Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have to say, as well, that it’s been a privilege to participate in helping to develop this budget. I think there are various perspectives on how much I’ve participated, but I certainly agreed with the Premier in the direction that we set off with, our visions and goals and so on, basically living within our means and, I think, facing up to the fact that we have some new realities coming. We need to respond to those. The more we can respond to those progressively and with good thinking, the better off all our people will be. I’m not convinced that a budget of $1.4 billion has gotten us very far along this road.
Mr. Speaker, we have some huge issues before us. There’s a time element that makes them crushing and more severe and demanding of our attention, not just for action but a thoughtful and well-laid-out and steadily building series of responses. That’s the sort of thing I’m looking for in budgets.
The first — and I’ve harped on this a lot — is climate change. It’s not a new thing. I think there’s a lot of awareness happening out there. Mr. Speaker, I’ll just read a little bit here on what other jurisdictions in Canada are doing: British Columbia, a 33 per cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 is their target; Alberta, 14 per cent below 2005 by 2050; Saskatchewan, 32 per cent below 2004 by 2020; Manitoba will meet the Kyoto target, 6 per cent below ’90 levels, by 2012; Ontario has a specific target; Quebec, 6 per cent below 1990 by 2012; New Brunswick, similar; Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland and Labrador. We get to the Northwest Territories and this chart says, “No explicit target.” This is no longer acceptable. Perhaps we haven’t had time in our short life to address this, but there’s no bigger issue to me and many of the people of the Northwest Territories than to get going on this. So let’s really get after that one.
Mr. Speaker, on the issue of the cost of fuel, it’s related to the cost of living. It imbues everything. It
has been, again, predicted for years. It is steadily rising. Now we’re looking at issues of availability. We continue to unwisely rely on fossil fuels, and our response to this crisis has been to subsidize. I think that’s appropriate in the short term, but I’d like to just review a few of our community situations. I’m speaking as the Member for Weledeh here. I’ve selected three communities to look at, that reflect the broad makeup of my constituency. The communities I selected are Yellowknife, Inuvik and Fort McPherson, because of the characteristics that they have and that, again, reflect Weledeh.
Just looking at family incomes — and I’m comparing them to Canada, and these are total after-tax incomes — in Yellowknife, for example, at $100,029 per household, we’re 46 per cent higher than Canada, and we have a cost of living that is 17 per cent higher than Edmonton’s. Inuvik, on the other hand, at $78,000 per household, is 15 per cent higher than Canada but with a 47.5 per cent higher cost of living than Edmonton. Fort McPherson: 23 per cent lower than the average after-tax income in Canada, at $52,000, but with costs that are 52.5 per cent more than Edmonton. Quite different situations there and things that we obviously need to address any time this jurisdiction is developing a budget.
Our response to try and deal with this — and probably rightfully so, again, in the short term — is to highly subsidize those communities that require it. The costs of housing, utilities, transportation and recreation are all actually lower in our small communities compared to Yellowknife because of those subsidies.
We’re subsidizing about $140 million right now, and this is an extreme cost to the Northwest Territories and the taxpayers of the Northwest Territories and Canada, but it’s also an opportunity. To me, it reflects the opportunity of developing our local economies to provide for some of those needs in ways that stimulate that local economy and the jobs and innovation that can bring.
Mr. Speaker, again we need some real innovation here and some real new ways of thinking outside the box. Let me give one example that we could have easily done here. We could have put out a giant RFP for a heating energy service contract for all major government facilities in our major road-connected centres at zero capital investment and millions of dollars of savings per year. At the same time we could then dedicate those savings to deal with the higher cost of living in our small communities.
This is the sort of straightforward thing that we can do. It’s all laid out there for us. It just requires a dedication to a new approach and new way of doing things.
My hope is that we can do things in an even better way in the next budget. We’re always talking about business plans and so on. I’m excited about that. For the revenue-generation discussion paper that’s coming up, we’re going to need some really innovative responses there. I’m looking forward to those discussions.
I’m very impressed with all my colleagues and all the people in this room for their dedication and their wisdom. I think we’ve really brought the issues to the table, and we’re struggling to address them.
My hope for the next budget and the actions we come up with is that we’re going to have greatly improved communication; an earlier consensus that contributes to comprehensive and real change in direction; some more direct and timely input from this side of the House; and that in the result, we come to value our volunteers and the incredible services and savings that they provide in the Northwest Territories. Finally, my hope is that we do the thorough and comprehensive analysis that we said we would but somehow didn’t quite get to in this round.
Once again, Mr.
Speaker, I
like the noises I’m
hearing for next year. I think we’ve had a bit of a challenge here with the new Assembly coming together and the timing difficulties in the normal process of budget planning that we’ve had to deal with. So again, I’m looking forward to participating in the next round.
Let me end by saying that I’ve been very, very pleased and privileged to work with my colleagues and the staff that we get to work with. I’ve appreciated that each side of the House has spoken with one voice. I’ll note that it’s a little more democratic on this side of the House.
Laughter.
And that speaks volumes to the hard work and the realistic approach that Members on this side of the House are showing. There’s a different kind of reality on that side of the House that I also recognize.
I also want to say that I think we’re all keenly aware that this process is for the betterment of the people of the Northwest Territories. I recognize that that’s where we’re all coming from, if I tend to speak a little too harshly from time to time.
So I can’t say I really support this budget, but I will be voting for this budget. I think we need to get this show on the road. And I’m very much looking forward to a new, outside-of-the-box, progressive approach to next year’s budget. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.