Tom Beaulieu

We can talk to the ferry operator. The ferry operator and the department do discuss how the ferry should be running back and forth on a regular basis if it’s deemed that the best way to continue to move back and forth was just based on demand by viewing the vehicles across or viewing vehicles at Tsiigehtchic, and that’s the way the ferry is going to operate and that’s something that we can discuss with the captain. So, with that, even when they do come across and they see that there are vehicles there, they still would be beneficial, and it’s not, say, few, but beneficial to the travelling...

The hours of operation are something that we’ve worked with and we’ve heard from the community of Tsiigehtchic that they wanted the hours of operation moved to certain hours. We would work with the community. If the community recommended hours that everybody supports in the community that are affected, we would have no issue moving the hours around, as long as we’re not adding hours outside of what we’re allowed to do within the standards that we follow and the guidelines that we follow to operate the ferry.

At this time we’re operating within the hours that we think the communities want. If...

Mahsi cho, Mr. Speaker. I wish to table the following two documents, entitled “Follow-up Letter for OQ 839-17(5): Innovative GNWT Recruitment Process;” and “Follow-up Letter for OQ 848-17(5): Human Resources Open Houses.” Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mahsi cho, Mr. Speaker. Today I’d like to pay tribute to the late J.B. Rabesca. He was known as Tsena. He was an orphan of Lutselk’e.

Mr. Rabesca was born on June 1, 1922, and passed away June 3, 2015. He was 93 years old. The elder J.B. was born in Otto Portage, married to Mary-Louise in 1950 in Fort Resolution and later settled in Lutselk’e together to raise their nine children. He was a humble man who lived a traditional lifestyle. He loved to hunt and trap, passed down his teachings to his children and grandchildren and countless community members near and far.

J.B. is survived by his...

Aside from their fiscal responsibility of spending money dredging the harbour, we don’t have the legislation to take over areas. That particular area is now federal responsibility. Even if we had the money to go in and dredge it once and go in and take the responsibility, this would be something that would continue.

It’s important that we, as a government, continue to have discussions with the federal government, for them to step up and take care of their responsibility. I have written a letter to Fisheries and Oceans asking them to do it. No response. Our officials from Transportation have...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Taking over federal responsibility may require us to create a department. There would be more discussion rather than us just asking the federal government to step up with $12 million to follow their responsibilities and dredge the Hay River. If we are going to start taking over or going into areas the federal government don’t seem to wish to do or don’t wish to spend their money on, then it would not be wise for GNWT to step in and start taking over federal responsibilities, pay for federal responsibilities.

This is a federal responsibility. We’ve written to them. We’ve...

The Building Canada is something that is cost shared 75 percent federal government, 25 percent GNWT for GNWT infrastructure. We did get one piece of federal infrastructure in the Build Canada Plan, which was removed by the federal government. We don’t think it would be wise to add federal responsibility and request money from the Build Canada Plan and then take over their responsibility with the money that we will be leveraging from our government. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Back in February, as the Member knows, I wrote a letter, sent a letter to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and asked that the federal government consider putting money into the port, dredging the port of Hay River, and indicated it was vital to the Territories for resupply of fuel and food to some of the communities. I did not get a response, so I’m not sure that I should be drafting another letter. I know that the public service Department of Transportation has been speaking to their counterparts about the issue, but it’s clearly something that is a federal...

Yesterday when we were meeting with Priorities and Planning, we committed that we would give the Regular Members updates on a weekly basis as we move through this process. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We have a legal contract with the operator. The operator has a process in the contract to make a claim. We then have to determine whether or not we think that is a valid claim, and we are going through the process. We were advised on August 19th that they had run into some issues and had indicated that they would be making a claim on the contract, and we started working with the contractor to see if they had a legitimate claim and how the claim would be broken down from year to year. Thank you.