Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Lafferty.

We are dealing with the supplementary appropriation. Please stick within the bill.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Chairman, we will continue through Municipal and Community Affairs to monitor all of the financial situations for all communities. Each one of them has some uniqueness about it. The actions to correct any deficits would have to be based on the factors unique to that community. But definitely, every community will continue to be monitored carefully. If there is a need for assistance in revising their budgets or in developing new operating plans, we will help them with that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Bell.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will not belabour this point, but I just picked up on a couple of things that the Finance Minister said. We were discussing Fort Simpson in particular, and he indicated that there is a debt recovery plan in place, an operation reduction plan in place, that Municipal and Community Affairs has been meeting with the municipality through July and August. He indicated that this shows that Municipal and Community Affairs follows through. I am wondering if he is aware as to how many years of the last five years Fort Simpson has run a deficit? Because I think that this speaks to how well Municipal and Community Affairs follows through.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Chairman, I do not have information on how many years they have run deficits in the past five years. I do not know if the Minister responsible for Municipal and Community Affairs has that with him here. I do not know.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Bell.

Thank you. Can I ask the Municipal and Community Affairs Minister if this is a unique occurrence and in fact if he is aware if this is the first time that Simpson has run a deficit in the last five years?

Mr. Allen.

Mr. Chairman, I understand that they have been in a deficit for the last several years; but again, since I am relatively new to this portfolio, I have been trying to help them to work out a recovery plan. We continue to proceed in that area. Thank you.

The Minister also indicated that he hopes in situations like this, that there will be relief in the new formula. Maybe the Municipal and Community Affairs Minister can indicate if he thinks the new formula will provide relief for Fort Simpson in the area of this deficit?

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Chairman, I do not think that we can get into discussing budgets for specific communities next year. As I said, through Municipal and Community Affairs, we are working on a new financing formula. To start giving information on things that are being projected for next year's budget I think is really reaching into the next fiscal year.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. I would like to remind Members you should be sticking to the context of the bill, supplementary appropriation. Do you agree with these figures, Mr. Bell?

Thank you. We are trying to stick to this particular issue, but I think that you can see with the questions that Mr. Nitah and Mr. Lafferty have asked, they are simply asking the questions because the Minister indicated that the new financing arrangement, the new formula, will provide relief to some of these municipalities in trouble.

I am not asking for specific details. I am just asking if he believes that the formula is going to provide relief to Simpson.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Handley, I do not know if you would have that information to allow you to comment on it.

Mr. Chairman, like I said, this is one of the problems that we ran into early in the life of this new government. We have been working on this one. The Member may not be asking for specific information, but I am not sure how he defines that because he is asking for information on Fort Simpson. I think asking about how much money is going to go toward helping Fort Simpson with their situation is getting pretty specific.

I think that is getting into our budget when we get to that kind of detail. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Bell.

Thank you. I am sorry for asking that question. It is clearly not something that we are going to deal with here today.

Can the Minister tell me what he meant when he said, we hope that there will be relief for some of these communities that are in trouble in the new formula? I was wondering if he could explain what he means by relief in the new formula for these communities.