Kevin O'Reilly

Merci, monsieur le President. My questions are for the Premier. It appears that our departments work in completely isolated silos when it comes to caribou and roads. Will the Premier tell this House and the public why caribou are not considered in designing and developing roads into the Slave Geological Province? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. No further questions.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I'm sorry, I just noticed this. On this page and it's reflected further back there, the money that we're expending on information technology projects is declining. There back in 2015-2016, it was over $2 million, last year it was $1.49 million, this year it's $1.4 million. Are we getting that much better at replacing our information technology or are we just sort of building up a deficit in this area. What's happening, if I could ask the Minister? Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the response, but I think I heard the words "I think." So could we get a commitment out of the Minister to provide that information to Regular Members? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. I'm still getting some mixed messages, I think, from the other side of the House in terms of which departments are working on this and so on. In the absence of a recovery plan and continued low numbers of caribou our government continues to push ahead with development that will have a significant adverse effect on the Bathurst caribou herd. At what point would Cabinet decide it is not in the best interest of caribou to pursue this road? Mahsi, Mr. Speaker.

But the fact is there's no recovery strategy or plan for the Bathurst caribou herd. Not one square metre of critical habitat has been protected, and there are no caribou protection measures in place for land users. Will the Premier tell this House why Cabinet is pushing ahead with a plan for a road into the Slave Geological Province in range of the Bathurst caribou herd in the absence of a recovery strategy or plan for that herd, and at a time when the herd is in a desperate situation?

Merci, monsieur le President. I made statements on the perilous state of the Bathurst caribou herd in February and June in this House. Last week, the Minister of Transportation announced progress on plans for an access road into the Slave Geological Province, including a road "that will provide the greatest economic benefit to the region and the Northwest Territories." While some may be happy, this is not good news for caribou.

When asked about how environmental concerns would be dealt with, the response was that those issues would be dealt with through an environmental assessment. Caribou are...

Mr. Chair, yes, look, I'm not asking the Minister to change official names of communities. What I'm wondering is if someone wants to get a birth certificate now, and they were born in Lutselk'e, and I'm not even going to say the name quite correctly, how does that appear on the birth certificate as their place of birth? Is it exclusively in Roman orthography right now or does it use the appropriate Denesuline fonts? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I apologize. I wasn't at the hearing, and I'm probably springing this on the Minister and staff, but I'll give an example if that's okay. It's my understanding that the official name does not just exclusively use Roman Orthography, so in our documents that we issue as a government people will be able to have that appear as their place of birth perhaps and those will be accepted then by the federal government into the international system. Is that what I'm hearing? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. Yes, that helps clarify this for me why we're moving money forward for the project. I appreciate that response. Thank you.