Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to both ministers for joining us here today.
My question is for Minister Vandal.
Last summer was a very challenging time for us in the Northwest Territories. It was the worst wildfire season we've ever seen in our history. It was the worst one on record, for sure. Three of our largest communities were evacuated. In fact, 70% of the territory's population were evacuated. That meant there were huge costs incurred by the government and also by businesses. Many businesses had to close for a fairly long period of time.
I want to ask if you could expand on the supports the federal government has put in place to help the Northwest Territories recover.
I also want to say thank you for making yourself very available over the summer and responding, especially to me, whenever I picked up the phone. That was very much appreciated.
For my second question, we know and we're already hearing that this coming summer may be even worse than last summer. We're experiencing drought conditions already. We had very little snowfall on the southern part of the territories. The Government of Northwest Territories is already predicting a very bad fire season.
Can you talk a little bit about what the government's doing to help the territories recover and what we're doing to try to prepare for this coming fire season?