Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Chairman, I do not know. That is something that I would have to check with the Minister of Transportation on. Some of them may be filling vacant positions. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Lafferty.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Chairman, we have two things we are doing. One is negotiating resource revenues from the federal government. If we can get the resource revenues to the North, then it would be up to us and aboriginal governments to negotiate a sharing of that. At the same time, we would then negotiate what the priorities would be for that new money. That is basically the work that we are talking about, both revenues and also the expenditures, how you spend that money. I think that has to be a joint decision between aboriginal governments and us.

I know the Minister of Transportation has been meeting regularly with Minister Collenette, the federal Minister, on a highway strategy and looking at any dollars that might be available. My understanding is that there is not a lot of optimism for any amount of new dollars for building new roads in the North at this time. The economic development agreement I referred to earlier, in the amounts I understand it would be in, would be much too small to make any meaningful difference at all.

There are no particular strategies I know of for that kind of investment. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Lafferty.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Chairman, the commitment from the Minister of DIAND is to have the negotiating process for resource revenue sharing in place by March 2002 and hopefully earlier than that, as early as December 2001, this coming December. I have not seen any good estimates yet of how long it will take to negotiate. I think that depends on the goodwill of all the parties. We are tentatively looking at a process that would take in the neighbourhood of two years. I would say near the end of 2003, sometime in 2004 is where we would be aiming. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Lafferty.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Chairman, I expect it will take us two years minimum to complete negotiations. Again, we are only one out of three parties in those negotiations so that is just our own estimate. I would hope that as soon as we are into negotiations, there is some consideration into placing resource revenues from the beginning of negotiations into some sort of trust, or have an understanding that whatever we would finalize in two years' time would be retroactive to the day we began negotiating. Those are things that are yet to be decided.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. General comments. Mr. Dent.

Mr. Chairman, I had a couple of questions about the sessional statement that the Premier made. Perhaps the House Leader can answer them because they relate to fiscal issues as well. In the Premier's sessional statement, he says, "Within the next decade, the Northwest Territories will be paying more into federal coffers than it receives." I was wondering if we could get an explanation for that comment, just in terms of how the Northwest Territories will pay more into federal coffers than what it receives back.

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Chairman, that is within the next decade. We are anticipating to have resource revenues -- that is a share of royalties -- for three diamond mines. We are probably looking by 2006-07 when the third one is in operation, possibly 2005 if they speed up production again. We have royalties and corporate taxes from three diamond mines. We would have the existing oil revenues, royalties and taxes from the Norman Wells oil field and any expansion there. We are anticipating that within ten years, we would also have the royalties, tariffs and corporate taxes from the gas pipeline that we anticipate being built.

I do not have specific numbers in front of me. They would be just sheer projections right now anyway. Clearly just those royalties and corporate taxes alone, let alone the other businesses that build up, would be enough to put us in a situation that would be comparable to Alberta's, or possibly in a richer situation than Alberta has right now.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The projection is then, since we are getting $500 million or $600 million, give or take, from the federal government now, the projection is that within ten years, royalties, and I think I heard the Minister say corporate taxes, that are paid by firms exploiting resources in the Northwest Territories will exceed that $500 million or $600 million. Is that correct?

Thank you, Mr. Dent. Mr. Handley.

Yes, Mr. Chairman. I think they will easily exceed that. We know that the oil revenues, for example, just out of Norman Wells alone last year, I believe, were close to $100 million. Just that small, oil field on its own. If you add in the diamonds and the royalties that are paid there, they are taking out, just out of Ekati Mine alone, they are taking out $600 million worth of diamonds, paying 12.5 percent royalties on that. That is close to $150 million just from one mine.

I think we can very safely and easily say in ten years, everything going the way it seems to be, we could be a "have" jurisdiction.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Dent.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. What is the split, roughly? I recognize the Minister may not have the exact figures in front of him, but what would the split be between the corporate tax portion of that and royalties? My concern is that the Minister has said that this amount of money that will be paid in royalties and corporate taxes could make the Northwest Territories look like Alberta if we got to keep it. I think we have to remember that companies will always have to pay federal income taxes. Those are not going to be handed over to provincial or territorial governments. What are we talking about here if we look at royalties alone? That is really the base question I am asking.