Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as everybody knows, we have been discussing the Agenda for the New North since the new year and in this agenda we are dealing with the realities that are facing us. We are looking at the bigger picture, not necessarily only at education, but all the different programs and services that all need additional funding. We have a fiscal arrangement with the federal government right now that provides us $700 million a year. From there, each department historically is allocated their share to run the programs and services of the department. We realize that we have a limited amount of dollars, limited opportunities to raise our own revenue, but we have to look at that. In the Agenda for the New North, we address that. We look at the fiscal reality of the day and say that, okay, we know 70 percent of our budget goes to social programs, including education. There is a tremendous amount of pressure there to enforce growth and there are demands on our existing budget.
What do we do about it? In the agenda we are saying that we have to look at trying to generate our own revenue, which is very difficult to do with the type of formula we have. We have to try to make arrangements with the federal government to change the tax window, so we can grab more of the percentage of the new dollar that we generate. At the same time, we are also trying to create an environment here in the north with all the different groups that are involved in the north about sharing control of our own resources. That is the direction that this government is taking in trying to create an opportunity there where we could generate perhaps additional revenue to address the real pressing problems we have in that fiscal arrangement.
That is the direction we are going, and every time I travel to different communities and meet with different chiefs and different mayors, village, town and city councils, we are addressing this issue on a much broader scale. That is where we see some possible new arrangements being made with the federal government. Perhaps what the honourable Members could do is help us express our concern about our present situation. We are okay for now, but down the road in about a year or two we are going to be in a situation where we have to start perhaps looking at deficits and so forth. We do not want to do that. We are talking about this new agenda today so that perhaps things will evolve over the next year or so, so we will be able to have a bigger tax window and our fiscal policy, perhaps will be further down the line, and the Northern Accord and the whole question of devolution. Thank you.