Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on Oct. 22nd, 2009

[Nicole Jauvin]

I personally see it going on forever.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Bravo! Good luck.

[Nicole Jauvin]

I don't think it will be easy to get rid of us.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Good luck.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Merci, Monsieur Lemay. Maintenant we go to Mr. Payne for four minutes.

Mr. Payne.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I'd like to welcome the witnesses here, and my apologies for arriving late. I was in another committee meeting and that one went on a little longer.

CanNor looks like it's going to be very interesting. You talked about your business plan, and I'm just wondering where you are with that business plan and how far have you gotten. Is it developed? Is it ready to roll out?

[Nicole Jauvin]

We have had a strategic planning retreat, which actually for the first time brought together the senior management committee of the department. We had that in early September in Iqaluit, and we spent three days talking about our values as an organization--that's kind of the first piece--and our business plan, what are the priorities and so on.

We are actually putting this together. This year, because we are so closely linked to INAC, I think until the end of the fiscal year we're actually still sharing the same parliamentary mechanisms for reporting and so on. So this plan is basically our first attempt. It won't be as public through the RPPs and the DPRs as the next one will be. But I don't see any issue with making it available to members of this committee.

We need to make sure our plan reflects the needs of the north. I know that with your visits and your interests you will have views as well, so we'll be glad to share that with you.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

So when that's all ready, we'll be able to get a copy of that?

[Nicole Jauvin]

Yes.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Okay, perfect.

The other thing you talked about in your opening comments is that you had met already with some of the territory leaders. I'm wondering what kind of information they have put forward as to their issues and concerns.

[Nicole Jauvin]

The meetings I've had were at the level of the public service with each territory, as well as with first nations leaders and aboriginal leaders. In Nunavut, of course, it's with NTI, the organization that's responsible for the implementation of the claim.

During the visits we didn't go in depth with respect to what their current priorities are. We wanted to establish a relationship. What we did say is that we.... My opening line is always that “I can't do my job, we can't do our job at CanNor, if you don't work with us. We won't be doing this on our own; we can't possibly. We have to work with you.” And that's very well received.

There are plans for holding consultation meetings and other types of exchanges at quite a high level to start thinking about what our priorities should be. There are priorities that have been articulated for each program. SINED is a very good example, but I think we need to take it one level up.

The other thing I think we need to do is share our capacity. One thing we've agreed to do is to share our basic knowledge about the analysis about the north so that we can see whether or not, hopefully, we're all on the same page. We will put all of those views together and get a better picture of where people are.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

That's about it, Mr. Payne. I'm sorry, it goes very quickly, but thank you very much.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

We'll now move on to Mr. Bevington.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Ms. Jauvin, for being here.

The minister said something about the Northern Projects Management Office that I want to clarify, because I don't think it was correct. He suggested that somehow this is a similar body to the one in southern Canada with the major projects offices. The major project offices in southern Canada deal with provincial jurisdictions. They're completely responsible for resource development within their jurisdictions.

I don't know how you can make a comparison between a major project office in southern Canada, which deals with decisions being made by provincial jurisdictions, and a northern project management office that deals with decisions being made by the federal government. How can the minister compare the two in terms of jurisdiction? I go back to what I spoke to in the letter from the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources saying they're looking for directions on regulatory development that will facilitate the eventual devolution of authorities to the Government of the Northwest Territories.

[Nicole Jauvin]

NPMO will be modelled very much along the lines of the MPMO, which operates in the south. The important thing to remember is that NPMO does not have any authority over other departments or regulators.

The role of the NPMO will be to ensure that we can look at projects from a project management perspective. When a company comes in, it's important to be able to tell them they will probably need three types of assessments and this number of permits, and they will need to undertake consultations with these groups. This has to be set out in a way that a proponent can make sense of it. It will give a little more certainty in how long the process might last. It will hopefully help to accelerate things a little and encourage proponents in their efforts to bring projects forward.

My colleague reminds me that neither office coordinates provincial or territorial roles. We're looking at the coordination of federal regulatory roles.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

That's my point. The federal regulatory role in resource development in the Northwest Territories is to make decisions, whereas the federal regulatory role in provinces over provincial-type developments is not to make decisions; it's to simply ensure that the regulations the federal government can bring to bear on those projects are being looked at and carried forward. There are two different roles here.

How do you anticipate that the federal government will use your agency to promote the legitimate, constitutionally backed desires of the Government of the Northwest Territories to have a bigger role in resource development decisions?

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

There's time for a brief answer to that.

[Nicole Jauvin]

That will not be the role of the NPMO. The NPMO will strictly coordinate and manage projects, so they will have no authority in that regard.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Thank you very much, Mr. Bevington and Ms. Jauvin.

Now we'll go to Mr. Duncan for four minutes.

[John Duncan, Conservative, Vancouver Island North, BC]

Thank you once again.

I'm going to address my questions to Patrick Borbey because I know he knows so much.

[Nicole Jauvin]

As opposed to the president of CanNor?

[John Duncan, Conservative, Vancouver Island North, BC]

He's been in the job a lot longer. Let's put it that way.

I notice money has been allocated for the study of the Mackenzie Valley Highway between Tuktoyaktuk and Inuvik. From your vast storehouse of knowledge, could you describe that for us in ways that are productive?

I'm personally very excited about the launch of Radarsat, I think it was a year or two years ago, and about what that will bring to the north in broad terms.

Finally, I think you may have been asked this before, but we're ready to launch this northern study in a serious way from a committee perspective. If you have any special area that you think we should focus on, that would be nice too.

[Patrick Borbey]

That's a lot. Thank you very much.

This is a project the department was handling up until the creation of CanNor. It has become a CanNor project. But certainly it is an exciting project, with the possibility of having the Dempster Highway extended all the way to the Arctic Ocean. CanNor is funding some of the feasibility work, the early work. It will require significant infrastructure investment, which will involve other parts of the government when a decision is required. Nicole has taken over that project, and it is a pretty exciting one.

I agree that Radarsat is an important asset that the government has deployed for the north, and it does play an important role in terms of helping us improve our knowledge of the north. I'm not a specialist in this area, but things such as ice conditions, our icebreakers, the scientific teams we send up north depend heavily on Radarsat to be able to assess what is going on there. It is a significant improvement on the technology that existed under Radarsat 1. So it has a lot of benefits.

All kinds of applications are going to be developed over the coming years, including applications that will help Inuit hunters be able to practise traditional skills more safely. So Radarsat, yes, is also part of the vision of the high Arctic research station in terms of being able to do a little bit more scientific work in the north for northerners.

In terms of your studies, I think you've talked a lot about skills development, the tools, the mechanisms, and how they work together to allow aboriginal Canadians, northerners, to be able to participate fully, particularly in the resource economy and the boom that's coming--economic development at large, but the resource sector is going to continue to drive the economy.

There are a lot of good examples out there. Diavik and Ekati have really made some important investments and have helped in those areas. If you talk to aboriginal leaders in the Tlicho area, they'll be able to tell you some interesting stories. More people are going to university. More people are acquiring the skills to be able to be part of the new economy. Nunavut has a huge number of projects that may become active mines soon. We hope there will be a first new mine in Nunavut in the first quarter of 2010.

Again, there's a story there that needs to be told and better understood about how proponents are working with governments, with the agency now, with HRSDC, with the territorial government, and communities to ensure that those jobs are going to go and the skills are going to be gained for the benefit of northerners.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Thank you, Mr. Borbey. That's great. We are just getting a little over time.

Thank you, Mr. Duncan.

The Member for Nipissing—Timiskaming now has the floor for four minutes.