Floyd Roland

Mr. Speaker, we have stated earlier a number of departments involved in this. There will be a government position. We will coordinate that and we will be working with Members as to what gets done. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wish to advise Members that the Honourable Jackson Lafferty will be absent from the House for the remainder of this week to attend the federal/provincial/territorial Justice Ministers meeting in Fredericton, New Brunswick. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

There has been quite a number of Assemblies that have shown their support for the Mackenzie Valley Highway, this Assembly being one of them. There have been a number of reports that include infrastructure, highways. I think there are a number of reports out there that have been put forward to the federal government around connections, highways, transportation, airports, ferries, that type of scenario. What we’ve been engaged in was to look at how we can keep a devolution/revenue sharing deal on the table tied to future investments in key infrastructure in the Northwest Territories like the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The opportunity that I took was with the Prime Minister, looking at the devolution and resource revenue sharing talks, where that was as the cap that was identified, and put it forward to the Prime Minister that we come up with an infrastructure deal that could see us in partnership building a project like the Mackenzie Valley Highway. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, in fact, I’d be pleased to put that information together and set some time up for Members of the Assembly to look at where things are at, and to look at this reengagement process we are now having some discussions on and looking to move forward in that partnership. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The area of discussions right now on resource revenue sharing tied to devolution is one that we’re starting to look at a reengagement strategy with the federal government. There have been a couple of recent meetings that have been held at a staff level that shows that the federal government is interested in coming back to the table. I’ve contacted regional leaders about reengagement, as well, and we’ll be having further discussions on that.

There have been no real negotiations for quite some time and the numbers the Member has used, when you look at what was put on the...

Mr. Speaker, I believe I made a commitment to the Members of this Assembly, through that earlier response, that we will work with Members. It is a coordinated effort from the Government of the Northwest Territories. We will contact Members through standing committees as to the process we will adopt going forward. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We have a couple of Ministers or, actually, a number of Ministers working on this file between the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources and the Minister of ITI. The response will be a joint one put together. The Ministers will be collaborating as well as seeking input from Members on our response.

Just for the record, the article that the Member has raised in National Post is one where it is an article from a reporter. There is no confirmation, in fact, that the federal government has said anything regarding the pipeline itself and where that project is. There...

The Member is correct. The proposal and the discussions that have taken place today, and even reviewing this, it is a partnership approach that we are looking at and, again, we have much work to be done before we can get into that level of discussion. I should also add that we have committed to continue communications between the town council and the employees, and working through the employees through the board. We’re hoping to get some correspondence just to give them an update as well.

I understand that the Honourable Bob McLeod is working on this initiative and is prepared to come forward with projects that he’s been looking at or the involvement that they’ve had. So that is something that we’re tapping into as well. Part of the problem is we’ve been trying to get the details and what would qualify under these programs, and as that detail has become available, we’ve started to put the focus on some of those projects.