Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As I said, so we are about $249 million away from having a highway of national standards. We are spending this year, on the Highway No. 3 portion only, $6 million. It is going to take an awfully long time to attain national standards on that highway. I am hoping that the Minister will make sure that he really works to bring the story to his colleagues across Canada to demonstrate that our need is significant. I have no doubt that there are similar needs, particularly in northern parts of provinces and the other northern territories. Perhaps, not only should we be lobbying for a significant portion of the $600 million, but I would like to hear that the Minister will work with other transportation Ministers to put on the table for First Ministers meetings the issue of the National Highway Program and whether or not the monies are adequate for that. I think we need to see an awful lot more than $600 million.

This money typically turns into construction jobs that Northerners can fill, or people, wherever the money is being spent. This is an important economic initiative and I would like to see its profile raised. Will the Minister commit to working with his colleagues across Canada to do that?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As a Minister, I have committed to that already in the House, but I can reaffirm that at this point. Just for the information of the Members, Mr. Chairman, what we see to complete Highway No. 3 reconstruction, is a $66 million figure out of the $249 million. We suggested to the feds that we would cost-share that with them at $33 million apiece, and we would consider that our share of the $600 million highway infrastructure money. It works out to 5.5 percent, that we would be getting out of the $600 million. In my recent meeting with Minister David Collenette, he gave me strong suggestions that the formula may not be necessarily based on per capita per kilometre, but rather on needs.

Because our highways are the only highways left out of the national highway system that is in need of hard top, we definitely qualify in the need category. He also suggested that he will be working towards putting another $1.2 billion in that program. By the time it comes into play, there might be $1.8 billion in that National Highway Infrastructure Program. Our percentage of that may, in fact, be what we need to complete Highway No. 3. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I know from a few years of watching the Minister when he was a Member of the House, particularly on the Ordinary Member's side, that he had a reputation for being tenacious. Some would say like a dog with a bone with some meat on it. I would encourage the Minister to adopt that same tenacity that we used to see in here when he goes after the feds on this issue, because we really need to see that money. I do not see any way to pull the money out of thin air or another area of our budget. I am hoping that he will really go after the feds and make sure that we get our fair share of the federal dollars and that it happens fairly soon. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the comment. I think that what I am trying to do here is to avoid giving people the wrong impression that we may, in fact, be receiving this funding. I really cannot put words in the federal Minister's mouth. However, I did leave quite optimistic that we were going to get more than our share of that funding. He was very supportive of developing the roads outside of rural areas, and particularly in the North. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. One other area that I hope the Minister will follow up on. I remember reading a speech that Minister Nault, the Minister responsible for DIAND, made in which he made it sound like his department was prepared to invest in road infrastructure if there were significant community involvement. I would hope that the Minister would work to try and bring the communities at either end of that stretch of highway into the fold and see about making an approach to the Minister to see if there might not be a few dollars that we might see from DIAND to put into this highway.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the department received a lot of support from the communities through our committees that we had established in order to address our Northwest Territories Highway Strategy. In meeting with the communities up and down the valley, plus in the North Slave, there was strong support for highway systems and development of highways. Even from the communities' perspectives in terms of the communities' abilities to get involved and construct their portion of the highway, rather than the highway being constructed from one end working to the other, the suggestion all along the valley that the construction would take place in the areas of the communities. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am sure that the Minister knows the gist of my comments that are coming second time around. It is not going to be unique. I have two issues I would just like to touch on. One is Highway No. 5, and the other is access to the Slave geological province. Mr. Chairman, it would be remotely heartening if Highway No. 5 even got on the capital plan, knowing how capital plans change from year to year. Except for prior year's cost, where there was some money spent a number of years back. I know the Minister's situation with finances, but I want to very clearly put it on the record that it still is a concern for Fort Smith and the South Slave. While my colleague Mr. Dent says they are only spending $6 million on Highway No. 3, we would be tickled pink to get $300,000 per year to get some work done. If Mr. Dent is willing to share that, I would be more than willing to support the Minister moving $300,000 a year to Highway No. 5.

