Premiers from all three territories met in Yellowknife and Hay River this week to discuss shared priorities, including ensuring northerners benefit from planned defence investments.
NWT Premier RJ Simpson hosted the annual Northern Premiers’ Forum in the NWT capital and his home town with Yukon Premier Currie Dixon and Nunavut Premier John Main.
“The point of these meetings is to ensure that as northerners we’re well aware of what’s going on in each other’s territories,” Simpson told reporters on Thursday.
“We figure out how we can work together and how we can use our collective voices to advance the interests of the North.”
Simpson said he has learned that when the territories go to Ottawa with a unified voice, “we get the attention and we get the results.”
Advertisement.
Advertisement.
“We have different approaches to shared problems and that’s where gatherings like this can be so valuable,” Main added.
Dixon said the forum is part of ongoing conversations between the territories and will ensure the northern premiers are “on the same page” when they attend upcoming meetings with other Canadian premiers and the prime minister.
Topics the premiers said they discussed this week included Arctic security and sovereignty, major projects, policing, immigration and workforce development, healthcare, early learning and childcare, Indigenous language revitalization, sports infrastructure, and Jordan’s Principle and the Inuit Child First Initiative.
Federal decisions ‘cannot be imposed’ on the North
One area of focus the premiers highlighted was ensuring that northerners have a say in and benefit from federal and defence investments in the North.
Advertisement.
Advertisement.
“Arctic security and sovereignty can’t be something that’s imposed, approaches to it cannot be imposed on us from Ottawa,” Main said.
“The approaches need to be done in consultation and close collaboration with people who live in the North, including Indigenous representatives.”
Simpson said he wants to ensure “mistakes of the past” are not repeated, saying previous investments saw a separation between defence infrastructure and communities. He said premiers are working to ensure the North capitalizes on the federal government’s current talk of supporting dual-use infrastructure.
Earlier this week, the federal government announced the Mackenzie Valley Highway and Grays Bay Port and Road had advanced on the path toward being declared “projects of national interest,” which would fast track their approval.
The northern premiers also discussed the Arctic offshore moratorium on oil and gas licensing as something that was imposed on the territories. Simpson said the NWT government was given little notice when the moratorium was last extended for five years, in 2023.
“I would like to see that lifted,” he said, adding that Inuvialuit and other northerners need to have a say in any development that occurs in the region.
“It’s an economic opportunity that we have here in the territory.”
Dixon said of “significant interest” in the Yukon is the development of energy infrastructure to meet growing demand, something he noted is also an issue in the NWT and Nunavut.
Advertisement.
Advertisement.
“We’re optimistic about the future when it comes to that issue,” he said, pointing to the federal government’s new electricity strategy, which promises to double Canada’s electricity supply by 2050.
Main said he hopes a federal assessment of healthcare services and infrastructure in the North will “lead to real tangible impacts.”
“We need support, we need partners and we have a huge infrastructure gap that’s leading to over reliance on medical travel,” he said. “If we can deliver services closer to home, it could benefit the territory in terms of our fiscal resources and also benefit patients and communities.”
The premiers on Thursday signed a renewed northern cooperation accord, a five-year agreement that serves as the basis for cooperation and information sharing between the territories on areas of mutual interest.
The 2026 Northern Premiers Forum ended with a community fish fry at the Fisherman’s Wharf.
Dixon and Main said this was their first time visiting Hay River and Kátł’odeeche First Nation.
“It’s a pleasure to be here and to experience the hospitality of the community here,” Dixon said.
Next year’s forum is set to take place in Nunavut.
