Robert C. McLeod

My understanding is, going back in history, that it has been tried in a few communities. They tried to restrict the sale of alcohol, but it didn't work out. I think that was just more of a business opportunity for bootleggers because I think they did quite well off of this. They went back to non-restricted sales.

Again, we would have to have a conversation with the liquor stores. We would have to hear from the communities. I know people in the territories have very strong opinions on alcohol and the effects of alcohol in the community, and we've all seen it firsthand, and we've seen a lot of...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I completely agree with the Member that alcohol is a widespread program all across the Northwest Territories, all walks of life, and I believe it is something that we need to continually battle. It has affected probably everybody in this building, and I'm sure most families in the Northwest Territories have been affected and are still being affected by alcohol.

Having said that, the money that we get from alcohol sale goes into general revenue, and that money that is in general revenue is then used to deliver a lot of the programs across the Northwest...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wish to advise Members that the Premier will be absent from the House today to attend the Arctic Circle Assembly in Reykjavik, Iceland. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would also like to recognize a couple of Pages in the Assembly from Inuvik. We have Amber Lennie-Ipana and we have Kyra Buckle, who are both from Inuvik. I would like to thank them for the work they do, plus all the Pages for the work they do, looking after the Members. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, the Member is correct. I did say that there was a good uptake at the beginning and made over $5,000 already, but it is now 14 hours into the legalization of cannabis. Maybe once the excitement wears off, the novelty wears off, or it is not the flavour of the day, there might be some changes, and it might get back to business as usual.

The Minister does make the final determination. I am not going to sit there and decide whether this business is viable; I would rely on the recommendations of those that would provide some technical and financial advice. I don't make the ultimate decision as...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we want to be sure that those who are seriously interested are fully qualified candidates to be vendors of cannabis, so I believe it is a fair deal. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

We have not been contacted by any potential retailers at this point. Should interested parties come forward, we will assess those as described in the information guide that was released. So we would work with those who are considering becoming a vendor because we have released the guide, so the answer, I guess, is yes, we would look at starting to process applications.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, cannabis is not new in the NWT. Legalized cannabis, though, is a controlled substance that is currently being distributed through liquor stores, as the Member pointed out, and federal requirements mean that it will be tracked from the seed-to-sale manner, and that has to be considered in our approach. I do not believe that legalization will add to illegal activities. We can use the liquor as a model. Even though liquor sales are legal, there is an illegal market that continues to exist. I think early indications are, and I can share some numbers, as of noon...

Mr. Speaker, I apologized to the Member on his question on the report. I will continue to give committee an update as we move forward, making it part of the overall report. I mean, as we unroll this, we can see how we can provide all the information to committee that's required.

As far as the monitoring, I believe I made a commitment to committee that I would keep them up to date as we go into the legalization of cannabis. We can have regular updates, if it's committee's wish. We do plan on preparing a report. It will be in the life of this Assembly, obviously. Whether it's after a year after...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it was not Cabinet, it was the Minister of Finance, and I wanted to ensure we had a plan that was going to be right. I do apologize to committee. I did make the commitment that we would have that before implementation day; obviously, I missed that. So it's on me, but I will provide the plan to committee. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.