Robert Hawkins

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there was, I think earlier in the return to oral questions, the Premier did cite that he's paid at a deputy minister III up to 300 and I think $26,000. It was actually more than the Prime Minister gets paid, oddly enough. But out of -- I would hope that, Mr. Speaker, that the Premier could be very specific as to what advice he's getting so he can approach the Prime Minister on these initiatives -- he's already lists them, I don't need to go through them -- and what type of political advice he's giving the Premier to help work in collaboration to get the...

All right, thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'm excited to ask questions to the Premier regarding his upcoming wonderful trip to Saskatoon, and I'd like to know little details and hopefully, we can share this within the House. Specifically, Mr. Speaker, what is the plan or what will the Premier be proposing at this First Minister's conference with the Prime Minister of Canada that suits -- that lines up with the mandate of the NWT but also some of our major significant infrastructure projects; and, lastly, especially noting the tone of the Prime Minister to build and be bold. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, investing in our Arctic road to resources, Mr. Speaker, it's the highway north of Yellowknife, is an excellent, if not a major significant economic opportunity for the North and Canada. Mr. Speaker, if you look at the NWT's GDP alone, you'd start to wonder in this territory, is it trending that people are quietly quitting? Our GDP is shrinking and things are -- maybe no one's taken the opportunity to inform or tell the Premier.

Mr. Speaker, we're going to need some bold brinkmanship action to get in there, lock down, and get some investment in the North...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As we all know, water's very critical to day-to-day life so I won't go at length of that; I'm sure that stands as a fact on its own.

Mr. Speaker, the Minister's saying he's not aware of the problem or aware of what they're going to do, or maybe we can clarify what the Minister can do in his role as Minister of communities when the city of Yellowknife's struggling with this potential financial endeavour. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. First of all, I want to -- oddly enough, I'll do it this way: I want to acknowledge the great statement by the Member for Yellowknife South about our good friend Steve Loutitt. She said much of what I would have liked to have said but it is recognition, so I'll say this to Mr. Steve Loutitt, our retiring DM of infrastructure. I want to thank him for his many years of service, and I used to call him -- sorry, I used to call him director Loutitt when he was a manager, and then guess what, he got appointed to director. Then I used to call him assistant deputy minister...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, one of the challenges I see as the downtown MLA, that we see a lot of -- we'll call it social problems. And, unfortunately, police officers are being used as social workers to deal with them. But the reality is they are being called on more and more and taken away from the primary job for general public safety and general duty stuff.

Mr. Speaker, would the Premier be willing to look at some type of way of increasing the police presence in the downtown of Yellowknife? I know he doesn't instruct the chief superintendent, but he does have sway with respect to...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have a question for the Premier who also is the Minister of Justice.

Mr. Speaker, the last budget, we had a rollout, I believe, of nine policing officers under the Indigenous policing initiative. I'm curious as to what the actual rollout looks like, where they are -- where did they go to and where they didn't go to with respect to the nine that the territorial government was getting. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, is it targeting specifically critical minerals? Is it targeting a specific sector in the mining industry? And where should we see sort of some dynamic results and when should we see them? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this case, I appreciate the Premier's statement because if you saw exactly what I see, it's weird. So it's weird that we're collaborative in that sense that -- so seeing the issue that he's pointed out, and I agree, it just seems weird. That's it, Mr. Speaker.

With respect to the motion, what I want to say is this: I wish there was more of a collaborative process. I'm not going to speak against the motion; it's very difficult to do that. I mean, there's everything in here I like. The only thing I didn't like is the process on how we were told this and, of...

And hence, Mr. Speaker, we have the policy now before us and that's why this motion is coming forward. Mr. Speaker, I have asked different times at committee when did they review the affirmative action policy. They have not. There's no answers. That's why this motion exists. Mr. Speaker, the Premier and everyone else can talk about the impacts on these people -- on folks, but there are equity groups that are being impacted by this. That's why it needs to go back to committee.

Mr. Speaker, this isn't the -- there was at least four letters that said slow down, have consultation. That's what this...