Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just to be very clear, certainly I’m in support of making sure that if we are going to have a midlife
retrofit on the Diamond Jenness Secondary School, it incorporates everything that we would like it to incorporate.
I’m not suggesting that we should take a band-aid and put it on a building and then close your eyes and cross your fingers and hope for the best for the next 35 years. I do want to see it incorporate all things. I’m just having a hard time accepting that from what I heard — when the Ministers, Education, Public Works and Services and everybody came down there, the deputies, and looked at that school — about high priority, red flag; “Let’s get on with it.” I have a hard time reconciling that to this being pushed back this far in the capital plans.
I’m encouraged to hear the Minister say that if the work gets concluded that needs to be concluded — the consultation, the design — in fact this government would be prepared to bring forward an expedited, fast tracked, accelerated version of this project. Second to this I hope that everybody in Hay River who might have a part to play in getting this project the kind of approvals and the kind of input you’re talking about is listening, because this is a very significant commitment that I’m hearing here today. We don’t want to be responsible for dragging our feet or slowing the process.
But I do want to ask about the financial implications of this. If this can be moved forward, are there any financial constraints that could see this project set back?