Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Bell.

Okay. I will accept the Minister's suggestion that practically all of it was northern contractors. I assume it was facilitators and those kinds of things that were used to do community consultations. Can the Minister indicate if the majority of this was competitive bid situations or sole-sourced?

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Chairman, I do not know how much of it was sole-sourced or how much went to a tendered process. I can say with certainty, given the nature of the tasks, that this is money that was spent in the North. A breakout of tendered versus sole-sources, I do not know.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Bell.

Thank you. I can appreciate the Minister may not have that information handy. Would he commit to providing me a breakdown for the community consultations, meeting expenses and printing services as to whether or not this was sole-sourced or competitive bid, and whether or not it was northern or southern firms used? I would like to have that information.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Chairman, we can provide that information. I heard Mr. Dent asking if we could do it before we approve the supp. The answer is likely no. I do not know if they could pull that kind of detail together that quickly but we will certainly undertake to provide it. If we can do it before the supp is approved, then we will. That is a lot of detail to try to dig back on .Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Bell.

Thank you. The next $600,000 that went into the Energy Secretariat, we look at the consultation for $100,000; the consensus building for $80,000; research and analysis, $50,000; development of the database, $25,000; the demonstration products, $45,000. Can the Minister tell me if this money was again a situation where we hired consultants out of government or was this all in-house work? I assume since it is broken out in dollar amounts that it was not in-house but I would like confirmation of that.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Chairman, by far most of it would be in-house. I expect there were some facilitators who were hired or are being hired to, for example, lead us through the consultation process or the consensus building process. Again, I am basically certain that we would not be using southern people here. If we are using facilitators for workshops, I do not know whether these were tendered or whether they were sole-sourced.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Bell.

Will the Minister commit to getting me information on the consultation, consensus building, research and analysis, development of the database and demonstration projects, and specifically indicate whether the money was spent in-house or was tendered out to consultants? Second, whether it was southern or northern? Thirdly, whether or not it was a competitive bid situation or sole-source situation in all cases? Would the Minister provide that information for me? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Chairman, yes, we will provide that information for the money that has been spent and what the projections are for the balance of the year in the breakdown that the Member is asking for. Again, it is a fair bit of detail but we will do it. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Bell.

Thank you. I would like to thank the Minister for that. In addition, the $550,000 that is being contributed to aboriginal governments for participation in the IGF process. It was my understanding that the money we were providing was also being matched by the federal government. I am not sure if that was how the process was to go. My understanding is that this would be split in half, the expense here. I am wondering if the Minister could indicate that and if we have assurance from the federal government or evidence that the federal government has already contributed $550,000 additional dollars to the aboriginal governments as well?

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Handley.

Yes, Mr. Chairman. This money was cost-shared, or matched by the Government of the Northwest Territories and the federal government. Exactly how the aboriginal organizations have spent the money, I cannot say with absolute certainty. I can tell you that by far, again, most of it was for participation by members. It was for the cost of holding meetings. There were some staff costs that were involved and there were some professional, legal, technical expertise that were contracted but again, I do not know who the aboriginal groups would have contracted and exactly whether they were northern or southern or how they would have contracted those services.

The balance of it is for office and office equipment. Again, the majority of it would be northern spent for sure. The biggest piece is for members' participation, not for consultation or hiring of consultants. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Mr. Bell.

Thank you. I appreciate that. In this situation, I am not concerned with how the aboriginal governments are spending this money that we are giving them. I am only concerned that we can verify that the federal government is also contributing an additional and equivalent $550,000 I guess my question is how do we verify that the feds put in $550,000? Do we have an accounting in speaking with the aboriginal governments and are the aboriginal governments verifying that the feds have contributed this money specifically for their participation in IGF?

I do know that they get money from the federal government. Is the federal government able to say "We give you this amount of money a year. You call it whatever you want but we are saying some of it is for the IGF process?"

I want to make sure that the federal government actually contributed an additional, over and above what they normally would have, $550,000 and we are now matching that. Can we verify that?

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Handley.

Mr. Chairman, yes, we can verify that there is an agreement between the federal government and the GNWT to cost share this money. Thank you.