Wally Schumann

As I have said, they have not looked at any GNWT lease procurement opportunities with this building for office space proposals. We are not aware of any department that is looking for incremental space at this point. I don't believe there is any funding available to do that at this point. A lot of this is all speculation in the paper about what is going to happen with this building. I don't mind having a conversation with the Member if there is an opportunity to have a look at this thing for other projects that the Government of the Northwest Territories is having a look at, but that would be...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I knew we would get questions on this one. This was raised in the newspaper with the Bellanca Building coming down. Now, we have to make one thing quite clear: it is a privately owned business. They own this asset. We are actively leasing space off the Bellanca Development Corporation in other buildings that they own in Yellowknife. They have never made anything aware to us as a government about this building. They haven't used it to bid on other projects in the Northwest Territories, or in Yellowknife, I guess.

For us as a government to look at this as an asset to use...

At this time, Marine Transportation Services does not foresee any significant delay in the delivery of fuel to Hay River or delay in the sailing schedule. The department is working closely with the fuel supplier, with CN and the truckers, and has an alternate supply of sources and transportation plans in place. However, the situation is fluid and can change very quickly.

Mr. Speaker, the Government of the Northwest Territories committed in our mandate to advance a number of renewable and alternative energy solutions to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels and lower the cost of living. One of those commitments included implementing a new Northwest Territories Energy Strategy, which we achieved in April 2018 when we tabled the 2030 Energy Strategy: A Path to More Affordable, Secure and Sustainable Energy in the Northwest Territories. This strategy defines our long-term vision and approach for transitioning to a lower carbon economy.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'd like to recognize Ms. Sheila Cook today on her award, and her daughter Tracy, who is attending with her. I have a message from my son C.J. He says, "She's the best teacher ever." Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The department makes every effort to do what we can. If we have to reuse this gravel to save money, that is what we are doing, making sure that we are not wasting our money, but like I said, we have to follow the provisions in the land and water board's licence. We are trying to minimize the effect on this.

We had questions last year from people who live close to the ferry landing about the disturbances that are taking place there. We realize that people are making a living in that area, they are fishing in that area, and we have to minimize the use of gravel and reuse the gravel as much as we...

Last year when we had those discussions, that was to meet the emergency need, what it would have been to truck it around. It was a hypothetical question, I guess, if we trucked our fuel and staged it out of Inuvik. This situation with delivery of fuel to the Hay River port, I'm going to have to check with our procurement people and see where the delivery of fuel is actually supposed to be. It may be that this extra cost might be burdened by the Government of the Northwest Territories. It might actually be on the supplier of the fuel. I'll have to get that information and get that back to the...

Again, to update the House, as of yesterday, the Alberta government, it's their fire. It's their jurisdiction, and they're in charge of things. They are escorting essential goods through this section of highway for the residents of the Northwest Territories as long as it's safe to do so, and as of yesterday, we're doing that. We are also communicating all these messages, as I said yesterday, publicly through Twitter, our online road map system, messaging boards and such, so the travelling public knows what's going on. There will be questions, I suspect, about Highway No. 7 through the Fort...

Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the honourable Member from Thebacha, that Bill 35, Supply Chain Management Professional Designation Act, be read for the third time. Mr. Speaker, I request a recorded vote. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I've said in this House over the last couple of days, first of all, we moved up the sailing season to try to alleviate the situation. We've been working with the fuel supplier, and now we have these fires that have started in Alberta which throw some of those plans into jeopardy, where we'll have to go back and rejig this. As I've updated the House today, we're working with our fuel supplier and looking at trucking things to Hay River in the short term, depending on how long it takes CN Rail to ramp their system back up and get their services available to Hay River...