Thank you, Mr. Handley. Supplementary, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, may I ask the Minister to be more specific about what are the indicators he is watching as he monitors the price of fuel and the cost of living and the impact it has on it? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Finance, Mr. Handley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Specifically, we monitor the price of fuel, and that is the market price on the New York Merchant Exchange. I can say that the price of natural gas, for example, has gone from roughly $10 to $5 since February and it is predicted to go even lower than that. The price of crude oil has gone from $30 a month, and gone down to $28 and it is predicted to go down even lower. These are all in U.S. dollars because it is on the New York Exchange.

We do not see the impact of those immediately. It is probably a three-to-six-month lag period in there before we feel the impacts. However, at today's trends, the prices are going down and we would have to take that into consideration as we watch what is happening over the summer. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Final short supplementary, Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Minister made it clear that he had to have this fuel rebate in place immediately after the last session because the price was so high and things were so bad. Could the Minister say at what point is the price low enough that there is no need for a fuel rebate program? What is the cutoff? Does the Minister have any idea on that?

Thank you, Ms. Lee. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Finance, Mr. Handley.

Mr. Speaker, I guess the cutoff is different for different people. Some people do not have much flexibility in their budget and need assistance for even minor changes. Some people can absorb a higher increase, but generally, I would say if natural gas, which affects the price of propane, stays down around $5 U.S., and as predicted, goes as low as $3.50, that is going to bring the price back to where it was a year, a year-and-a-half ago. With crude oil, if the prices go down to $20 a barrel, which some people are predicting, then that will bring that down to what it was a year, a year-and-a-half ago. If we have both of those scenarios work out, there probably would be no need to have a fuel rebate. I say that knowing that some people may still feel a bit of a crunch, even with the prices going down. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Handley. Item 6, oral questions. The honourable Member for North Slave, Mr. Lafferty.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. Tough question. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Health and Social Services, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I fully anticipate that the subject of infrastructure and facilities will be raised in the context of some of the challenges we face on our social issues. I hope to be able to have a discussion with the participants at the conference as to ways we may be able to work together to advance the increase in the limited number of residential treatment beds we have at this time. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Minister. Supplementary, Mr. Lafferty.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Health and Social Services, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we are hoping that the discussions and dialogue that take place at the Social Agenda Conference will give us a context within which we can look at some innovative ways of dealing with social challenges, such as addictions. We are hoping to implement some of the recommendations that come out of there as we move ahead with our business planning and just planning on the part of the department for the needs and for the resources we have in the coming years. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Minister. Supplementary, Mr. Lafferty.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Health and Social Services, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the responsibility, the lead on addressing many of these issues, has traditionally been carried out with some help from the regional governments and the aboriginal governments, by the Government of the Northwest Territories. As I said, we want to talk in Hay River on the Hay River Reserve about relationships and how we can collaborate and coordinate our efforts with people. We want to talk about relationships so that we can make the most effective use of the ideas and the resources that we do have.

Certainly, as Members all know, our resources are not unlimited. We do have restraints on what we can spend on various things, but we think there is a lot of room for improvement on how we expend those resources. There is a lot of opportunity for us to think about how we could do things differently that might involve other kinds of resources other than financial. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Minister. Final supplementary, Mr. Lafferty.

Thank you, Mr. Lafferty. That is a difficult question to answer. The honourable Minister responsible for the Department of Health and Social Services, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I believe that it is possible to compile a total of what we have spent as a government on referrals to places like southern addictions treatment centres, residential treatment programs. It is possible to put those numbers together.

We should not dismiss the fact that people may have been helped by those referrals and by the expenditure of those resources. Sometimes, it was the best thing to do in view of what the people were facing when we talk about different duo-addictions and specialized treatment that people may have required. I do not think that we should dismiss the fact that some people may have been helped by those, but yes, we could put together the totals for what we have spent in the last five or ten years on southern placements. Thank you.