Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to assure the Member that I am not greedy. But I do know how to do basic math. The problem is that we have a deficit. We are not balancing our books, so we cannot now go out spending like drunken sailors just because we are projecting some healthy revenues. We have to continue to manage responsibly. Until we have a balanced budget, I cannot see us starting to hand money out and not tax anyone. The government cannot do everything for everybody. We will just run up deficits and that is not acceptable. I will not continue to lead us into a hole. We have to be responsible. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Supplementary, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am glad that the Minister of Finance is working on his math, because my math tells me that this is really not a good revenue option. He is proposing to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to collect very little money.

Mr. Speaker, I propose that this is not just a tax question. Has he thought about those small bed and breakfast operators, most of whom are in his riding?

Let us just think about how this works out in practice. We have to think about a little bed and breakfast operator with four rooms who has to write a cheque to the government every month. They may get $500 in income and they have to write a $50 dollar lousy cheque to the government every month. Has the Minister thought about that, Mr. Speaker?

Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Finance, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Again, I wish to point out to the Member that this is not a tax on the hotel operators. This is a tax on the occupants who use the hotel rooms. A lot of those people are tourists and so on.

Keep in mind, as well, that we are projecting that this is going to give us a net increase of a million dollars. A million dollars is a million dollars.

I sympathize with the small bed and breakfast operators and hotel operators who are trying to run a viable business. I also have a lot of sympathy for small tourist operators who are trying to eke out a living in the tourism industry. I feel sorry for a lot of the people in the small communities who want jobs and there is no opportunity there.

So, Mr. Speaker, I have committed to spend the money that we collect here, the net amount of money, the million dollars, to put that back into tourism. That is going to help a lot of people in the communities and, in fact, even in the large centres.

This is an opportunity to build our tourism industry and I think we can benefit a lot of people. The government cannot do everything by itself, we need to work in partnership and we need to get revenues from other sources. This is not just a tax grab, this is an investment opportunity. This is an opportunity for everybody in the North to benefit. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Supplementary, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think he may be putting back on his sneakers because I do not understand where he is going to get a million dollars in net. Mr. Speaker, in most communities when you travel there, unfortunately the hotels are not filled with tourists from elsewhere. They are filled with government employees.

I know that the tax is not from the operators, and it may be that the visitors who visit do not mind paying $5-$10 to our tax coffer, but he cannot implement this tax without the middle person, so given that the math is so bad and the Minister has just been so....

Pardon me, Ms. Lee. Could you ask the question, please?

And he already said that there is not going to be direct taxation, so my question, Mr. Speaker, is, is he not being really sneaky, and what he is really trying to do? Is he is going to implement this and increase the tax to make it worthwhile? So he is not really looking at five percent, maybe he is looking at 15 percent....

Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Finance, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wish the Member shared the same commitment and support to the tourism industry that I do. This tax will generate for us about $1.1 million by our estimates, and that is based on a five percent hotel tax. We anticipate it will cost roughly $100,000 to administer this from the government's point of view.

That leaves us $1 million, basic math. So we have $1 million to re-invest into tourism, based on our estimates. I am not looking for a 15 percent tax. I said five percent and please do not imply something else, because we are looking at five percent. That is all we have ever said. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Final supplementary, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Obviously he is working from figures and facts that we are not privy to. My question is already in the wake. He could not give us information on how many operators he is talking about, how many bed spaces, or any of those facts. He has not consulted anybody to the fullest extent. Could the Minister provide us with the information that he is working on and would he seriously consider scrapping this really bad idea?

Thank you, Ms. Lee. I am going to remind Members again, that supplementaries should not carry preamble and I will begin to enforce it much more strictly. I have a stopwatch and I know how long you take. So please, question, short, no preamble. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Finance, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My department is working on finalizing the exact number of hotel beds in the Northwest Territories in establishing for more rooms. There are roughly 1,100 to 1,200, plus some new ones being built right now, but we will get more specific information.

Mr. Speaker, the Member just made reference to the fact that there are not many tourists staying in hotels in the small communities. That is what I want to fix. We want more than just government employees staying in those hotels. We want to see tourists in there. But in order to do that, we have to market. We have to provide regional support, and that is what this tax is going to do. This is an investment in tourism. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Item 6, oral questions. The honourable Member for Hay River North, Mr. Paul Delorey.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my question is for Mr. Handley. I was impressed with everything that is coming out in the oil and gas industry and the possibilities for the North. We have heard many, many times, that the diamond industry in the Northwest Territories has done much for the North, but in fact it is all in Yellowknife.

So I am looking forward to oil and gas as being much more beneficial to the Northwest Territories outside of Yellowknife.

-- Applause

One area in the budget speech that kind of caught my eye was you mentioned the creation of four regional positions, petroleum advisor positions. I would like to ask the Minister if he could tell us exactly where these positions are going to be. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Delorey. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Finance, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Right now, one of them is designated for each of the three regions along the valley. One for the Inuvik region, one in the Sahtu, and one in the Deh Cho region. One of the positions, right now, is being designated to work with the Mackenzie Valley planning and development initiative that the Department of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development is undertaking. Initially it will be located in Yellowknife, because that is where the project is being headed out of.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Supplementary, Mr. Delorey.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The position that you marked headquarters, or the one that the Minister has referred to just now, could the Minister tell me if that position is in place right now or is it going to be put in place?

Thank you, Mr. Delorey. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Finance, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The positions are being put in place in the regions. I think the hiring is going right now as we speak, so some of them may actually be in place. The position with the Mackenzie Valley development planning exercise, I believe, is already in place. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Supplementary, Mr. Delorey.