Glen Abernethy

So it appears that with the exception of one that is going to be increased to $30,000, we’re at least $10,000 above any of the other jurisdictions. I’m wondering what was the research behind that. How did we determine or decide that $35,000 in the Northwest Territories is the appropriate amount?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think my colleague Mr. Hawkins did a good job describing what this is about. This is simply a motion to get the future government in 10 years to conduct a review of the concept of a special majority. It was brought forward by committee and it wasn’t fully supported by Cabinet. There is some merit to looking into it and exploring it and doing some research. It definitely requires some additional research and I think 10 years from now when this comes forward for review is a good time for us to review the concept of a special majority. There might actually be some...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to follow up on the comments of my colleague Ms. Bisaro. Over the last four years it’s come up many times where certain regulations would have benefited from a review of Regular Members prior to being enacted. I would say that often this would be the exception as opposed to the rule. Many regulations will not likely ever need to come to this level to be approved, but clearly, without question, there will be those certain or specific regs which would benefit from that public review as well as review by the Members of the Assembly. The reason it’s here is...

One of the items that was discussed at that March 23rd meeting was the possible need, or need, in fact, of an industry association. At that time there was a lot of talk about the department working with some key individuals in the film industry that exist today about trying to find a way to create an industry association in the Northwest Territories. I was wondering if the Minister could tell me if there’s been any progress on that front.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment and are in follow up to my Member’s statement earlier today.

On March 23rd I attended a meeting between industry and government on the NWT film industry, and at that time the GNWT, or the department committed to a number of items with respect to the film industry. One of them was to encourage greater cooperation between ITI and ECE, one was to dedicate some seed funding for film and media arts, one was to invest in a website, one was to invest in the formation of an association for the industry...

I accept the argument or the evidence or the information provided. I mean, it’s easy to correlate that. What was there will likely be there, but now in the new…(inaudible)… But I still worry that there may be an increased demand as more people realize that it’s a territorial process instead of a Supreme Court process.

I guess my caution to the department is even though I do fully support the arguments behind doing this increase, I do fully support this increase and I fully support this bill coming forward, I do caution the department that it may result in an increase in workload and I hope the...

In determining the amount and deciding to bring this bill forward, was there any assessment done as to the amount of reduced cases being brought to the Supreme Court, but in correlation, the increase in the work demand or workload on the Territorial Court as a result of these changes?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’d like to thank the Minister for bringing this bill forward. It increases the monetary limit in civil cases from $10,000 to $35,000, as the Minister said. In committee this was discussed and it was felt that increasing it from $10,000 to $35,000 would speed up the court process as many people -- I think this is correct, correct me if I’m wrong -- a lot of housing issues that are going to the courts are forced to the Supreme Court because they’re just over $10,000, and this may expedite a number of those situations and allow us to clean up some of the cases...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’d like to thank the Minister for bringing forward the Heritage Act. There certainly has been a lot of talk about the Heritage Act over the last four years and I think it’s good that it finally came through. For me, as the purpose indicates, the Heritage Fund is to ensure that the future generations of people in the Northwest Territories benefit from ongoing economic development, including the development of non-renewable resources. Ultimately what this comes down to is this is for the people. This is for the people of the Northwest Territories both today, but more...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to thank the Minister. Clearly it’s the commitment of the film industry, representative of the film industry and the departments of both ITI and ECE that have led to the success in this area. One of the areas that they talked about or the Minister has touched on is the funding that is now available to the film industry through SEED. It’s $100,000, which is, clearly, great. I’m wondering what kind of mechanism they have to assess the value of those dollars that we’re spending, how we’re going to track those dollars to make sure that they are in fact bringing...