Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the Member is correct in that we have a lot more highway than solely the kilometres of Highway No. 3. We have 2,200 kilometres of highway that we have to maintain. I think, as the committee goes through the budget, you will see where we are addressing our dollars to try and spread them out over all the 2,200 kilometres of highway, plus our winter roads.
You are going to see where we have addressed money for Highway No. 3, Highway No. 1, Highway No. 7, and Highway No. 8. Now, you will also see in there where we have addressed dollars towards a winter road bridge at Ochre River in an attempt to extend the winter road season.
I think it is important, Mr. Chairman, that I point out that we do not believe we are cutting ourselves short on maintenance dollars. We believe we have allowed each region to have sufficient funds to carry out their maintenance. Where we are short of money is for reconstruction, bringing highways up to standards and for hard topping or chip-sealing.
As a department, we have been attempting to do between 15 and 20 kilometres of reconstruction per year. This includes some reconstruction on Highway No. 8. Even this year, even though we had to cut back our capital, we still kept $2 million for Highway No. 8 reconstruction programs. That includes the bridge. Those are the things I mentioned in my opening comments.
In reference to whether or not the department will be able to find the dollars to meet the National Infrastructure Program funds, we suggested that the $33 million the federal government could fund towards the Highway No. 3 reconstruction program would in fact be spread over five or six years. That would allow us to use our existing funding to do twice as much. You could say that we have cut reconstruction from ten years down to five years.
We did not suggest that would be any shorter of a period than now, although there is pressure to have it reduced to three years. At this point in time, we were only suggesting a five year reconstruction program. I hope that answers the Member's comments, Mr. Chairman.