Nunavut premier brings development wish list to the Senate

Nunavut Premier Paul Quassa and Nunavut Senator Dennis Patterson on Parliament Hill yesterday evening, when Quassa appeared before the Senate special committee on the Arctic. (PHOTO BY STEVE DUCHARME)

OTTAWA—Nunavut Premier Paul Quassa arrived at Parliament Hill yesterday with a wish list of projects he’d like to see funded to help fix the territory’s infrastructure shortfalls.

“We can’t do it alone,” Quassa told members of the Senate’s special committee on the Arctic on the evening of Monday, Feb. 26.

“We believe there’s an opportunity for a modern nation-building exercise,” Quassa said, outlining Nunavut’s chronic shortfalls in housing, mental health, addictions treatment, telecommunications, electrical power generation and education.

Quassa said it’s critical for Nunavut to complete ongoing devolution negotiations with the federal government to hand over control of Crown lands in Nunavut, which make up about 80 per cent of the territory’s land base.

The statements by Quassa and Northwest Territories Premier Bob McLeod, who also spoke to the committee that evening, could serve as a primer on Arctic policy for many of the committee’s regular members, who represent constituencies in southern Canada.

“I am encouraged by what seems to be a growing focus on Arctic issues,” Quassa said.

But he criticized Ottawa’s decision to allocate federal funding on a per capita basis, which he said hurts Nunavut because of its small population and huge land mass.

Quassa identified cruise ship tourism as one of Nunavut’s growing economic sectors, but said the ships “are pretty much on their own,” and called for more spending by Ottawa on policing Arctic waters.

And Nunavut’s slow internet and telecommunication system “contributes to a sense of disconnect from northern and southern Canada and further isolates Nunavut from neighbours,” he said.

Federal investment in northern fibre optic cables—possibly piggybacking along a proposed hydroelectric corridor from Manitoba into Nunavut’s Kivalliq region—would “positively impact Nunavut in many ways,” he said.

Quassa also questioned how a developed country like Canada still struggles with outbreaks of tuberculosis. This most recently occurred in Qikiqtarjuaq, where a mobile TB clinic has been deployed in the community.

And a lack of higher education continues to hamper attempts at reaching a representative proportion of Inuit within the Government of Nunavut workforce, the objective of Article 23 of the Nunavut Agreement, he said.

More spending on education is imperative, Quassa said.

But he added that a short list for proposed partnerships between Nunavut Arctic College and southern universities has been recently drafted in consultation with Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. and Nunavut Arctic College.

Some of the institutions appearing on that list include: First Nations University, McGill University, the University of Regina, the University of Prince Edward Island and Carleton University in Ottawa.

No specific academic subjects were identified in the partnership.

In his opening remarks, Quassa did not want to say anything about his government’s new mandate, titled “Turaaqtavut,” announced the same day he appeared before the committee in Ottawa.

The mandate title translates roughly to “where we are aiming to go” in English, Quassa said.

“Although I can’t yet discuss the details of our mandate, I will say we will continue to provide Nunavummiut with the services they need and remain committed to fulfilling our obligations until the Nunavut Agreement,” he told senators.

Bill Morneau, the federal finance minister, will deliver his government’s 2018 federal budget in the House of Commons today at 4 p.m.

“We eagerly await tomorrow’s budget announcement to learn more about what will be invested in Nunavut,” Quassa told the Senate committee.

The Senate passed a motion from former Independent Liberal Senator Charlie Watt to create the special Arctic committee last year.

That came after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, in December 2016, announced his government will create the Arctic Policy Framework to replace the Harper government’s Northern Policy, together with a five-year ban on Arctic oil and gas exploration.

Watt started out as the Arctic committee’s chair, but because of Watt’s intention to resign from the Senate to serve as president of Makivik Corp., Nunavut Senator Dennis Patterson, the deputy chair, ran yesterday’s meeting.