Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to use my Member’s statement today to speak to the comments that Minister Michael McLeod just laid before us.

I like to see that the government is finally starting to look at a lot of the infrastructure projects they have going on across the Northwest Territories. I like the fact that they’re going to try and get these program budgets passed in the fall so they’ll give contractors an opportunity to get all their material on the winter road and begin construction. We see every year the infrastructure carry-overs from one year to the next. I think that drives a lot of the cost of our infrastructure projects up.

One remark that stood out was the standardized designs. I like to see that. I like the fact that we may come up with a standardized design for a lot of our projects across the Northwest Territories, with a little tweaking here and there, and not making them big, multi-million-dollar works of art. I think it’s a good idea to get away from that. We’ve already seen examples of projects that have gone way over budget just because of the basic design of the buildings. There’s nothing wrong with a good, clean design that’s very functional. I think that’ll go a long way to improving the amount of money we spend on these infrastructure projects.

The level playing field is something I’ve always had an interest in. As a rule, Mr. Speaker, I don’t normally support negotiated contracts. I have gone against that rule a couple of times this year because I felt it was something that was beneficial to the North and the community in supporting these projects. I went against the rule I normally follow. I think that also drives the prices of some of our infrastructure projects up. A good example was a contract I saw for some work on the highway: $2.4

million for one five-kilometre stretch,

negotiated; $1.7 million for the five

kilometres

before it, publicly tendered. That’s a difference of $700,000.

I think we’re on the right track here. I like the fact that they will be looking into the designs. I think there will be a lot more competition. I hear from contractors all the time. Sometimes they feel like there is not a level playing field when they have to compete against the fact that some contracts are negotiated. To take advantage of some of these situations, they do try to partner up with some groups to get into negotiated contracts, because they feel that it’s their only opportunity to get any more work.