Kevin O'Reilly

Thanks, Mr. Chair. Just to get it clearly on the record, this was not a bill that was co-developed in a collaborative manner. I would like to ask the Minister about one issue raised with us around financial security by the Independent Environmental Monitoring Agency. It is my understanding that, with a recent amendment to a water licence for one of the diamond mines, there was an adjustment made to financial security when they wanted to deepen a pit. The company came forward with a financial security which was not accepted by our government, because it dealt with both land and water related...

Merci, Monsieur le President. I want to thank the Minister for that great news. I had no idea, nor did the public know, that the Cabinet had actually approved the Bathurst caribou range plan. I know there are a lot of people and the remaining 8,000 Bathurst caribou are happy about that. Of course, there is always money for roads, including $10 million more for the GNWT contribution for the Slave Geological Province Road. It will likely come forward as the first supplementary appropriation for the 19th Assembly. Can the Minister tell this House: when will money actually start to flow for work...

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I just would like to, well, first off, seek the advice of the law clerk first. The way the amendment reads that says that the Minister shall in accordance with the regulations require an applicant, blah, blah, blah, for a commercial or industrial use. As I understand this, the Minister could set thresholds in regulations, even for commercial or industrial uses, such that some would require financial security or certain types of thresholds. Is that a correct interpretation of this, or is that the kind of authority that the Minister has with this clause? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. The purpose of this motion is to try to address this vacuum that exists about how regulations are going to be made in virtually all of the post-devolution legislation going forward.

Committee tried to secure some sort of understanding agreement of the Minister moving forward on how regulations would be developed, and once again, we were told that there would be some sort of mysterious government-wide approach developed that has not revealed itself so far. There is no assurance that the Indigenous governments, organizations, and the public, interested stakeholders, are going...

I would like to thank the Minister for that good information. It is great to hear that we may finally get an updated memorandum of understanding. Can the Minister tell us whether this agreement will provide for any temporary and/or permanent protection of habitat?

I appreciate the advice from the law clerk. My interpretation of that is that the Minister already has the authority to set thresholds to deal with some of the issues that he has raised about different size of commercial operations and so on, some of which may not require financial security in his or her view in the future. I don't accept the reasoning that the Minister has provided that he or she in the future requires total discretion to determine financial security and that it not be mandatory in some way. I would like to move a motion if I may, Mr. Chair on this clause.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I would suggest that Members have a look at the discussion leading up to this recommendation in the report now that it is before you. What committee observed was various approaches to trying to incorporate this idea of Indigenous rights into various bills. I guess the Public Land Act showed the minimum work with just a non-derogation clause, whereas some of the other bills actually tried to incorporate aspects of co-management or at least referenced land-rights agreements in their definitions or in the text of the bill itself.

This is trying to encourage Cabinet to develop a...

Merci, Monsieur le President. I have made many statements on the caribou crisis, in this House. During my time here, the Bathurst caribou herd has plummeted to about 8,000 animals, while our government has taken little action beyond continued restrictions on harvesting. Over the same time, the budget for Environment and Natural Resources has been slashed by 10 percent. Nothing has been done on our side of the border to temporarily or permanently protect habitat. The only new funding approved for the caribou crisis was for further study and a slight increase of the wolf bounty.

Our Minister of...

Thanks, Mr. Chair, and I want to thank the Minister for raising the financial security provisions in the Commissioner's Land Act which have been in place. They were actually brought into place on February 14, 2011, and those do require that financial security for industrial and commercial purposes would be mandatory so that this has now been in place for seven or eight years, over eight years. That was largely based on the experience from what happened with Giant Mine, where our government assumed a liability of $23 million because the surface lease that we had, GNWT had for the property...

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I know we are all under a lot of pressure to get this legislative backlog cleared out of here, but this is the first time I have actually seen the final report. It is the first time our colleagues in the House have seen this final report. To have it tabled or given to us earlier in the day and then expect us to actually review and debate it the same day, I just don't think this is a very good practice. I did not exercise my right to nay the unanimous consent; I could have. I just don't think this is good practice to do this, but I think it is symptomatic of the amount of...