Mr. Chairman, this is the first time that we have had to deal with such a substantial amount in a supplementary appropriation. I have a number of questions here, Mr. Chairman, if I could ask them at this time. I don't know whether the Minister has told the House exactly what the increases here represent so I would like to ask, first of all, to the Minister, what is the increase here of $1.2 million to the Municipal and Community Affairs amount of supplementary appropriation? Could you provide that information here to the committee? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. In the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs, Mr. Chairman, in the water and sewer account there is a shortfall for 1994-95 of $2.022 million. There will be some reimbursements to MACA by the Northwest Territories Housing Corporation in the amount of $491,000. The department has identified $331,000 from within its budget that it can put towards this shortfall which means that there is a shortfall in the department in this particular area of $1.2 million, Mr. Chairman. That is why the motion has been put forward. Unfortunately, this was not discovered until late in the year and we were unable to get it into the supp and get it before the Standing Committee on Finance and, as I advised the standing committee in the House yesterday, we did have knowledge of it and I wanted to make the House aware because otherwise the Minister's department would appear to have overspent by some $1.2 million and this would be a better way to handle the situation. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Changes to the subsidy program were discussed in committee of the whole in April 1994 and, at that time, the Minister of Municipal of Community and Affairs suggested that the additional cost to the government would be about $201,000. The total amount originally budgeted for the subsidy program in 1994-95 main estimates was $7.011 million. This was already increased to $8.436 million and this amendment will increase it by a further $1.531 million, of which $1.2 million is to be supplementary funding making the total new figure of $9.967 million. This is an increase of almost $3 million which is about 40 percent of the original budgeted figure. Can the Minister explain how much of that increase is due to the changes in the subsidy

program, and how much is due to other factors such as new house construction, sale of staff and NWT Housing Corporation housing, and increased per capita consumption and so on? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The combined effects of various factors are affecting these subsidy payments, Mr. Chairman. They include new private customers who qualify for subsidized rates, including home ownership housing through NWTHC, GNWT and NWTHC houses sold to occupants or to the private sector, new private housing units excluding home ownership and GNWT sold units, and new commercial customers or buildings. There have also been increases in water consumption for existing private customers due, we believe, to increase in per capita consumption which is, we believe, due to the quality of housing and plumbing; there is more water used in appliances, increasing the size of water tanks, changes in user habits et cetera; population growth, which we know is all across the Northwest Territories; and, increases in the level of commercial activity. I believe Mr. Antoine mentioned that there have also been increases in economic rates for the water and sewage services.

Mr. Chairman, I think his specific question was how much of that is due to the increase in economic rate, and we believe that to be $140,000. The additional subsidy payment for 1994-95 was due to the delay in implementing the rate increases in the water and sewer area, Mr. Chairman. That was $142,000. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Does the Department of Municipal and Community Affairs communicate with the NWT Housing Corporation regarding the new houses that have been constructed by the corporation and put into use? This is in order that the department can properly plan for increased consumption. If the Minister could give me some information on that. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, yes, there is communication between Municipal and Community Affairs with regard to new home ownership units through the Housing Corporation, also with regard to their public housing units and there's also DPW talking to MACA about the same sort of thing because they are selling houses as well.

The difficulty is we really don't know what the consumption is going to be and what the progress is going to be on those particular units. And I will admit that we knew going into this particular fiscal year that the department was experiencing a shortfall in this area which has been made up for in the budget that's now before the House, Mr. Chairman.

I think the department is doing as good as it can to keep up with the changes that are occurring across the territories and it's working closely with the municipal governments to make sure there's good communication; but I think always in these cases, we're going to be down to the last quarter before we know exactly what the impacts are, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

Why did the department not plan adequately, Mr. Chairman, for increased consumption due to the sale of staff housing and the new houses that were constructed? Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, we did make some plans on the sale of staff housing, and we made some projections both on the revenue side and also on the impact to departments side and we did make some adjustments to the department. We also adjusted the department because there was a new water and sewer rate coming into effect and we, I think, took away over $300,000 from them in anticipation of those new rates. But we delayed the increase in rates. The other thing is that we really don't know when those houses are going to be sold. DPW can say we have this number of units that have had interest expressed in, but by the time the ink is dry on the paper and the mortgages are in place and so on, we really don't know when those sales are going to take place or, in fact, if the whole number of sales are going to take place.

There were a number of factors that were influencing this particular area this year, Mr. Chairman, and made it difficult for the department to accurately forecast. Thank you.

Again, Mr. Chairman, I think the consumption of water...A lot of the new units in the north have water tanks and the consumption, perhaps, may have gone up with the new construction, the larger water tanks and so forth. Did the department anticipate this in the budgeting process since it appeared to be a factor in a dramatic increase in the subsidy? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, that's another difficult one because public health workers are out there encouraging cleanliness and encouraging people to use more water. And we know that when people do have access to good, clean water and hot water, that they do use more of it. The only thing that seems to affect the consumption of water in the Northwest Territories is price, Mr. Chairman. As the price goes up, people are much more frugal with the wastage of water.

Again, it's something that is anticipated -- because we know that the increase does occur when it becomes more available -- but something that's really hard to predict, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

Can the Minister explain to us how changes in the economic rates for water and sewage service have affected the amount of this subsidy? Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, as the economic rates increase so does the draw down on the subsidy. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.