Floyd Roland

Mr. Speaker, Members make a point of how I haven’t communicated with Regular Members on quite a regular basis, and a number of examples were given. But we have listened to Members. We’ve approached Members with some solutions to some of the concerns that were raised. We’ll continue to do that — to work with Members to try to come up with the options.

But, Mr. Speaker, one of the things I need to do before going to Members is to see if there’s even any appetite from the federal government, in this case, for a solution. Otherwise, I’d be wasting Members’ time by coming and saying: here’s an idea...

Just earlier in the Member’s statement I was told to put the sails up and get moving, and now I’m being told to put the sails down and park it until I get word by word discussion with my colleagues.

Yes, we should have gotten the information to you sooner. In this case, because of the time frame, trying to get all the pieces together in a sense of regional leadership, getting that piece, having the Prime Minister come up to the Northwest Territories and trying to fit it in the schedule, I didn’t have an opportunity to share that with Members. I guess I’ll have to wear that one, as well, on the...

The Power Corporation doesn’t itself select what communities they go into. It’s through the PUB. They’ve set up a process and how others can also feed into that system of their review. I don’t have a list with me at this time. We can work with the Minister responsible for the PUB and provide that for Members. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I don’t think that as the Government of Northwest Territories we should hang our hat on one initiative. I’ve watched previous governments stand up and make grand plans and talk proudly about where we can be and what we can do and at the end of that term sit down and say: well, we almost had it.

Devolution resource revenue sharing is one of those areas we’d like to get concluded in the life of this Assembly, but I also heard that in the last Assembly and the Assembly before that.

I would like to see what I think would secure our place within Canada: building the much needed...

I believe we just recently sent out a package to all Members of the Assembly on how the rate base is structured in their communities, from those communities that are on diesel, those that are on hydro, the administration costs, the amortization costs and interest costs on loans. All of that was put together to show Members just how much and to what percentage certain activities take up of that rate structure that impacts communities. That is one thing we’re doing; we’re looking at those costs. The Power Corporation, whenever it goes to the PUB, has to justify its operational requirements. That...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think I got my mandate right from Members themselves in this Legislative Assembly when you voted for me as Premier of the Northwest Territories. On top of that, with a number of the issues we’ve put on the table…. We talk about the vision and goals of the Members of this Assembly, taking that and trying to pursue it. That’s where the mandate comes from, and that’s where I carry through with the business at hand.

Now, I know Mrs. Groenewegen herself has quite a number of times stated on record in this Assembly that she’s not been satisfied with the approach we’ve taken...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. On October 14 Canadians will go to the polls to choose the next federal government. There has been a great deal of media attention paid to the campaign, to party leaders and platforms, and to the promises made to Canadians. Some of those promises, in areas such as the environment, taxation and economic development, will have a direct impact on the North.

During the past year the North has had a significant degree of media coverage and an unprecedented number of visits by the Prime Minister and other federal Ministers. Quite clearly, we are solidly on the national stage.

T...

Mr. Speaker, again, we have not had any real discussions with the federal government. I put a proposal on the table for establishing a framework, and that’s the area we’re discussing right now.

Prior to that, probably shortly after we took office and realized that the deal that was on the table was not going to be satisfactory for us here in the Northwest Territories, we started looking at options. We know the federal government has always considered Norman Wells an equity, not a royalty. We started tracking that to see if it, in fact, would be a way of trying to look at how the revenues can be...

Mr. Speaker, as the Government of the Northwest Territories 16th Assembly took office, we set up a new arrangement with regional leadership. We hold four meetings a year where the regional leadership as well as the Government of Northwest Territories can put items on the agenda.

We have been having discussions at that table about devolution and resource revenue sharing, and again this opportunity came up. I made a number of calls, because of the short time frame, to try to get as much of the aboriginal leadership as possible up to speed as to the letter I was presenting. In fact, I did speak...

Mr. Speaker, as I said earlier, the letter I sent to Members has what we have on the table. We can share all the information about how we came up with this number in the hope of having something further. I would rather do it that way than try to get into a process here and have the federal government decide: well, they’re discussing it there, and there’s no real commitment and no use having any further discussion. I’m ready to share all the information we have, and I believe we have given that to the Members. But we can go through it in more detail or have more questions at that point as well...