MR. SPEAKER: The hon. Member for the District of Port de Grave.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: Hear, hear!

MR. BUTLER: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker.

I stand today and I say to my hon. colleague from Lake Melville: He has no worries; this is original. It contains names from just about every district in this Province.

Mr. Speaker, I want to read the prayer of the petition again:

WHEREAS we the people of Newfoundland and Labrador have always built cabins or tilts away from our homes for hunting, fishing, berry picking or just spending time up in the country, or places around our shores, sometimes just to get away from the stress of everyday living; and

WHEREAS your government has come down hard on the thousands of cabin and trailer owners that are out on our land with eviction notices and forcing them to move without providing them with an alternative; and

WHEREAS Kruger has timber rights to approximately one-third of all forested land on the Island and is refusing the vast majority of applications for cabin development;

WHEREUPON your petitioners call upon all Members of the House of Assembly to urge government to have compassion on the citizens of this fair Province and allow them the right to enjoy what is rightfully ours. We were born on this land and should have the right to enjoy it. As in duty bound your petitioners will ever pray.

Mr. Speaker, I have here today some 300 names of constituents from the Towns of Glenwood, Appleton, Bunyan’s Cove, Port Blandford, Charlottetown, Canning’s Cove, Lethbridge and Bloomfield. Mr. Speaker, all those people are asking is that government will reconsider their decision that they have taken this past year.

Government, originally, has not typically targeted gravel pit campers for contravening the Province’s Lands Act due to the cultural uniqueness and historical meaning of the practice for the people of this Island. All they are asking, Mr. Speaker, they are asking not only me by presenting this petition, they are asking each and every member in this hon. House, through you, Mr. Speaker, that government will reconsider their decision, sit down with them and consult with them. What they are saying is this has been a right that they have enjoyed for forty or fifty years, and I relayed many stories last week that are coming in each and every day.

What these people are asking government is to have another look at this decision. Do not just come and put a notice on our cabins or our trailers and say: Look, if you do not move them within sixty days they are going to be destroyed or burned or towed away. What they are asking: Sit down with us prior to that. We know what happened in some areas of the Province. We know that there are issues that have been resolved to the satisfaction of all.

So, Mr. Speaker, I ask the House of Assembly, through you, that government will reconsider this and listen to the plight of all those people throughout the Province when it comes to what they believe is their rightful decision to be able to enjoy the great outdoors.