Contributions, 11-30, economic development, grants and contributions.

Page 11-31. Economic development, grants and contributions. Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. In this particular area here, I'm moving over to the festivals and culture and heritage area, there is a discussion on one of these pages, Mr. Chairman, of the continuance of a $25,000 contribution to the Great Northern Arts Festival in Inuvik.

I wholeheartedly support this contribution. The survival and hopefully the growth and enhancement of festivals and events are truly something that is a great showcase for the NWT of our peoples and their skills and our lifestyles.

Mr. Chairman, last year the current or existing Department of RWED, along with ECE announced the joint responsibility for the NWT Arts Strategy. On this page here, I wanted to see if the Minister could advise on what particular areas, like the Great Northern Arts Festival, the new department will continue to invest in and where does it see its role vis-a-vis the support of the new NWT Arts Strategy? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Bell.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We also feel that the Great Northern Arts Festival is a very important and worthwhile festival and we continue to fund it for that reason. We do have funding under the NWT Arts Strategy. We have had some discussion around this, if the Member will remember, I believe the $75,000 ongoing target adjustment for 2005-06 for RWED, also for ECE, but I will focus on the RWED $75,000 portion.

The $75,000 really will be focussed on helping artists purchase northern raw materials for production of traditional art and fine crafts. I don't have the details in front of me in terms of what the ECE money will be targeted toward, but our portion of the NWT Arts Strategy, the $75,000, will be targeted in that manner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Braden.

Mr. Chairman, the split responsibility for this continues to leave me and I think this Assembly with a bit of a dilemma over when there are issues of policy or resources or funding. Just where do we go when there is an arts and culture question? Like I said, I have criticisms, I have concerns about the level and support we're giving to arts and cultural events and initiatives in the NWT, but as the Minister has explained quite rightly there is a shared responsibility here. I don't quite know where to take my argument. Perhaps it's one that belongs in a different venue and not one that is just restricted to one department.

I won't harp on it, but I will outline very briefly, Mr. Chairman, an issue that I have with the new Arts Strategy and that it doesn't identify festivals and events as a key outlet or a key venue for the exhibit and preservation and demonstration of northern culture. It leaves volunteer organizations scrambling about where to go and how to direct their work when it comes to seeing what the GNWT can do for them.

There is a potential tourism impact in any festival and event that we have. Is there a pocket developed here within parks and tourism for potential contribution to a festival or an event? Is there some other program that people go to? It's quite nebulous here and as the Minister described there's $75,000 in the Industry, Tourism and Investment department, but it's directed solely to the procurement of materials for artisans. Where are all the other potential benefits and requirements for this very vital and, right now, rather fragile part of our whole arts and culture strategy? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think that's a very good question and one we have had some discussion around. I guess from our perspective as a department, we are funding something like the Great Northern Arts Festival and we are looking at it from the aspect of business development and support for traditional crafts, which will comprise business activity.

The $75,000 in new funding and the $50,000 that we have reprofiled from $125,000 to be broken out between the various regions, that funding is available through the BDF, but again we are talking about funding arts as business development. We feel that is our appropriate mandate.

Also in the Arts Strategy, ECE has money that they have profiled and I believe the money ECE is profiling is for arts, but for heritage and cultural preservation of traditional history of the arts and those kinds of areas and not necessarily for business development. That speaks to the NWT Arts Strategy. I believe they have additional money in past that have been application based that other festivals have been able to tap into, but probably that question is better put to the Minister of ECE in his budget. I do appreciate the Member's concern in terms of where we look in this government for the funding of festivals and other events. I guess we would say in terms of the Great Northern Arts Festival, we feel this one is appropriate for us. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Braden.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I know that this leaves a number of organizations, festivals and volunteer groups kind of frustrated, Mr. Chairman. The ongoing support for the Great Northern Arts Festival is superb. I would love to see a similar kind of ongoing, sustained commitment to festivals like the Caribou Carnival here in Yellowknife, the Midway Festival just outside of Fort McPherson, and the South Slave Music Festival. So there are a number of different events that deserve support, but I think what we need to do and what I will be working with the arts community, along with my other colleagues, and go back to the policy table and see if we can't come up with something to address this very significant area and what is so far a really big gap in our arts and culture framework. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Braden. We are on page 11-30, grants and contributions, economic development.

Page 11-31, economic development, grants and contributions, continued.

Page 11-32, grants and contributions, total contributions, $9.585 million.

Total grants and contributions, $10.237 million.

Page 11-34, economic development, active positions and that's continued on 11-35.

Page 11-36, lease commitments - infrastructure.