Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, at the Department of Transportation we have a number of major projects that we have approved every year in our budget. Some of these contracts we handle ourselves, mainly the highway contracts. But the other contracts like the airport terminal building is handled by the Department of Public Works and Services and their tendering processes. But in the highway construction portion of the department, we do not have that many contracts that were issued last year. On the major part of it, we just had two. The amount of northern employment which we are trying to aim for is as high a northern employment content, as possible. We aim for about 95 percent for northern employment on all future highway construction and operation contracts. This department is attempting to implement certain measures to try to reach that goal.
Just for statistics, Mr. Speaker, this past year we had two contracts on a major section and the northern content for that one had 62 percent northern content. The other one was 51 percent northern content. However, it is not that high of a content, but we try everything we can to aim for as high a northern content, and on an ongoing basis, we could commit to providing regular reports to the Member and to this House as we move along in trying to achieve our objectives of 95 percent northern employment on all future highway construction operations. Thank you.