Michael Miltenberger

I will commit to get the response to that question from ITI and make sure that it’s shared with the Member. I just want to reiterate once again, the strong commitment demonstrated, high level of practice and investment in the parks by ITI is going to continue. Thank you.

Yes, we will ensure that we look at not only the eggs but the harvesting of some of the birds as the Member has suggested.

I think the key question, of course is, is there something we can do? The Member has raised a good issue. I’ve been Environment Minister now for quite a number of years and I must confess this is not one of the issues that has been high on the priority list that I’ve been aware of. Now that it’s been raised and the Member has provided the history, I will restate my commitment to go back to the department and see what options there are to try to address this issue and look at some of the suggestions and advice provided by the Member.

Power lineman is a very specialized, highly qualified trade where there are electrical skills required but also the ability to work under very significant and extreme circumstances, often on pole trucks, in some cases climbing poles, so it’s not a type of profession that you can just have folks train partially. But I take the Member’s point and concern about having a permanent facility and capacity based in the region, and I’ll be happy to have a discussion with him possibly tomorrow morning, bright and early at breakfast. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We have an emergency rating system. The folks on the ground in the communities, in Inuvik for example, make determinations. They talk with the folks in the various communities and then they look at the severity of the situation in each community. The one that is the most critical is the one that we try to get to the fastest and the soonest. If you have a community where there are hundreds of people with no power for a great length of time, that is a critical emergency in the wintertime. So, we work to the utmost, working around the weather, keeping safety in mind, but...

There are 266 days left to the next election. I will commit to the Member to have a fulsome discussion with the chairman and president of the Power Corporation, and I will be able to report back to the Member on the content of the outcome of that discussion. Thank you.

We have some personnel on the ground. We have some that we use and we try to look to work with other folks who have some kind of similar capacity.

In terms of do we have any particular linemen, I would have to confirm and get back to the Member on that. Thank you.

I would be happy to concur with the Member that he is a fountain of good ideas. We are 270 days left until the next election. We have our to-do lists, work lists that are fully subscribed to. We are working to implement all those plus some others that have been added on over the course of the last year or so.

The Member raises a very legitimate, good issue. The issue of putting a fee, a recovery fee on each barrel is there. It’s a question of the resources and the time. We have an Environment Fund that is being used and managed carefully to do all the things that currently are in place. To...

Thousands, Mr. Speaker, and they would be invariably in areas where there were old abandoned sites either for exploration or some type of small mining venture from the days of yore, but a lot of it tied to exploration sites.

That program is handled through the Power Corporation, and they’ve been taking care of the communications. If there are specific concerns from the Member, then I would be happy to talk to them about what may be needed to be done extra to ensure that those concerns could be addressed.