Michael Miltenberger

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we are going to proceed, and we’re going to work with every community to come up with arrangements, alternative or interim as they may be, to ensure that people have the ability to get their beverage containers to a place where they can be compensated. If there’s no depot in that community, then we’ll make arrangements to make sure that people can have those containers taken to a place where compensation can be made.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we’re going to work with individual communities, but my suggestion to everyone is keep your containers and we’re coming.

---Laughter

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we have contractual arrangements, in actual fact, with all the doctors. They’re on salary, but they all have contracts. In fact we do, I think, still have four fee-for-service doctors in Yellowknife. So the issue of fee-for-service is a reality that exists in the North and we can’t exclude them from anywhere else, in my opinion, if they exist in Yellowknife. We’ve already accepted that fact. So there’s nothing, in my opinion, to preclude a doctor from setting up a fee-for-service arrangement. We already have the basic process set up in Yellowknife as we...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Member referenced the fee-for-service and at one point there were fee-for-service doctors who made a decision to switch to salary positions. There have been concerns ever since about productivity issues; we work with the doctors and have tried to address that; we have added more doctors; we are going to continue to work with the doctors and the authorities to recruit.

The Member points out a problem that is an issue, and that is the access to doctors. I can tell you that the constituency that I represent has the same circumstance. I still, on a...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in fact, we do invest millions of dollars. We had initiated and completed two years of a three-year plan for mental health and addictions. For the third year, we have the funding there and we are taking the time to review where we’ve been, where we are and where is the best direction to go. I have approached the committee for their input. We have also gone to the authorities. We are also going to have Ms. Chalmers, the author of the State of Emergency report that initiated this plan three years ago now, to take a look to see the work that we have done. In...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we are working with a number of groups, and we give all these proposals serious consideration of what fiscal resources may be available to meet such requests. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this project is a good idea, and we acknowledge the fact that we have some communities that we haven’t made arrangements with yet. We still have some time left, but the reality is that we are going to unfold this and it would be almost impossible to just pick and choose individual communities. This cost is put on the distributors and it goes to the communities, so Members can keep their cans and their bottles of beverages and we will compensate them. The program is there, and we’re going to do everything in our power to make sure this works. We have...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I’d just like to point out that this very important initiative was created late in the life of the 14th Assembly and was seen as something that was put into place before that Assembly finished. The 15th Assembly has picked up that challenge, and we’re moving on that. Mr. Speaker, through this program, we estimate that we discard about 25 million containers over the course of a year. That’s over 500 containers for every man, woman and child in the Northwest Territories. We’ve picked a date of November 1st that we want to try and roll out this program in all...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there are issues with the Mackenzie Bison Sanctuary, not only on Highway No. 3, but issues with the community of Fort Providence in terms of the buffalo in the community. We are very interested and will be taking steps to work with the local community governments to look at what options there are to try to deal with the issue of the bison, both on the road right-of-way and other areas of concern with this herd.

We have already tried rubber bullets in the past, I understand. It has a very short-term effect. The issue of some type of harvest is one we would...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, Minister Scott clearly said in his letter that he was committed to a fully functioning board where all members, including Mr. Van Camp, are engaged and not put on the sidelines. It is my expectation that he will transmit that sentiment to the board chair and that this issue that has bedevilled us for some time now will no longer be on our agenda and we can all get back with the other pressing issues at hand. I will be tracking this issue very closely with the board member and, if necessary, we will take further action. The Premier, as well as the...