Katrina Nokleby

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, it's my understanding that work did resume on the health centre over the last while and that since then there's been a demobilization or a stop of work. Can the Minister speak to that? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I appreciate that explanation because it is something that I've never actually really delved into but kind of always wondered about. And don't get me wrong, I fully support the tourism industry and I'm super excited to see all of the return of the blue parkas around town and here at the Chamber, coming in to see the Assembly while we've been in session and such, so fully deserved to the tourism industry. They're doing great work in getting our name out there. And, you know, there is also even a crosscomponent there. You know, there is a need now for or an interest in...

Okay, so not much of an update. Can the Minister respond to whether or not Clark Builders, the contractor for that work, has demobilized from site? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I just wanted to start on page 234 with the increase in funding to the NWT geological survey. I do know that $50,000 of that is to explore the possibility of using the fine silica sand at the Nechalacho rare earth deposit, whether or not there's some sort of cement potential for that. And could the Minister speak to, do we have the results of this assessment around the potential there and if so, do we have potential there? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. There's lots of good programs here under the grants and contributions and transfers part. And I would be remiss if I didn't ask about the seniors aging in place retrofits and repairs. Noting that it has dropped slightly from the 20222023 and I'm on page 388 of the estimates. I'm just curious to know why we're seeing a little bit of a drop there. And given, you know, I think that we've had lots of conversation around keeping seniors in home as long as possible, it's quite an important topic. So could the Minister provide more information on that? Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. And I'm glad to hear that the Minister is speaking about efficiencies and such. I guess I rise with a bit of a concern that when we look at other areas where the federal government has come in with this great idea or they've made election promises that they want to see fulfilled, and I'll pick on ECE with the Daycare Act. You know, not a lot of flexibility for us to actually do anything or make our own northern or madeinthe-North imprint on it. So how is the Minister, I guess and maybe this is going to be a hard one to answer. How can the Minister ensure that that...

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Madam Speaker, my questions are for the Minister of ITI. I've been looking through Canada's critical mineral strategy that was announced I think a couple years ago now. And like a lot of government documents, it's full of a lot of "we should do this" and "we're going to improve the economy by doing things such as this," but there really isn't a lot of sort of tangible actionable items in the plan. Given that the Northwest Territories contains a lot of those critical minerals needed for Canada's green energy strategy, can the Minister speak a bit more about when we...

Thank you. And yeah, and I do appreciate that at the time when we you know, I was raising this issue and the department was responding, and the reason to bring in that southern firm was that training but, you know, as that goes farther, and I hear that we're looking at this contract and this arrangement, I feel that maybe the best way to maybe go forward, and perhaps you have to pull the colleague in from ECE or something is to help or to ITI, is to, you know, help develop the local firms to have that capacity in the North to do that more critical risk control type work, which does, you know...

Madam Speaker, the Northwest Territories has a resourcebased economy. Mining has driven our development for decades. It has built roads and power lines, provided high paying wages, apprenticeships, and other opportunities for Northerners. Mining has also driven significant secondary business development throughout the territory, including within the service industry and through contracting. NWT communities benefit from socioeconomic agreements, and Indigenous governments who have signed onto devolution share in the resource royalties our primary industry creates.

Madam Speaker, without resource...

Actually, this might be a little bit of leeway as well but since my colleague brought up the security at these apartments and it is my understanding the security that has been jointly hired does look after several of the apartments, not just one building in particular. But it is my understanding that the more specialized firm that had been hired earlier on coming from Alberta was is no longer being contracted and it's back to northern security firms. Could the Minister or department confirm if that is truly the case? Thank you.