Caroline Wawzonek

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Absolutely. The team was with the Member for the Sahtu in the region only a couple of weeks ago, but it has certainly been my experience that talking about this more and getting more information out is important. It's been talked about a long time, and so to be putting more concrete timelines on it is something new that people will, frankly, not be familiar with. So I am more than happy to make sure that -- to circulate this to all Members. We really do need all of the Indigenous governments on whose lands this is going to traverse, the community governments, hopefully...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, Mr. Speaker, happy to speak to these. Folks may have seen there is now a live RFP out, a procurement event out for Smith Creek. It's specifically for the design element of that bridge, not necessarily for construction. I would anticipate this may well find itself going through a different path in terms of the procurement for construction. But the RFP is out to get this bridge designed, get that moving. It is long known to be the gateway to the MVH and needs to be replaced; we know that, Let's get that done. Meanwhile, Mr. Speaker, on Oscar Creek Bridge, happy to...

[Translation] Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, we do offer bonuses to employees who speak not only French and English but also for those employees who are bilingual in an Indigenous language. In March of last year, we had 177 employees who received the French bilingualism bonus and 151 who received the same bonus for bilingualism in an indigenous language. Thank you, Speaker.

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Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the following document: Government of the Northwest Territories Summary of Commitments to Enhance the 2026-2027 Main Estimates. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, Mr. Speaker, the timelines continue to change, but they continue to change because we continue to find ways to shave some time off and to condense some of these timelines. We're feeling that pressure, not only from the residents throughout the Northwest Territories, but, really, some expectation on the part of what we're expected to be delivering from a national projects type of event. So we are with that, Mr. Speaker, aiming to be out in a procurement event next year. So that will require us now to be making some decisions about what kind of procurement this will...

[Translation] Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, a number of services are offered. We have translation services provided by the secretariat for Francophone affairs. This is part of the department of education. And, as I said, we have recruitment services specifically for Francophones. And, Mr. Speaker, we also have services for courses that we provide to our employees in order to assist them in improving their language skills.

[Translation Ends].

[Translation] Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yes, our people who work in recruiting in the civil service are doing specific things for Francophone employees. For example, we have job fairs which are hosted by the college of the north, and in our civil service recruiting system, we have three bilingual positions, and other positions where bilingualism is an asset. And these are for people -- these are in order to recruit people who are bilingual into the NWT civil service.

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Mr. Speaker, I wish to present to the House Bill 47, Appropriation Act (Operations Expenditures) 2026-2027, to be read for the first time. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am familiar with the concept of no fault insurance and with the time afforded me by some motions here, I was able to Google this and get a bit more information. It does seem that, in fact, there's been some studies done of British Columbia and New Jersey and other states and provinces that have no fault insurance regimes. It is not uniformly considered to necessarily be particularly positive. There are some situations where it actually winds up resulting in higher premiums, as so the studies would say. And where there are concerns that it doesn't actually provide the...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Insurance Act does live in the Department of Finance. Mr. Speaker, I'd have to look back and see if -- in the course of time prior to my being here, if there had been some analysis done on this. I can say that at the present time this is not under consideration. Thank you.