Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  It's, again, the connections. How can we make those connections happen? How can we already be dialoguing, when we go into a crisis, so that all we're doing is changing tracks and not trying to re-establish relationships? I think that's the most important thing. As I mentioned a couple of times, it's making sure the communication tools are there, making sure there's access to the Internet and cellphone service.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  We definitely have lots of challenges around communication. Some communities have very compromised Wi-Fi—harken back to dial-up. We have lots of challenges with cell coverage. It's getting better, but it does not exist between communities; it exists only within communities, and that in itself creates lots of problems.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I'm afraid I couldn't provide that kind of granular detail. I could certainly research it and get back to the committee.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  The ability to increase our population, and thus increase our eyes on the ground, is an interesting one. It's one that we struggle with all the time. I'm not sure that's entirely what needs to happen. I agree with Professor Huebert that we need to be doing a more efficient job of communicating and knocking down those silos.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes, absolutely, and part of the challenge is we are leaving community governments to sort these issues out on their own and not supporting them in doing those mitigation measures and helping them with hiring an engineer, for example, to come in and do some of those analyses. That's where I really strongly believe we have to embrace this partnership model.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes. I think we have all experienced all the work we do being in silos, whether they're territorial, community or federal. We have to move away from that approach. We have to see this as a collective problem, and we need to work together. We will achieve so much more. We're a small jurisdiction here, and our communities are that much smaller.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Certainly it is an ongoing challenge for us every time we come up against a new risk or a new challenge. The roles and responsibilities are very unclear. We would definitely benefit from additional training, even if all it does is establish relationships beforehand so that people know who they are dealing with, know who they are speaking to, understand the communities, understand the territorial resources, and understand the federal resources better before they go into it.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Finally, I'll just highlight the four things that I found in a 2010 report saying the same things: Use smart military investment; develop a long-term plan to invest in northern infrastructure; make Canada's north the world leader in climate change adaptation; and make partnerships official policy.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  My name is Sara Brown and I represent the NWT Association of Communities. I thank you for this opportunity to speak to you. We represent all 33 communities in the NWT, and as such we are planning to discuss four key areas. First of all, the use of smart military investment is the backbone for building the new north.

Finance committee  Thank you very much. I'll be brief. First of all, I want to make it clear that everybody in the territories is on the front line of climate change. We're seeing lots of evidence of it. It's affecting lots of ways of life and it's going to start affecting infrastructure. The reality is quite different from what you experience here and we are going to need lots of resources in the way of both supports and dollars in order to address it.