Tom Beaulieu

Mr. Speaker, I'm glad to hear the Minister speak about work with the community governments. I'd like to ask the Minister if there is a plan to directly fund the Aboriginal governments, or community governments, in order to address core need housing in the communities? Thank you.

I would like to thank the Minister for that response. We are not seeing the actual work on the ground. Unfortunately, that's lot of good planning, but no action.

Mr. Speaker, when is the NWT Housing Corporation planning to update a comprehensive needs survey? From 2017 to 2018, in the Northwest Territories, there were 1,200 jobs lost, so I'm assuming that that has some impact on the affordability of housing in the Northwest Territories, so I think it's urgent that we do something instead of staying with the 2014 needs survey, that we do something that is current today. So I'd like to ask the...

Marsi cho, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, today I would like to speak about the core housing needs across the Northwest Territories. At this time, over two years into this government, there is no territorial-wide housing plan that addresses the core need reduction plan on a community-by-community basis.

Mr. Speaker, I have risen in this House many times urging our government to create a housing development plan that is pertinent to each of our 33 communities and is comprehensive enough to identify the exact types of core needs that are most pertinent within each community. A thorough plan can better...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I move that the Chairman rise and report progress.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to thank the Minister for that response. Mr. Speaker, we have situations where individuals are beginning to discover the reason why they have the program, and that is because those older tanks do fail after a certain number of years. I would like to ask the Minister if the Minister could look at the possibility of helping individuals out where there is no tank in the community to install and they have a leak. It will take potentially a couple of weeks, because most likely, in situations like Lutselk'e, you would have to fly the tank in. Could the NWT...

In many of the communities, we don't have private tradespeople. I would like to ask the Minister, in situations where there may be an inventory of tanks, and we have a tank failure that may be urgent or an emergency situation, if the Minister can work through the system and have the housing authorities' maintenance staff change the tanks at the community level?

Marci cho Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I would like to recognize the interpreters from Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh, Mr. Tom Unka from Fort Resolution, and Rose Sundberg from Detah.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, committee would like to consider Committee Report 6-18(3), Report on the Review of the 2017 Report of the Auditor General on Climate Change in the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

One of the main things that the Housing Corporation is trying to prevent with the new program is, obviously, the potential for a huge environmental disaster, as we have seen situations where we have leaking tanks that have cost $250,000 to remediate, because it takes quite a hole to get the fuel out of the ground.

In my case, there is hardly anyone that can afford to actually pay for the costs of a full remediation if they have a complete failure with their fuel tank. Therefore, it could involve moving a home and so on and so forth. I would like to ask the Minister if the Minister would have...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I want to ask the Minister responsible for the Housing Corporation some questions on the new program, the fuel tank program. I think that is a very good program. It is good for the environment and very good for, even, insurance purposes.

I would like to ask the Minister if, in communities where most of the heavy materials are brought in by barge, if the Minister could, in advance, in communities that are barged in, particularly Lutselk'e, of course, for my riding, if the Housing Corporation would send several tanks into Lutselk'e in preparation to exchange...