Wendy Bisaro

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I MOVE, seconded by the honourable Member for Thebacha, that, notwithstanding Rule 4, when this House adjourns on Thursday, November 5, 2009, it shall be adjourned until Wednesday, January 27, 2010;

AND FURTHER, that any time prior to January 27, 2010, if the Speaker is satisfied, after consultation with the Executive Council and Members of the Legislative Assembly, that the public interest requires that the House should meet at an earlier time during the adjournment, the Speaker may give notice and thereupon the House shall meet at the time stated in such notice and...

Thank you, Mr. Minister. How? What sort of options did you come forward with? Could you please explain to me what considerations were taken, what options were considered and what the decision was? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I spoke today about priorities for the next capital infrastructure budget and the 2011-2012 budget. I know it is a long ways away, but I think it is time we start considering priorities of the government. I suggested that providing cell service in the 25 communities that don’t currently have it should be one of the priorities of this government. My questions are addressed to the Minister of Finance. I would like to ask the Minister where the provision of cell phone service to all communities in the NWT sits in terms of this government’s priorities. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I agree that the Yukon is not the NWT. We certainly have different geography, but the information I’ve been given from a technical perspective is that really all we need is a cell phone tower in every community. So that’s 25 towers. We certainly don’t need to have towers in between every one of our communities.

My last question for the Minister -- hopefully, he can give me an answer that I will like, I guess -- but what will it take for this government, this Cabinet, to make cell phone service provision in providing cell phone service in all of our communities a priority...

I thank the Minister for his answer. I can’t argue that we have set a capital plan out. However, I can argue that these plans are not set in stone. I don’t think they should be considered firm and concrete from day one when we first establish these plans. In a four-year period of our election, we have to be able to respond to the various concerns of our constituents, and not just my constituents but across the Territory. I would like to suggest that, certainly, priorities can change. I think they do change. I have seen that already in two years.

I would like to know from the Minister whether or...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I bring this motion forward because I believe it is a very serious matter of public safety and I believe it’s a situation that needs to be corrected. Distracted driving is said to be an unreported traffic safety problem and I believe that statement as well.

I made a statement two weeks ago and I said that distracting driving can be many things: eating, drinking, changing a CD, using portable video games or DVD players, fiddling with radio dials, talking to a passenger, experiencing emotional distress, minding children, personal grooming, looking at...

The Minister’s answer points out two things for me; one is that this Assembly, this government has little input, can provide little direction to the NTPC board and the Minister referenced that he’s not really aware of what the board has done in this particular instance. I’ve totally lost the other one out of my head, so I will go on to my next question and that is, to the Minister: how will the replacement of the Bluefish hydro dam be funded? Thank you.

Thanks to the Minister for that answer. I guess I was referring and I needed to be a little more explicit, but for extraordinary expenditures where you have an unforeseen capital cost or an unforeseen expenditure of a fairly large nature, what kind of planning goes in place for those sorts of things? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s my pleasure to recognize a hardworking member of the Water Strategy group, a constituent, Judy McLinton who’s up behind me somewhere. I’d also like to recognize two of the Pages who have been working so hard on our behalf over the last three weeks, Aimee Yurris and Michael Callahan, who are constituents as well. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to thank all my colleagues for their remarks. I in particular would like to thank the Minister for his considered remarks. I appreciate the actions that the department is taking and I will hopefully see that some of the discussion today is going to come to fruition.

I’d like to comment on a bit of a technical point. A couple of people have mentioned that we’re creating legislation if this goes through and technically, no, we’re not. We already have the legislation. We’re asking for an amendment to an existing piece of legislation. So we’re not really creating...