Mahsi, Mr. Chairman. I, too, would like to congratulate the Minister on the work he and his staff are doing in the department. I've noticed, especially in my trips to the communities, the benefits of the initiatives that the Minister has done. He has taken steps and devolved responsibilities and authorities from headquarters to regions. He has also moved, physically, person years from headquarters to the regions. I hope that these initiatives are not being ignored by other Ministers. I think these are examples that should be followed by all departments in devolving responsibilities from headquarters to regions, and in turn to communities.

Early in his ministerial career, one of the Minister's initiatives was...I think he used the words "jobs, jobs, jobs." Try to create jobs in the smaller communities, in all our communities. I want to say that creation of jobs is not...Sure, there is a lack of jobs in small communities, but many larger communities -- mine, in particular -- still have a high unemployment rate. There's not a lot of industry going on and there's a need to assist and help in a community such as Inuvik. We have to create and help create and help assist the creation of small businesses. I think it's well-known that if you have 10 small businesses with two or three jobs each, that's 20 to 30 jobs. It think it's been proven that the small business grants and contributions really go a long way in generating these one or two-man businesses.

The investments, as the Minister mentioned, from the Business Development Corporation, a lot of the money has initially gone into replacing buildings. That's a high-cost effort and really is not generating many new jobs. I think the construction has generated some jobs but basically you've just housed the employees that were there before in new buildings and new comforts and, hopefully, it might increase their productivity but I'm not sure if we've got any numbers on that.

One of the issues, I guess, and it's still something that has to be looked at -- the devolution of responsibilities and authorities for contributions and grants may have eased it a bit -- there's still in loans and, I think, in EDA a long waiting period for cheques. I know one time it used to be 90, 180 days, maybe longer. I think that's reduced now to maybe 30 to 45 days or whatever it is but small, $20,000 or $15,000 cheques shouldn't take that long. We have regional finance officers that can issue cheques in the region and something should be done there to help get the monies out quicker.

One area that I didn't see very much of in the Minister's statement was with regard to co-ops. Co-ops are still very valid and going concerns. They're still one of the largest employers of northerners, especially aboriginal people in the north. They are registered businesses and I think they should be given proper credit. They should be supported in whatever way possible.

I still, personally, have trouble with the concept of level I, level II, and level III communities. As I mentioned earlier, the problems of high unemployment, the problems of transportation, all the criteria used when generating economic...In running businesses, it doesn't matter where you are in the north because I think they're all the same to different degrees, and I think we should look at that concept of how we categorize communities. Help should be given where needed on meaningful and employment-generating initiatives. That's all I wanted to say. Mahsi.