Kevin O'Reilly

Merci, Monsieur le President. My questions are for the Minister of Lands, who appears to have the lead on strategic oil and gas bankruptcy. The Cameron Hills sour gas field is a mess, and the remaining funds to manage and remediate this site are drying up quickly. Can the Minister tell us when he expects the GNWT will take ownership of the site? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Thanks, Madam Chair. The deputy minister sounds a lot like me four years ago when this was being set up, when we made these suggestions about who should be represented on the committee. It kind of fell on deaf ears with the previous Minister in the 18th Assembly, so I guess I will ask again: is the Minister prepared to work with the Standing Committee on Economic Development and Environment to look at a more appropriate composition of this committee and how they can report publicly and better engage the public in general? Thanks, Madam Chair.

I want to thank the Minister for that, but it didn't really answer my question. There seems to be some kind of top secret exposure control plan that he can't even share any information with me on the floor of this House. I've asked about whether northern and southern workers are separated at the worksite. He can't tell me that. Now, I'll try something else. Can the Minister tell me whether this top secret control plan requires masking of employees at the site?

Thanks, Madam Chair. When this was being set up, there were a number of concerns and issues raised around the accountability of these two committees and whether they were really independent and whether they were going to be doing any kind of public reporting. I can't even find one word about them on the Department of Infrastructure website. I had understood that they were going to be keeping minutes, that the minutes were going to be made public somehow. There was going to be an annual report from each of the committees. There's nothing. Can the Minister commit to giving us a status report on...

Merci, Monsieur le President. My questions are for the Minister responsible for the Workers' Safety and Compensation Commission. We've had a recent outbreak of COVID-19 at the Gahcho Kue Mine site; 19 confirmed cases, 11 of which are workers from out of the territory, but eight of them are NWT residents. My question for the Minister is: what is he doing to protect northern workers at this mine site? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Government House Leader for giving me credit on the clause-by-clause review of that faulty legislation in the last Assembly. Of course, we are looking forward to getting some regulations, as well. While I can understand that COVID may have delayed some of our legislative work, I am more than happy to ensure that departments and the government as a whole have the resources to start legislation flowing. Can the Government House Leader confirm whether there are the human resources and capacity necessary to begin to turn the legislative taps on...

Thanks, Madam Chair. If there's any lessons to be learned from that is: you don't amalgamate departments quickly and think you're going to save a bunch of money. Yes. That's kind of what I was saying in the last Assembly. Okay, been confirmed. Thanks, Madam Chair.

I want to thank the Government House Leader for that answer. Maybe we will get a couple of bills. However, I spoke about how this is supposed to be the Legislative Assembly, not a debating club. Can the Government House Leader tell us when any significant legislation is going to be introduced to put our committees to work?

Thanks, Madam Chair. I'm trying to understand what an amalgamation inaccuracy is. Can I get an explanation of that? Thanks, Madam Chair.

Merci, Monsieur le President. We are now about a third of the way through our term. I am increasingly concerned with lack of substantive legislation from Cabinet. To date, there have been a total of 24 bills, almost half of which were appropriations. This is not quite as bad as the last Cabinet as they had only introduced a total of six non-appropriation bills at this point. The bills from this Cabinet, outside of appropriations, deal with pithy matters, including:

a monumental effort, with some of the most convoluted wording I have ever seen, to change the Public Highway Act to absolve GNWT of...