N.W.T. mine benefits agreement criticized on 1st day of spring legislature sitting

An agreement the Northwest Territories government signed at a mining conference in Vancouver last week came under fire the first day MLAs were back in the legislature.

• Budget, bills and bargaining: N.W.T. MLAs return to legislature for busiest sitting yet
• Fortune Minerals and N.W.T. gov't sign agreement on mine benefits

The government touted the socio-economic agreement with Fortune Minerals "marks another milestone for the NICO project on the path to becoming Canada's first primary cobalt mine."

The agreement applies to the NICO project, located in Tlicho territory on public lands. The Tlicho government boycotted the signing in Vancouver, with leaders saying thatdespite repeated requests to see the agreement, they weren't shown a copy of it until the day before it was signed.

• Tlicho gov't has 'serious concerns' with Fortune Minerals-N.W.T. agreement

In the legislature on Tuesday, Frame Lake MLA Kevin O'Reilly said the signing "seems to be more of a news event to show how the N.W.T. is open to the mining industry than a serious effort at benefit retention."

O'Reilly said the agreement was an improvement over previous socio-economic agreements, notingit includes northern hiring and spending targets for the closure phase of the mine, a human-resources office based in the N.W.T. and a training and learning centre to be established in Whati.

But he said it contains the same flaw as all of the other socio-economic agreements signed by the government.

"It's basically an unenforceable, best efforts arrangement," said the Yellowknife MLA, noting there are no penalties for missing northern hiring and spending targets. He suggested the company should have been required to make a payment into a training or education fund when it failed to meet the targets.

Industry minister responds

Industry minister Wally Schumann suggested it would be unfair to place all responsibility for meeting hiring targets on mining companies.

"To some degree we are responsible for this because we are responsible for workforce development," he said. "We believe these things are working."

O'Reilly said the government's biggest failure was not having the Tlicho at the table when negotiating an agreement that applies to a mine on Tlicho land. "That's not the way we should be doing business," he said.

Schumann said the government discussed the substance of the agreement with the Tlicho in December and got their feedback on it.

The agreement calls for a 35 per cent northern workforce during construction of the mine, and 60 per cent during operations.

The project is far from being a mine. Fortune has been courting investors since before the project was approved by the environmental review board six years ago.