Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The fact is that they are a task within a department. While they are an agency of this government, you cannot isolate Arctic College from its accountability or the expenditures in this House. You cannot dissociate the Minister's responsibility for the resources that you vote for that institution. That has been the problem that has existed in this country, right across Canada, for post-secondary institutions. It is a very big discussion issue that is resulting in some very serious questions about how post-secondary institutions operate in isolation, in many respects, from government with no accountability for the public funds that are allocated to them. I don't disagree with the concept of independence, but independence without accountability is a very significant risk that we take that one should be cautious about.

The other point is that, in the final analysis, when we get to the strategy and approve the strategy for Arctic College, it may be that many of the questions the honourable Member is raising may be better addressed in that document and upon the approval of that document, but I would be very careful about the concept of an absolutely independent body of authority with the Arctic College board because they, in the end, have to be accountable here. It is a very significant issue across the country, as I pointed out.

No, I didn't say anything about him not reading the page. I said clearly that, you have to remember that Arctic College is now a task and it has to be seen as being part of the accountability. It is not simply an independent board operating on its own. We have to be very careful about that issue. It is the same and no different than the question of divisional boards of education. There has to be some accountability for the resources. That was just generally what I was saying earlier.

We do have a board of governors for Arctic College, if that is what the honourable Member is asking. Whether or not I appoint them, yes.

I guess that is no different than school boards being set up. For instance, we set up school boards to manage the schools on our behalf. We generally give the direction, lay out the direction to those boards. We let them manage the institutions. The Arctic College board of governors is generally now considered to be in that context. They still have the right to raise money through third-party arrangements. That is the basis upon which they have been established. It is not an institution for which they are not accountable for public funds. I think that is a bit of a problem across the country, where you have institutions off on their own expending public money with no accountability to the Minister or to the Assembly.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Arctic College board has always reported to the Minister. That is not a change. The fact is that post-secondary programming and the Arctic College board is now a task in culture and careers. We are placing them in a position where they are now accountable. They are not independent. They are accountable for publicly-expended resources. If the honourable Member doesn't want that to happen, that is a different issue. My direction, in reorganizing the department, is to make them publicly accountable, as they should be, to the Minister because that is the basis on which their act was originally set up.

The other thing is that the honourable Member indicates that all the third-party arrangements have been worked out simply through Arctic College. Not all of them have been worked out through Arctic College. The department has been involved in coming up with some of those third-party arrangements. In other words, it is basically money interminably going around in circles. We are basically trying to say that there has to be an accountability. That does not mean that we have changed any legislation. We have not changed any legislation to suggest that the Arctic College board should not be able to raise their own funds. I would, in fact, encourage that. But, at the same time, there should be some accountability. They should not be so independent that they're not publicly accountable to the Minister. If the suggestion is that, then we have to change the legislation to give them absolute independence so they're not accountable to the Minister. My suggestion to you is that the best way to approach this is to put them in a situation where they are accountable through a section of the department.

I don't know whether Mr. Ningark has something to say, but I was going to move that we report progress.

I would be willing to defer to Mr. Ningark. If he nods his head, I will defer to him and he can ask his question, otherwise, I move that we report progress. Okay, Mr. Chairman, I move that we report progress. Thank you.

I will call the House back to order. Item 19, report of committee of the whole. Member for Yellowknife South, Mr. Whitford.