Norman Yakeleya

Thank you, Mr. Chair. The territorial health expenditures just run over $325 million per year. The staffing is about 1,257. We have our own health board in the Sahtu, which runs about a $10 million operation. When you look at the numbers here in terms of the amount of dollars that are spent in the Sahtu compared to some of the regions, knowing the Sahtu is deemed as an isolated region with the winter roads only going for three months of the year and a lot of fly-in/fly-out of the services there, when you look at other regions that have some of the communities that are along the all-weather...

Mr. Speaker, my questions are for the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources.

Can the Minister provide to me the GNWT or Environment and Natural Resources definition of “consultation”?

Can the Minister outline the process that supported his decision to implement a ban on hunting caribou in the area in question?

Will the Minister provide an explanation as to why the caribou are calving two weeks later than the normal period for calving?

Can the Minister provide what types of interim agreements were signed with the Tlicho or Yellowknives Dene communities to implement the ban on hunting...

In my discussions with the elders -- and I’ve had a few discussions with them, Mr. Speaker -- the elders say the animals on this land are there for us to survive as human beings. I believe if the Minister wants to quote more traditional knowledge, I think it needs to go to the people, to the real hunters, the real people who use caribou, people like Colville Lake, people in Deline who say this is not right. Why are our calves being born two weeks late? Something is wrong. Again, people who know this, it’s not the government. So I’ll ask the Minister again, in terms of the ban here, the people...

Mr. Speaker, I’ve been listening, with interest, to the responses from the Minister of ENR. I want to ask the Minister of ENR in regard to the Bathurst Inlet caribou population, which was 120,000 in 2006. The Minister indicated that in 2009 the population dropped to 30,000, so 90,000 caribou disappeared somewhere. I want to ask the Minister regarding his consultation on the ban in this specific area. Is the Minister willing to look at possibly the ban in terms of giving the aboriginal hunters a percentage of caribou in that area, maybe a half percent or 1 percent in terms of providing that to...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this afternoon, before lunch I had caribou stew.

Mr. Chairman, my comments would be brief in terms of the budget. I do want to thank the staff members and the Ministers for putting together this budget. I know that the budget process is quite contentious and that the needs are always greater than what we could afford and that priorities have to be considered and sometimes when I have issues that want to be brought forward to see if they can get any attention, sometimes they go in with the mix of other things and sometimes they don’t come out on top or it has to be considered at another time.

Mr. Chairman, the budget here shows an increase of...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. If that’s the case, the aboriginal people would have agreed. Why is it that when I call my leadership in the Sahtu, they say this is not right, this is wrong. The Wekeezhii board has to make a decision and it has not yet made a decision. The government, in its wisdom, jumped the gun. Mr. Speaker, was there an agreement to say, yes, we’ll come back? Is that part of the consultation? Sometimes I hear consultation in terms of this is what you shall do and that is it. Was there an agreement in terms of putting a ban here and waiting for people? You should really come to the...

In terms of the resources, can the Minister tell me roughly the estimates of the resources and when possibly they could hope for some resources in terms of working on the highway from Dempster to Inuvik or Inuvik to Dempster, somewhere where we’ll start seeing some work in the Sahtu or even in the Gwich’in region?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a question for Mr. McLeod, the Minister of Transportation, in regard to the Mackenzie Valley Highway. I want to ask the Minister in terms of any of the latest updates on seeing this highway being constructed and progress on seeing some work being done in regard to starting the Mackenzie Valley Highway.

Mr. Miltenberger listed a number of factors to the decline of the caribou. I would like to know about the impact on the caribou. Does the Minister have any information in terms of the calving of the caribou? Has this had an impact on the calving of caribou?