Norman Yakeleya

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Earlier I had questions to the Minister of Transportation. I’d like to continue my questions. Bassett Petroleum will be doing 120 loads of delivering fuel to the community of Deline. In the assessment by Bassett Petroleum, operators of those vehicles, they’re asking to see if the department is going to put kilometre markers along the road to Deline, even to have a few pullouts on that road to Deline.

Does the Minister think that’s something that can be done this year in regard to these two items?

Mr. Speaker, for the Minister’s information, there are a lot of “worst spots” on the winter road. We also have people who are servicing the Sahtu. We have a fuel company from Hay River, Bassett Petroleum, starting to haul fuel into the Sahtu. Their operators have given a list of situations on the winter road.

From the observations of Bassett Petroleum who have been on the winter road because they’re doing the fuel haul to Deline and the other communities, is the Minister taking their comments to heart to look at areas that they’ve indicated that need some tender loving care?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This being anti-bullying day, I thought I’d try to twist my questions into questions to the Minister of Transportation in the Sahtu. Our roads are rough, rough and rough. We have 1,444 kilometres of winter roads. That’s leading from Wrigley to Fort Good Hope, Colville Lake and to Deline.

I want to ask the Minister, given his recent awareness of our winter roads, especially from Norman Wells to Fort Good Hope, and the annual hand game tournament this weekend in Fort Good Hope, what is the Minister doing to fix the potholes, to fix washboard alley? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I apologize. I’ll table the document and I’ll leave my questions for some other venue.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just have one other question. An interesting point that the renewal of the licence is in the federal government’s hands and the federal government is part owner of Imperial Oil oilfield. That leads to other questions. Anyhow, I’m not going to belabour on that point here.

My other question I have for the Minister has probably to do also with the federal government, is the Great Bear Lake area where I think it was 700,000 tonnes of material that was dumped into the lake. I know that they are going through a process of that remediation cleanup and it has to do with the...

I appreciate that. Is this person able to help the communities, and I’m looking mostly at Fort Good Hope and maybe even Tulita, as to translating the language of a licence like Imperial Oil with all the chemicals and scientific jargon and technical wording into plain English so our people can understand what Imperial Oil is reporting? They do give a report but it’s a very highly technical, engineering, scientific report so we need a person that then can translate, saying this is what they’re saying, these are the chemicals that Imperial Oil is using, this is what’s been processed through the...

I’m so happy, Madam Chair, because I know the people in Fort Good Hope will be happy because, again, the application by Imperial Oil is to take out billions of litres of water and use it for their operations and half of those billions are going back into the Mackenzie River and flowing down towards Fort Good Hope and Tsiigehtchic and down to the Arctic Ocean. So this person is going to be a key person to work with the community of Fort Good Hope.

My understanding again, and I appreciate the Minister’s response, is this person then going to be available to help the residents of Fort Good Hope...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I believe people who are in the Sahtu or people who are planning to go up to the Sahtu appreciate what the Minister is saying in this House this afternoon.

I want to also thank the Minister and to follow up on his commitment on a preconstruction meeting for next year.

Is the Minister also going to seek the opinion of one of the users as Bassett Petroleum operators and see if they can be a part of that preconstruction discussion as to the conditions of our winter roads? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

In the Department of Transportation, one of their objectives is safety on our highways. Certainly that applies more so with the winter roads in our communities.

As part of the Safety Program in the Department of Transportation, are there any requests or consideration for additional maintenance on our winter roads? We have about a month and six days left if the weather holds out to have our winter roads still in operation.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Our winter roads can only last for three months and then they close down. I want to ask the Minister, given his assessment and the questions that we’ve been exchanging today and looking at this on a going-forward basis, can the Minister commit that next year we can have some type of pre-meeting with all the communities, contractors and operators and look at our winter roads and have a thorough discussion? We are still dealing with these issues from the past and it doesn’t seem to be getting any better, especially now that we don’t have additional funding from industry...