, where I spoke of the Premiers’ meeting in Montreal that took place yesterday.

As I mentioned, the Northwest Territories has fought long and hard to actually get a seat at the national table with the other Premiers from around the country. I believe it was in 1992 when former Premier Nellie Cournoyea became the first Premier of the Northwest Territories to actually sit with the other Premiers.

I was listening, like many Northerners, to Northbeat last night. The Premier...

I thank the Minister for that. I agree with what he’s saying. I wasn’t a Member of the Legislative Assembly during the life of the 14th Legislative Assembly when North Slave Correctional Centre was built, but that building and the young offenders unit that joins it were built at millions and millions of dollars. I forget the final figure. It was probably $20 million over budget, maybe even more.

You would think that as a government we would learn a thing or two along the way. When you go to a construction method that allows designs to change on the fly, it’s going to cost you money. So why...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to start off by saying I do support it, and I can see the business case. I’m a former businessman. I understand saving money and the fact that if we build a building, we could potentially save up to $2 million a year, and I think it’s about $39 million over the course of it.

However, it’s a huge building, and I question the size of it. At over 40,000 square feet that’s an immense building. If you put that into a community the size of Inuvik, what does that do to the local market? I think it’s incumbent upon the government to do that type of study, a market...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just had a few more comments on the Inuvik schools, if I could, similar to questions I have raised in the past and comments I have had in the past getting back to accountability. Again, I am supportive of the schools being replaced in Inuvik, but if you look at what the public sector would do if they had to replace an aging piece of infrastructure, it would have happened and it would have happened in a much more timely fashion. I don’t think we would have seen the scope changes, the design changes. I know that departments are up against it, because they’ve got a...

Mr. Speaker, I agree with the Minister that we have to maximize the return we get from having diamonds here in the Northwest Territories. I think the Minister stated that the work was being done internally and that it is a framework. Yesterday I said that time is of the essence. I think we need to be on this. I also heard the Minister yesterday state that we did have people attend the three town hall meetings in Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto as it relates to the feasibility of a diamond bourse. What was the purpose of the Government of Northwest Territories attending those meetings?

Thank you. Mr. Speaker, I want to speak again today about diamonds and how it is that the Government of the Northwest Territories is currently sound asleep when it comes to diamond policy, strategy and vision.

It has been ten years of mining diamonds in the Northwest Territories, and we just have not been as successful as we should have been. I believe we still have tremendous opportunity through the review of the diamond policy, strategy and a firm commitment from this government that diamonds and the secondary industry here in the Northwest Territories are going to be fully supported.

Yesterda...