David Ramsay

I think we should be more focused on the health and safety risks as opposed to what constitutes an incident. We can’t be too safe when it comes to protecting the employees that we have.

To get to the Member’s question, we are looking at redesigning the space to share a reception area and also a second egress at the back of the office space to allow a second way for the employee to get out of that office should the need arise.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The sheriff’s vehicle is an eight-person vehicle. It’s required to be that size and it transports court parties. Here in Yellowknife it would transport the court party to Behchoko, so it has to be of a certain size. The cost on a vehicle of that nature is somewhere in the area of $65,000. Thank you.

We continue to talk about the importance of the commercial fishery to the Northwest Territories economy. It is a shadow of its former self. The numbers are better this year and I will commit to the Member and Members of the House to get the most recent numbers to them. The Member cited between 30 and 40 percent increase in production. We’ve seen some new fishermen get out on the lake taking part in the fishery.

As I mentioned in my previous response, we can’t wait forever for the federal government. If they don’t make a move and support us on moving forward with the fish plant in Hay River...

The departmental occupational health and safety specialist has identified the current set-up of the rental office as a health and safety risk for the employee staffed in that location. At times the clientele the staff is dealing with can be frustrated and very agitated with their landlords and, therefore, can express aggressive behaviour, putting the staff at risk. Proper physical security measures need to be put in place to ensure the health and safety of that staff. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yes, we do have witnesses. Thank you.

I don’t have a crystal ball. I’m not sure who’s going to be back and who’s going to be in which position, but it’s safe to say, early in the life of the next government the Agriculture Strategy will be put forward to the 18th Legislative Assembly and debated by Members of that government. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We can try to get the Members more detailed information on the scope. We are going to be combining the MEP and the rental office. It is a costly venture to be combining these two spaces and putting in the requisite security requirements into the space.

That would be between $50,000 and $400,000.

We had a tremendous amount of positive feedback from around the Northwest Territories. In talking with stakeholders, people were involved in the agricultural sector here in the NWT. We believe we had a consultative approach. As I said, we will be tabling the What We Heard report in the House probably sometime next week. The Member can see for himself who we talked to and what we are going to focus on. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We will get the Member the detailed information on what the other vehicle is used for. I will just mention again the cost of the vehicle at $65,000 is not excessive for this type of vehicle and it is not certainly a luxury vehicle, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.