The other issue is the issue of access to the Slave geological province. I am interested to know if there is a position by the department and government as to which route they are interested in taking? It seems to me there are quiet improvements to Highway No. 4, or Ingraham Trail, and it is going to reach the point where there is so much money invested that the government will say that we are committed to this particular route because we have invested so much money. Whereas I know that the people in the North Slave and the Dogrib region are very interested in having a road through their territory that would hook up all their communities as well as provide access to the mines, it would be there a long time after the mines closed down, giving us a significant added benefit of having a number of communities on all weather road access.

So those are my two issues. I do want to acknowledge the commitment and upgrade that is going on to the airport terminal in Fort Smith. It is much appreciated. When the Minister of Transportation hits the lotto for highways, we will be there with our little cap in hand, looking for a few shekels to put towards Highway No. 5 chip-sealing. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I sympathize with the Member, in that his highway is not being addressed at this point in time with chip sealing. I am optimistic that we are going to find some funding in the near future that we could use towards expanding our capital. I am also encouraged by the report from the committee that they do not feel that this department should bear any more cuts in our capital programs because we are, in fact, starting to suffer as to our ability to maintain what we have and bring it up to national standards.

In the past, Highway No. 5 was addressed with some hard topping, as the funding was available. It is just unfortunate that the funding is very reduced now. Remarkably, as I have been told, up to 50 percent reductions in the last four to eight years. We are, in fact, barely operating as a department in our ability to bring our existing highways up to standards. We definitely need new funding sources.

As far as the Slave geological province and whether or not Highway No. 4 will become part of the resources as suggested, we have no decisions on that yet. It is included in the Northwest Territories Highway Strategy and that has not been accepted or presented to Cabinet yet. We are expecting that sometime this fall, when the department will have all the information in from the committees and from the different areas. There have been no decisions made yet at this point, where the highway will take off towards the Slave geological province. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have some general comments with regard to the department, specifically with Highway No. 3, and I appreciate that the Minister is looking for additional funding and is optimistic that we may soon see a larger portion or, at least a portion of what would be $1.8 billion, instead of a reduced amount for highway infrastructure. That is good news. I think we sorely need it.

I am, obviously, most familiar with the problems surrounding Highway No. 3, and that is the highway that I am most concerned about. There are two real issues for me and my constituents. The first one has to be safety. I have driven that road many times in the past. Many of my constituents also drive the road. I feel that it is not safe. Obviously, it is not up to national standards. I do not even think that is a question in anybody's mind, but after bad weather conditions, I think it is downright treacherous.

I think it is only a matter of time before we see further accidents on the road and that is terrible. I think we have to do whatever we can to prevent that. Given that, I understand that this government does not have any more money to put towards roads and the money is going to have to come from the federal government. We have to do whatever we can to lobby the federal government, on whatever basis necessary to get some more money to upgrade the infrastructure we now have.

I think the argument with the federal government is going to be that we do not want to put a price on safety and we do not think governments can put a price on safety, but we see it all the time. Governments do. The federal government has and will continue to do that. Obviously, if cost was no object, we would have our road and it would be safe. So there is a price, but I think we have to argue to the federal government that tourism is suffering as a result of the condition of that road, as is industry. I think that that is what they are very concerned about. Right now, they get all the royalties from all the mineral development in the North and obviously it is going to be very lucrative in the future. I think they should be interested in ensuring that road is up to standard so that it can be effectively used by industry. That is sort of backwards logic. We would like to see control and devolution of the authority and get the resources ourselves, but in the meanwhile, I think we have to lobby them hard in this area and explain that industry will suffer as a result of that road.

