Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the contracts process used by the public bodies associated with the Government of the Northwest Territories needs to be reviewed. I believe we need a transparent system that benefits northern business, but I am not convinced this is always the case right now.
After having been contacted by some constituents concerned about some contract awards, I requested some information about contracts from the Housing Corporation, the Northwest Territories Power Corporation and Workers' Compensation Board. To say the least, Mr. Speaker, it was an arduous process to get it.
Even worse, I have become concerned about some things that came to my attention while we were looking for that information. Mr. Speaker, these public bodies are outside of the government, so each agency had to be contacted individually. Another hurdle was created because none of these agencies provide contract listings like the GNWT does, where contract payments are publicly listed every quarter.
In fact, the GNWT, right now, posts all payments over $5,000 on the web site for easy public access. However, Mr. Speaker, at WCB, the Housing Corporation and the Power Corporation, it is a lengthy process for staff to manually compile these reports when they are requested. I think it should just take a quick search from a simple set of records, as it does with the regular quarterly report from the Government of the Northwest Territories.
There were some problems too, Mr. Speaker, with this reporting, when it is done by hand. One of the reports even had a contract listed to a northern business when the business says they did not get it. Mr. Speaker, it is time for all public bodies to report contract payments like this government does publicly.
I am concerned that without regular public listings of contracts, it is too easy for contracts to go to southern firms when there may be qualified northern firms. Public scrutiny is an important part of the use by government of public funds by revealing when contracts are awarded to non-northern firms.
I was also concerned by some of the terms that I found in the RFPs looking at these contracts. For instance, Mr. Speaker, one of the terms set out to successfully bid on some of the contracts that I looked into required the proponent to have a huge revenue base to qualify for consideration. Mr. Speaker, I think that a smaller company would work much harder fulfilling a contract, and the mobilization costs would be much lower, or non-existent, for a company already based in the North.
Mr. Speaker, I have seen contract specifications that appear to have been drafted by southern companies. I would think that it is obvious they would be preparing their specs to position their firm for future contract bids.
Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to conclude my statement.