Inside the political ropes, the 20th Assembly is nearly fully operational.
The premier and cabinet are in place and the assembly committees have been populated. Orientations and briefings are ongoing, the vision and priorities are being discussed and agreed to, and the daily business of government is being tended to.
Every MLA and cabinet member is being inundated from every point of the compass with suggestions and requests about pressing issues, big and small, short-term and long-term. The delay of the election, assembly orientation, and the Christmas break will have consumed 120 days of the 1,460 days before the next election, highlighting just how fast a mandate is consumed. It will be a short Christmas for many as they prepare to hit the decks running in January.
As all this is underway, we need to remember that many members were elected promising better government. I would like to touch on two key priorities, a short-term one that can’t wait and a longer-term one that is essential for the critical revitalizing of the NWT when we think of better government, not more government.
Priority one
In four short months, spring will be underway. The current extreme low water and ongoing drought would seem to indicate a minimal flood risk. The drought, and fires that are visibly smouldering away under the snow around the North, would seem to indicate the 2024 fire season may just pick up where this last season left off. The 2023 fire season exposed serious structural flaws and lack of preparedness at the territorial level in dealing with a crisis of this magnitude. The biggest issue was the lack of a whole of government response, including:
-No whole of governments approach among the GNWT, Indigenous governments and municipalities for territorial emergencies
-No clear territorial plan or command centre
-Role confusion in headquarters between those departments with firefighting personnel on the ground and support departments, such as Health, Justice, Municipal and Community Affairs, Infrastructure and the Northwest Territories Power Corporation, leading to added stress, tactical planning confusion and critical time delays on the front lines.
-Resulting communication confusion within the GNWT, with municipalities and with other governments and agencies assisting with the fires.
-Apparent confusion surrounding the role of elected leaders during a time of crisis. For clarity on this one all you have to do is look at how the president of the Ukraine and his colleagues have been doing their jobs in the most brutal of conditions.
I am sure the critical incident debriefing underway will deal with these issues and more. Those whose communities were devastated by fire and those whose communities barely escaped devastation are watching very closely.
Priority two
The single biggest political obstacle for the revitalization of the NWT is the failure to conclude outstanding land claim and self-government agreements.
This has caused ongoing political discord, division, as well as uncertainty in the private sector. It has also hindered the ability of governments to engage in effective planning at the territorial level.
For more than 50 years, Canada, joined by the GNWT, has engaged in an adversarial negotiation process that has become an industry. The negotiating claims industry that has been created benefits mainly the lawyers, negotiators and government officials who specialize in negotiations.
What should be an expedited political process has become a grindingly slow bureaucratic process where there is little political pressure to conclude agreements in a timely way, contributing significantly to the situation we are in today.
The NWT is currently stalled and needs to get into political and economic gear. The cabinet and Indigenous leaders need to meet around the leaders table and see if an agreement for an expedited process for the settlement of all outstanding land claim and self-government agreements can be reached in terms of process and guidelines.
There will need to be direct political oversight of every file to ensure content issues are resolved and timelines met. The expedited process used for the negotiation of the transboundary water agreements with Alberta and B.C., or something similar should have applicability.
This critical meeting will create the political conditions for an expedited negotiation process to finally resolve this major political obstacle that has held Northern governments back for far too long. Together, Northern leaders can then pivot to Ottawa to jointly implement the expedited approach.
Political certainty will encourage development, and the huge war chest of claims money realized by settling claims will give all Indigenous governments the capability to become major players in growing the NWT economy.
—Michael Miltenberger is a former longtime MLA and cabinet minister residing in Fort Smith.