Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are for the Minister of ITI. I see that the BIP has reared its ugly head again and we need to address it once again, Mr. Speaker.
At the beginning, I was amenable to the suggestion that we might want to do away with the BIP and replace it with a two percent small tax cut. Since then, I am hearing that a lot of companies in the North don't make enough money actually to benefit from a tax cut. If they could pay their expenses and wages and break even, for lots of companies that's doing well. So they will not see the benefit of it.
The other thing is that in many other ways, BIP is an important aspect of doing business in the North for many companies. I was thinking about the potential for the Novel housing where there is a lot of money to be spent in the North and the government is promising that this is going to happen. I would like to know, then, without the BIP, would the companies that might bid on buying the units, or fixing the units, or doing the roadwork, how would they benefit from that if they don't have the benefit of being BIP status? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.