Mr. Chairman, what we're dealing with is the Power Corporation's budget. What I plan to do is present a paper that would contain some of the detailed questions on how we are going to proceed. This would be available for full debate at another time. It would be a document that Members will have adequate time to absorb the information and ask those questions. However, it's really not connected with the present budget at this time. Thank you.

The Power Corporation used a large amount of capital do a substantial study on the possibility of a transmission line from Hay River to Yellowknife. How much did that cost?

The cost of that study was $1.013 million.

How many aboriginal people have you hired in your Hay River district office, either as casual or permanent PYs?

I don't have the statistics with me for the aboriginal employment at the Hay River office. We follow the government's affirmative action program, and hire all qualified affirmative action candidates who apply for positions.

I realize the difficulty right now is with regard to qualifications. You hire so many qualified people that you really don't have any openings for people who are interested in that field, so they can be hired. There was a situation in my constituency where some students were interested, but I guess the preference would be for college or university students, as opposed to local people. I brought this up and the Minister responded by saying that overall, under affirmative action, there are about 31 per cent aboriginal people in the Power Corporation. But, that's everybody, including power plant operators and aboriginal people in the field.

If you were to get the statistics for the Power Corporation's headquarters, I don't think they have anything to be proud about with their affirmative action program. I wanted to express that concern. And if they don't have the statistics, I would be interested in getting them. If you are looking at the overall operation, I can see a large percentage hired under the affirmative action program. But, I'm more interested in finding out what the numbers are in the headquarters.

Mr. Chairman, I provided those statistics at one time. The Member is very correct. In the communities, we've been able to support and maintain affirmative action people who are there on their own merit because they do have the qualifications. The corporation fully realizes that the availability of candidates for the more technical positions could be greater, these trained candidates are in our education system. One of the things I expressed to the Member when he asked the question is that if there are any specific people who are interested, I talked to the chairman of the board and we would be interested in knowing about them, and maybe we could arrange career path development, or something that would help. These people are not coming forward. I don't know if we can say that the Power Corporation is at fault, I think we all have to take that responsibility.

I again offer that opening to the Member. If there is someone specific, who doesn't quite have the qualifications, but is interested, the chairman of the board has made a commitment. If we have those names, we will have a talk with them and try to get them in a program to bring them up to the technical standards that are required. I just want to make sure you know that the door is not closed. The door is open. I think we have to take that approach with this corporation because there are highly technical requirements for some of the jobs, particularly in engineering and for some of the positions in headquarters. Those positions are generally responsible for more than just the community, but for the overall operations.

I just want to make sure that invitation is open. If there is someone who is interested, we should take special interest in that individual, to try to help them along. Thank you.

I used to work with NCPC at one time, and so did you, Mr. Chairman. A lot of the technical tasks that are referred to are out in the field, as opposed to what goes on in

the offices. When the Minister refers to the technical work, I'm not too sure what is so technical about operating computers, giving out bills, et cetera. If this work is substantially technical, perhaps you might be able to enlighten me. I still recall working back then -- and I won't tell you the year -- doing banks, running transmission lines and everything else. To do those things was quite easy, once you knew the schematics, or the blueprints.

Perhaps the Minister might enlighten me on what is so technical about the operation in Hay River that it requires specialized training and career path direction. If my memory serves me correctly, the two individuals I referred to didn't get past the receptionist. They were discouraged from even considering filling out an application because they were told that the positions were highly technical and required college or university students, and not just students who just completed grade 12.

Mr. Chairman, when the Member was discussing this issue, I thought he was referring to the more senior positions in the corporation in Hay River. I'll just give you an example. The one affirmative action employee we have there got his position on his own merit. This person started off with the Power Corporation in Inuvik many, many years ago. Mr. Bill Bourque, who is an aboriginal person, is the superintendent for transmission and distribution. He has worked long and hard to get to where he is at today. It has taken him a great number of years to get the necessary qualifications to be able to run that particular department. We are talking about a very technical part of the program. If there are some difficulties with a secretary...I thought the Member was really talking about the more senior positions in the Power Corporation. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, the only point I am trying to make is that, right now, the people who are being hired are not aboriginal. It has to do with whether you know the people at headquarters. I was only trying to make that point.

In November of 1993, there were 106 individuals who were eligible for affirmative action status out of the 262 employees. That is being categorized. It doesn't mean that they were hired because they were aboriginal or whatever it was. They were hired, but they fit in the category. Fifty-nine of those people were indigenous aboriginal employees. Like the Member said, many of these people are out in the field. Forty-four were indigenous non-aboriginal employees, that means long-term and non-aboriginal people. One of them was a resident disabled employee and two were resident women in a non-traditional occupation. The total affirmative action employees were 106. I recognize the Member's concern, but I think that if there was an issue and a situation where the Member feels that a person was not given due consideration, I would like to know about that. Thank you.

Just for the record, Mr. Chairman, I did write to the Premier about those two individuals.