Jane Groenewegen

Mr. Speaker, I would like to recognize two pages that have been serving in our Legislature this week who are from Hay River South. I would like to thank them for a job very well done. They are Mikaela Muller and Danelle Stelmack. Thank you, girls.

I’d like to ask the Minister: is he quite satisfied that the signage leading up to the bridge is adequate to communicate to people that they need to slow down? Has he seen the signage? Is it bright enough? Does it start back far enough? Is it sufficient?

Mr. Speaker, I’d like to ask the Minister of Transportation: what’s wrong with the bridge? Should we be worried even driving across it at five kilometres per hour? What is exactly wrong with the bridge that requires people to slow down to five kilometres per hour?

I’m just waiting for you to finish your consultation there.

What’s wrong with the bridge? Why do we have to slow down to five kilometres? Should we be worried about driving on it at even five kilometres per hour? What kind of assurance can the Minister offer to the public? What’s wrong with the bridge?

Mr. Speaker, I know, at least for myself, I want to make sure that we use government resources to impact our residents in the most positive way possible. Our public service is a huge piece out there.

I would love to hear the Premier today tell us and confirm with us that layoffs of employees in the public service will be a last resort in terms of reducing the expenditures of this government.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to hear something encouraging from the Premier so that we could look at effecting these cuts and reductions with the absolute least impact on employees as possible.

At any given time in the public service of the G.N.W.T., I believe there’s about a 15 per cent vacancy rate. I know that in some positions, it’s not possible to deliver the programs and services without positions being filled. But with a 15 per cent vacancy rate, isn’t there an opportunity to look at perhaps not re-staffing positions that are not absolutely essential and integral to delivering a program or...

Mr. Speaker, today I would like to recognize my constituent Mr. Tyler Hawkins of Hay River for his outstanding talent achievements in the music world.

Tyler Hawkins began his music lessons on multi-stringed guitar when he was just eight years old. He received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from York University with Honours in Performance in 1990. Since then he has been working as a teacher and a private guitar instructor in the Northwest Territories.

This weekend we’ll see another dream realized, as through Tyler’s leadership, we will host what I hope is just the first N.W.T. International Lute...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The report or response to the interim appropriation report was read into the record earlier today, into these proceedings. Just to speak to those issues in a little bit more detail.

This is an unusual budgeting year because of the Territorial election. It throws us off our normal schedule and thus the need for an interim appropriation. I think the interim appropriation from an O&M point of view can be fairly well characterized as a status quo kind of extension of previous fiscal years’ operations.

I think that where we got into more concentrated discussion was around...

I would like to provide a report from the Standing Committee on Priorities and Planning. It’s a report on the 2008-2009 draft Interim Appropriation.

The Standing Committee on Priorities and Planning met to review the draft 2008-2009 interim appropriation between January 14 and 23, 2008. The draft interim appropriation included operations expenditures needed for the first quarter of the 2008-2009 fiscal year as well as a preliminary infrastructure acquisition plan. The operations expenditures are based on the 2007-2008 main estimates and do not include any new initiatives or reductions.

The...

Mr. Speaker, I would like to seek unanimous consent to return to item 5, recognition of visitors in the gallery.

Unanimous consent granted.

Recognition of Visitors in the Gallery

Mr. Speaker, we ask people to slow down. If they don’t slow down and something unfortunate, an incident, took place, how serious is the bridge? This is a precautionary measure, I understand. If a big truck went over it and didn’t slow down, what could happen?