Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Following up to my Member's statement, I have questions for the Minister of Strategic Infrastructure, Energy, and Supply Chains.
Mr. Speaker, can the Minister provide an update on the community engagement sessions and what the department's hearing from the residents as they engage with the community. Thank you.
Thank you, Member from Inuvik Boot Lake. Minister responsible for Strategic Infrastructure, Energy, and Supply Chains.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I had to practice to get it right myself. So, Mr. Speaker, I am happy to have the chance to speak to this. There's been a lot of engagements over 30 years on this particular stretch of highway, but we are at a different stage now. Over the last few years now, we've heard communities say they wanted to have community readiness. They don't want to just have the road get built. They want to be ready, they want to participate, they want to be ready when it is built. So we are accelerating the work for community readiness. The team is there all week. They had two days in Norman Wells. I would encourage anyone in the Sahtu -- it's all over social media, I don't have it in front of me here, to check out the engagements happening in the evenings. Because we are looking to really meet with the communities to figure out what needs to happen so they can participate more fully and to be ready. Again, community readiness is a different stage. It usually happens towards the end of a project. We're moving it forward. We're confident enough to know that we need to get this done, and that's what they're there laying the foundation for, for community readiness, participate, and to be ready when that road gets built. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you for that. So around that, I guess that same theme of being involved, what opportunities, Mr. Speaker, will there be for Indigenous governments and local communities to stay involved as this project moves forward?
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there's already work underway in partnership with Indigenous governments. We had, in the fall, signed a work plan with the Pehdzeh Ki First Nation out of Wrigley and met just last week there. We're going back again to design the final routing. The final design of the routing will be done together so that we're making best use of traditional knowledge as well as with more western traditional science-based design. They're putting those two things together so we have the best possible route. But meanwhile, Mr. Speaker, again, looking to work on a traditional knowledge studies throughout the area to make so that the final design has best use but also that -- again, the community readiness is about making sure that there are corporations in those communities, corporations and individuals who might need further training, who know what's coming, who are ready when the project come forward, that they're there to participate, that they can make best use of different opportunities, and to work with the Indigenous governments who are land holders and traditional land users that, again, when this project moves forward that they are there to participate in those contracts, that their members are there to participate in those contracts, and, really, so that this -- the work starting from today and going forward is seamless, that everyone knows the timeline and everyone's ready to bid on contracts, to participate in contracts, and have whatever training is necessary to do so. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister responsible for Strategic Infrastructure, Energy, and Supply Chains. Final supplementary. Member from Inuvik Boot Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you for that. Mr. Speaker, my final question is when the residents of Inuvik head south with their commerce to head into the Yukon and head into possibly Alberta, Mr. Speaker, when can the Minister anticipate that they can put their left signal light on and take a left turn and head all the way down to Yellowknife instead, Mr. Speaker?
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I share this dream. Mr. Speaker, and I believe a lot of people in this territory share this dream. Mr. Speaker, I want to first emphasize we will be complying very much as proponents with the guidance of the board, the Mackenzie Valley Resource Management Board. They are the arbiters right now of making sure we go through an environmental process that provides mitigation steps as necessary for the road project right now to Norman Wells. We will continue to work with them on phase 2, which is that section that gets us all the rest of the way up to Inuvik. But we started those conversations. We want to work to ensure that we are making best use of available information. There was data gathered back in 2013. There's more work happening right now on a winter road routing as I understand from some of the Indigenous governments in the region. We can marshal all of that, and we can accelerate this project so that we are not waiting another 30 years or even another 10 years. If we can start construction on the southern portion in possibly as early as 2028-2029, then we can certainly be, I think, accelerating the northern portion similarly as well. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister responsible for Strategic Infrastructure, Energy, and Supply Chains. Oral questions. Member from Yellowknife North.
