Daniel McNeely

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm looking at medical travel assistance here. In previous years, it was a lot higher, and we're anticipating a lower number here. I'm hoping that maybe some detail on explanation could be provided. Are we getting better at booking travel than we were? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Madam Chair. There on page 157, the contribution to the NWT Power Corporation, maybe I can ask a little bit more detail on the increase. Is it related to the Taltson hydro repair? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Maybe I'll rephrase that. As I mentioned, there was I'm just using that one example. There are several bilateral agreements that I'm I'm still doing my research, but it's in the neighbourhood of $1.5 billion that exists with these bilaterals. I don't know whether it's five bilateral agreements specific to the target of the application applied for. In this case, I'm just using the 570 bilateral payable over ten years. That'll be $55 million or $57 million per year. And that was signed in 2018, I believe, or 2019. So there should be some existing capital in these...

Thank you, Madam Chair. First of all, I'm glad there's some willingness to reinstate the community access program. I've seen firsthand a lot of growth in that area. And for me, coming from and going to small communities, it's really comforting to see the value on TPR. So TPR would be your taxpayers return of public funds. So when I see it in the book here and I go out to the community and I see it out there, okay, it's happening. And it makes me feel good that the government is doing something right by providing meaningful benefits.

And looking at the business plan, the business plan on page...

Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair. And thanks for that encouraging reply by the Minister.

On my last trip, which was a one-way from Norman Wells to Yellowknife, it cost the government $1,800. And there's many cases where medical travel patients are coming here only to find out the appointment wasn't booked but it was booked for a month later, or other cases where people actually told me their experience. So that's why I say it's costing the government because of some mistake that was made and it seems to be quite common for medical travel patients to come to their appointment when, in fact, it was...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Public Lands Act Regulations. Today, Mr. Speaker, I want to speak about the status on implementation of Public Lands Act.

Mr. Speaker, the work on the development of the Public Lands Act began in 2017 during the 18th Assembly by the former Department of Lands. The Act was later introduced and eventually passed at the end of the 18th Assembly in August of 2019. Based on this, a person would probably think the Public Lands Act has been in force for about five years now; however, Mr. Speaker, this is not the case.

According to the text of the Act, Mr...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. That's all I had at this point in time. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm glad to see that the -- there's an increase of 6 percent. Hopefully it's going into the right programs, being as efficient as it could be. And when we hear a lot of the news on lack of nurses, so we got to rely on agency nurses, and we hear the ongoing delivery problems with medical travel, pre-assessments, so when I hear that and I look at the business plan and the supported financial documents to that plan and I look at the list of programs and -- or health and social programs that this department's offering and services and so on, so taking a real wholistic...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm glad to see that this department is taking an active role as identified in the business plan to address our drug trade issues. And I'm also glad that some other responsibilities are with the Minister and the Premier so when they're making trips to Ottawa to solicit for more money, I think we can all -- we can encourage our leader to emphasize the need for additional policing resources. And then when we get to the -- when we get to the fact of homelessness, now we've got the Minister and the Premier responsible for that department also or that initiative. So it works...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I kind of view this OROGO office as a continued allied services to the industry community. And I'm going to say this is probably a real good rate of return on this expense there, Mr. Chair, because our revenues or the royalties received by this industry, I think it's -- I don't have the numbers in front of me, but it's into the millions. So if you're spending $1.2 million, and you're getting back royalties in the neighbourhood of two or three or four, wouldn't you think that would be a good expense on regulatory responsibilities with this area? There's much that this...