Norman Yakeleya

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to thank the Member for Nahendeh for developing and asking me to consider seconding this. I’m very pleased to second the motion.

I’ve also looked at the seniors home repair initiatives that this Housing Corporation has put into our communities. It makes it quite difficult, even though the programs are there, for the seniors to apply to them and receive help. Sometimes they’re lucky, they can get the support. Sometimes they miss out because they don’t understand the applications or the process itself. It’s quite foreign to them. Some of them don’t understand the...

Thank you. Has the department looked at other avenues to support this initiative, or partnerships in the region or in the North to look at where some cost savings can be looked at? Because there are other needs also. I hear from Members that want to have institutions in the North also.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Being Education Week I want to ask the Minister of Education a few questions regarding the Sahtu. Mr. Speaker, education, either you’re on the land, and my people always wanted to be successful even on the land. Now today in the new world of making a living we want to be successful.

Mr. Speaker, on the land we had an open university. In the Sahtu now we have Aurora College centres. I noted that many of our students are now leaving the Sahtu region for other centres for their educational careers. I want to ask the Minister. When he is talking with his colleagues about...

I look forward to at least the Tulita report, Mr. Chair, and hopefully later on the Fort Good Hope report. I wanted to ask the Minister, I know there was an issue with the school in Colville Lake with the washroom facilities and the running water there. I know there was material there, material being ordered to get there and I think it’s already there and waiting to use it. Right now I believe that Colville Lake’s School is still using the honey bucket system and there are other issues that prevent them from hooking up the water lines and the washroom facilities. Can the Minister comment as to...

Mr. Chair, I wanted to speak to a little bit of my experience on the CANOL Trail. I just love being out there on the CANOL Trail and hoping that we would have a future Do et’q Territorial Park. This area is very special to the people in the Sahtu and I recommend that some of my colleagues here have some time to take a hike on the trail there and see the beauty there. It would be good for all of us to be out on the land there. However, Mr. Chair, there’s a serious threat to the proposed territorial park and that’s the ATVs, the all-terrain vehicles, as I spoke to earlier, that’s destroying some...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. A couple questions on the hydro initiatives. I’m very happy to hear Mr. Deputy Minister indicate the Sahtu hydro. Deline has been waiting for a hydro initiative for about 17 years. The Minister had taken a delegation to Montreal to look at a possibility there and I was hoping that they would start looking at plans, if that’s something that could be used on the Bear River for the community of Deline. That would be something that the people in Deline would be looking forward to.

I want to ask the Minister on a forward going basis, this initiative seems to be viable, it’s...

Certainly communities and the regions are appreciative. Can I get a breakdown of the amounts for the groups that he listed off?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just a few questions on the benefits. The Sahtu has a special day designated as Sahtu Day, June 23rd. A lot of employees from the Government of the Northwest Territories are Aboriginal and Sahtu beneficiaries and this comes up every year in terms of them taking this day off. They are either told to take it through other benefits that they have incurred or they are asked to look at other initiatives. Is this something that the government would look at to honour Sahtu land claim day because if it hasn’t, then this year it will come up again. Some of the employees would...

I appreciate the Minister’s offer and I would take him up on his offer. I want to ask the Minister also on the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Office, we certainly want to continue to support the operation and look at where they can help support communities along the valley that look forward to training. It takes awhile to be an apprentice, pipefitter or any type of trade that would be required for the pipeline. That’s part of what we’re looking for in the support to get our communities up and trained to prepare for a pipeline, if there’s going to be a pipeline. I want to ask the Minister if that’s...

We certainly look forward to that. I know that in Deline they’re asking about it so hopefully if they really, really do well, everybody in this House will be buying Deline fresh eggs and having some turkeys for Thanksgiving dinner. I just wanted to say that to the Minister to look at other initiatives in our region.