Kieron Testart

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I can't help but feel that the first day back in the House is like the first day back to school. But unlike school children, our work as Members doesn't stop for the summer, and warmer days bring more extreme weather events driven by climate change. Even though Northerners are the toughest people in the world, we are still recovering from the collective trauma of the 2023 wildfire crisis. But what isn't recovering is our constituents' trust in this government.

We were forced from our homes, separated from our families, and the emergency management system was...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And, I mean, I'm going to respectfully disagree with the Premier. I mean, the findings were that the existing system proved ineffective during a large-scale disaster and that the system's not agile enough to deal with these things. And we have to take it on face value that the actions taken from then to now have actually resulted in all these improvements and we don't need anything else. Northerners want to see some movement on this. So will the Premier reverse this decision, accept the recommendation, and explore creative ways to bring a centralized response agency or...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the structure of the GNWT, including the establishment policies for departments, rests with the Premier's office, as did the after-action report that was commissioned by TSI. We've been talking about the recommendation to create an emergency -- a dedicated emergency services agency. It could also be done by way of department. We've had conversation about this. But before rejecting that recommendation, did anyone involved with this on the government side of this report do the analysis of how we could cost-effectively create a new agency from our existing...

Thank you to the Premier for the donation. I donated earlier today, and I would challenge every Member of this House to provide a contribution as well. But it shouldn't be up to members of this House or the members of the -- or the citizens of the Northwest Territories to fund veterinary care in small communities and regional centres, places where the SPCA spends a lot of their resources doing spay and neuter programming, emergency medical care, all those kind of things.

Why are those not considered critical territorial services? Because if we don't -- I mean if the Premier knows about stray...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Well, Mr. Speaker, this summer Yellowknife's down to one vet, which means for pet owners, there's one vet in the Northwest Territories, apart from people who fly in to do work, largely brought in by the SPCA. There's some vets who work for ECC, I believe, who do wildlife work. So is the Premier offering to use our veterinary technical experts in the department to offshore this should the SPCA fold its doors because it can't pay the bills and they have no more funding to operate these essential services? Because I'm not hearing any other solutions. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'd like to recognize three pages from the Range Lake riding: Ava Fuentes, Hayden Purcka, and Matthew Sison. I had lunch with them and yourself, Mr. Speaker, and it was lovely. They reminded me of what the Pythagoras theorem is, which I had forgotten. So thank you for that. We don't use math as much perhaps we should, at least that complicated. But I can still read a budget.

Mr. Speaker, I'd also like to recognize Tom McLennan who is a Yellowknife city councillor. Thank you for taking an interest today, and thank you to the pages for their hard work for our sitting.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the reason I asked whether or not different options than just a full agency were done is because we've done this before. We have the Department of Infrastructure that's Transportation and Public Works. We have the Department of Finance that's Finance and HR. We've amalgamated departments to find cost savings. So what if we take justice and public safety? I don't want to ask a hypothetical. But were alternative options explored in how we could amalgamate existing resources to provide a dedicated department or agency, whatever you want to call it, but to meet...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And I would appreciate knowing a clear timeline on that. Are we looking at the end of term or next year or something like that because this technology's moving fast every day, and faster still, it's learning a lot. So when can we expect to see those new policies come in place? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'd like to recognize a visitor in the gallery who is right behind me; it's Christian Bittrolff. He's the president of the International Association of Firefighters, Local 2890. Thank you for being here today, Christian.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, first responders are the courageous men and women who go to work every day to put their lives on the line to keep us safe when we need it the most. This bill aims to create the most comprehensive workers' compensation coverage for firefighters in Canada by covering all types of cancer and heart disease.

The bill also gets rid of latency periods for these diseases and makes the sole requirement employment for two years in a fire department.

The bill also applies to full-time, part-time, and volunteer firefighters. The 24-requirement for presumptive coverage...