In one of the accidents last year where a tank truck flipped off the road, there was some indication that the driver was sort of forced off the road, or had to go off the road as he passed another truck in that area. And also some discussion that at certain points in that road, two semi-trailer trucks cannot actually physically meet without one of them going off the road. That is a scary thing to think about. If that indeed is true, then that is something that we have to look at immediately, because I think the results of two trucks meeting at a point in that road, where it is impossible for them to pass, could be catastrophic. I think that has to be immediately addressed.

So, although I do not believe we can put a price on safety, I believe the reality is that the government will. I would like to see them move quickly to spend some money to upgrade all of our roads, but certainly the ones that will affect industry are going to get the attention first, and I think that that is a reality.

With the department's action this last year to lower the speed limit to 70 km per hour on the road, I think that is an indication that they understood the conditions of the road were brutal. This was an attempt to address the safety issue. There were some people who suggested that maybe they would not address safety issues because people would then be motivated to pass these larger vehicles on what is a treacherous road certainly to pass on.

So I think the government had the best intentions. I am not sure what the verdict was. I guess there were no serious accidents, so we can take it to mean it was effective.

I do not know if that is a solution in the future. I do not know if we need to lower the speed on development and lower the speed for tourists and other things. I think we need to fix the road and I know the Minister will continue to lobby hard to get us the money we need and I want to urge him to continue in that manner. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, in my opening comments, I referred to the amount of money that we asked for, for operations and maintenance. We believe that this funding will allow us to address any operations and maintenance needs that are identified on the existing highways and that includes increased traffic for oil and gas development or mining development. The demands they put on the highway results in us having to do further maintenance.

Relative to Highway No. 3, we may in fact have to do more maintenance on this highway, due to the truck traffic, while we are going through the process of reconstructing. So over the years, we may have to increase our maintenance cost on this particular stretch of highway, but we would not have the capability of addressing any needs that are identified on the highway to allow for safe passage on those highways.

My department has advised me over the last couple of days that there is nowhere on Highway No. 3 where two trucks cannot pass safely. The measurements we have taken are the minimum measurements. Two or three sections on that highway are eight metres. That is the minimum standard for the travel portion of the highway. This does not count shoulders.

Now, if we get areas that are below the standard, we would take steps to bring it back up while we are waiting for the reconstruction program to catch up. We definitely can say that we do not have an area on Highway No. 3 where two trucks cannot safely pass.

As far as our ability to address the needs on any of the highway systems, it is basically the same thing, Mr. Chairman. All of our highways are being impacted by more and more traffic on these highways and weather conditions that take their toll. We cannot always catch up right away to respond to weather conditions that have created potholes, but that is to be expected.

In particular, if the highways are calcium, they are soft and are more subject to rain. They are also slippery. It is at those times that the driving conditions are no longer safe, if you go at speeds that you cannot control the vehicles. Therefore, we always fall back on the saying that your speed should be limited by your ability to control the vehicle, subject to the condition of the highway that you are driving on. It is not based on what is posted. It is based on your ability to control the vehicle in the conditions that you are experiencing.

So we keep telling the public that you have to adjust your speed. In the case of last winter, where we found it may be a need to reduce the speed of the trucks, this was in response to the amount of truck traffic, plus people complaining that they were, in fact, having problems navigating the highways with the speed of the trucks. So we put speed limits in place for trucks. These are measures that we will take in order to keep highways passable and safe.

At this point in time, we have not had to shut any highways down, but that is not to say that we will not do it if we feel they are not safe and passable. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you. I thank the Minister for that response. I do have a bit of a follow up.

At kilometre 55 in the road, roughly half way between here and Rae, the road winds a bit and there is water on both sides of the roads. It has been suggested to me by several constituents in the past and people in industry that at certain times in the last couple of years, because of weather conditions as Mr. Steen alluded to, the road does tend to erode at the shoulders. There have been times when two trailer trucks could not pass at certain points in that road. I am wondering if the Minister can tell me, to his knowledge, that at anytime in the last couple of years, have there been impassable parts and stretches of that road for two semis to meet, which would basically cause an accident regardless of whether they were going five kilometres per hour or 105 kilometres per hour? Thank you.