Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have some reservations in regard to the size of this supplementary that is presently in front of us. We just passed the main estimates a couple of months ago, yet the size of this supplementary is pretty large, knowing that we are not out of the woods yet with respect to the deficit situation that we just got out of. If we have a bad fire season over the summer, I believe we may be back in those trees. I think that we as a government have to realize that we are spending the main portion of the whole supplementary appropriation reserve that is supposed to be there for the whole year through this one supplementary.

I think we have to be cautious when it comes to expenditures knowing that we have a process in place where we as a government and we as Members have a say in regard to how the expenditures are going to be done through the business planning process that we all go through, and that the departments should plan ahead for these expenditures. Yet, Mr. Speaker, there are a lot of expenditures in there which were not even part of the main estimates or planning process that we were looking at just a couple of months ago.

I realize there are some important issues out there, but we have to also realize that we are not better off than we were a number of years ago. If Members can remember from the 13th Assembly, we had a major deficit situation where we had to cut over $100 million. That was a lot of pain for everybody in the North. I feel that we as a government and as Members of the opposite side of the House have to realize that the supplementary appropriations should be used only in cases of emergency. We should not be using dollars because we want to establish a new program where we missed the timing of the capital planning process. I do not think it is fair to our communities.

The communities I represent, in the case of Aklavik, they have an alcohol and drug centre which they cannot use because it was condemned by the Department of Health and Social Services because the sewer system froze up and they cannot even have gatherings or meetings with clients. These situations are happening in our communities where those projects are not part of this year, but yet we have allocated a lot of dollars to different groups.

I think we have to realize that it should only be used on an emergency basis and only when it is absolutely needed, and we have to use supplementary appropriations for the whole year and we cannot use the large portion of it just a couple of months after we passed the main estimates in this House.

Mr. Speaker, I will be having more questions on this matter when we go forward.