Mahsi. This will impact over 8,000 customers living mainly around the Great Slave Lake area. The tax will mean that each customer will have to pay an average of about $2 per month on their electricity bill, or about $24 per year. This increase is on top of the charges already imposed to cover the low-water surcharge and the upcoming general rate increase proposed by the Northwest Territories Power Corporation.

Mr. Speaker, my concern is that, at first glance, these don't seem like large increases. But add them up, and the accumulated impact is large. The majority of these revenues from the tax increases will go directly to the federal government to help pay off the deficit. So, even though it may seem like the federal budget was relatively harmless to the average northerner, the federal government continually picks away at our incomes by increasing taxes on goods and services and on industry which we, in the Northwest Territories, consider essential for our survival: gasoline, air travel and electricity. Mahsi.

---Applause