Kevin O'Reilly

Merci, Monsieur le Président. I want to thank the Minister for that. Yeah, I raised this in the context of even the Giant Mine environmental assessment where I wanted the board to look at the remediation guideline, but they declined to do that.

This old work that was done leading to the 2003 arsenic remediation guideline, it overestimated background levels by 5 to 10 times. Of course there's a lot of other research, even the Minister mentioned some, that has been done on the toxicology of arsenic since 2003, and much of that points to the need for lower exposure for humans. Will...

Merci, Monsieur le President.

An interesting study was recently released summarizing extensive soil sampling for arsenic covering much of the Slave Geological Province including the Yellowknife area. Thanks to local resident Mike Palmer who worked with Queen's University Professor Heather Jamieson for this work.

Using a combination of mineralogical analysis and statistical and geospatial analysis, they showed conclusively that in soils around Yellowknife and up to 20 kilometres away, most of the arsenic came from mining. Arsenic contamination persists even after more than 60 years after most of...

Merci, Monsieur le President.

I give notice that on Monday, May 31st, 2021, I will move that Bill 29 Resource Royalties Information Disclosure Statute Amendment Act be read for the first time. Merci, Mr. Speaker.

Merci, Mr. Speaker. I know it's a question period, and I don't have to necessarily get answers. But I still don't have an answer to that question. So I'll give the Minister the opportunity when she answers my next questions to say that she'll actually respond to the first one I asked.

But, Mr. Speaker, I've had some concerns raised with me about the qualifications, perhaps some of the work that might have been done by some folks that may be doing some of the assessment.

Do homeowners have the ability to seek a second opinion, or if they disagree with the assessment...

Merci, Monsieur le President. Sorry. I didn't give the Minister and Municipal Community Affairs a headsup, but I've received a number of calls, emails, about the briefing that we had on flooding, and I wanted to take this opportunity to follow up on some concerns that have been raised with me.

First off, I've heard a number of concerns around how the assessment of damages is being done or could be done. And can the Minister tell us whether communities have the ability to hire their or a First Nation would have the ability to hire their own assessors, get the work done, and seek...

Merci, Monsieur le President. Thanks to the Minister for that. I don't think I got a response. I wanted some work done on the human health assessment work that was done back on the 2003 guideline, but I'll pursue that separately with the Minister. Clearly, there's a need to review this arsenic remediation guideline which currently only includes two land uses for residential and industrial use.

So in reviewing this guideline, is the Minister committing to expand the land uses that are considered, and then what, of course, are the implications for the Giant Mine remediation.

...

Merci, Monsieur le President. My questions are for the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources. I'm sure he's already been briefed up on the excellent research by Messieurs Palmer and Jamison that proved the overestimation of natural background levels for arsenic in the Yellowknife area and the persistence of mining related arsenic after more than 60 years. We have an outdated 2003 arsenic remediation guideline that is based on this overestimation of background arsenic. Can the Minister tell us what the plans are now to review and update the drastically outdated arsenic remediation...

Merci, Monsieur le President. I recognize I've got a bit of an advantage as I was in the last Assembly. All you have to do is turn back to the original discussion paper on this topic, and it was put forward as a set of targeted changes, that there was going to be a broader review later. I'm happy to talk to the Minister about that.

I was never really in favour of ITI administering subsurface rights when the department has a conflicting mandate to promote resource development. That's exactly the kind of situation the public reviews of the Gulf of Mexico oil drilling disaster said should be...

I think I've got a pretty good memory, but I don't think I've raised this issue on petroleum rights before. I'm always happy to talk to the Minister. I don't like how there's at least three separate sets of information about petroleum rights on the ITI webpages. Can the Minister tell us whether it's her intention to set up a coherent public registry, and when that might happen?

Merci, Monsieur le President. I seek unanimous consent to go back to item 3 on the agenda, Members' statements, to allow our colleague from Kam Lake to make her statement. Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

---Unanimous consent granted