Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The question that I have for the Minister or his staff is that when the communities ask for additional space in these facilities such as Inuvik or even Tulita, the community had to buy into the deposits. The community had to upfront some money in terms of additional spaces that they need, and then the community put the funding to, say in Tulita, the addition of a stage to the gymnasium. Now that the budget has increased significantly for the Tulita school building by just over $20
million, the
community is asking why they had to put an extra $400,000 out of community capacity building for the addition of the stage. The budget is already up $6 million more than what was originally budgeted for.
Then they came back, and this is something that they wanted me to ask in terms of this funding here. It seems that the schools…. Because of the prices and the labour and the steel and fuel, these prices are going to be increasing every year. I know Fort Good Hope appreciates this process of checking out the school and getting it constructed and for this school there. They have an option also to allow them to put funding towards the school.
There are other schools in the Territories, Mr. Chairman, in terms of making contributions to infrastructure to these facilities. But it seems these prices are always escalating, and they are saying: why do we have to put in the money here when you’re putting an extra $3 million, $4 million, $5 million into these buildings?