Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Next on my list is Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The comments I have will probably be in five areas I want to speak to the Minister about.

The first area is the recent discussions we had in this House this afternoon on the Mackenzie Valley Highway and the approaches that could be discussed between the communities and this department here specific to the Sahtu region. The research that I’ve read and the documents I’ve read on the community approaches to the Mackenzie Valley Highway are quite appeasing in terms of the regional economic stimulus that could be happening in the long term with this approach. I’ve also read in the Hill Times that the federal Minister

of Transportation and Infrastructure has $4 billion available and that $4 billion is there for projects that could be done in 25 months. According to the Hill Times, the Minister is willing and waiting to see how soon he can get this money out into the communities and regions and territories or provinces. I’m hoping that the Minister could take advantage of the limited time we have with this funding here as stated in the Hill Times with the federal Minister.

In the same breath I wanted to ask the Minister about these dollars that are available in Ottawa, that if there’s any way that his department could push very strongly to put the proposal, I think it’s ready to go -- the Bear River Bridge proposal. Because I think that Bear River Bridge might fit quite nicely within the time frame of 25 months. If that’s the type of funding that can go forward. I’m not privy to the details on the requirement or criteria for the Bear River Bridge, but it’s something that is being bounced back and forth. The Bear River Bridge went through all the stages to a point where the steel had to be redistributed to other projects in the Northwest Territories. I wonder if that’s something the Minister could bring forward to the federal Minister and get the Bear River Bridge built for us.

The Oscar Bridge is somewhat a sore issue in the communities of Norman Wells and Fort Good Hope. It’s between those two communities. The Oscar Bridge has been sitting there without any type of structural movement or any type of work done on it. It’s quite a few dollars, but I think that’s something the department needs to own up to and do the right thing and complete that bridge by putting the approaches onto that creek there. It’s really an eyesore in terms of driving by it and I think that bridge needs to get done as soon as possible.

The airports in my community...I certainly want to thank the department and the Minister for extending Tulita and Fort Good Hope. However, with the conversations about Deline and Fort Good Hope, who have partnerships arranged with North-Wright Air, that we are looking at investing into further aircrafts that would meet the 2010 Transportation Canada rule in terms of runway length. I think that rule will come into effect in about 21 months from now. There are some other details I’m not going to get into, because correspondence has been going between this department and North-Wright and Deline. I know Fort Good Hope spoke on it, but I haven’t received any type of correspondence to address their concerns. However, it’s been quite an interesting exchange of correspondence as to he said, she said.

What I’m asking for is if the Minister would consider North-Wright and Deline’s request in terms of seeing if Fort Good Hope and Deline can receive

an extra 1,000 feet of runway to their airports right now. This would mean a lot in terms of safety. This would mean a lot in terms of lifting restrictions. This had to be a very contentious issue and I am certainly going to start bringing it up within the life of this time we sit here.

North-Wright has invested $1.6 million into Yellowknife’s Airport here in terms of a terminal and construction. If you look at all the agencies down the Mackenzie Valley in terms of usage of government transportation facilities at the airports, I think North-Wright has one of the most leased spaces within this department. I think some very careful and serious commitments need to be discussed when we talk about airport runways in our region here.

Mr. Chair, the department has looked at winter roads and I’m very grateful that the winter road from Fort Good Hope to Colville Lake is being considered as part of the infrastructure on highway systems. I think that’s something that’s good, because now we know for sure that road will be somewhat safe in terms of being put into Colville Lake. The winter roads, certainly they still continue to need upgrading and safety. They need to have some improvements, cut down some hills. Certainly when I read the report on the Mackenzie Valley Highway construction I noted the number of bridges between each community. The Minister has indicated a number of times of the amount of bridges that are going in, the amount of bridges that are being worked and still some bridges that need to be completed between the communities, so I continue to support the Minister on building these much needed bridges along the winter roads.

There’s an aspect here, in Fort Good Hope, that they spoke to me about last year and I want to bring this to the Minister’s attention in terms of the consideration of the winter roads, if the Minister would consider putting in the winter road between Fort Good Hope to the Dempster Highway, in terms of looking at that section. It’s been scoped out. It’s been looked at. It’s about 345 kilometres south. If you hit the Dempster Highway and you come 60 kilometres south of Inuvik. Is this something that they would consider and look at as any other projects that have been asked by us for the department to consider? That way, during the winter months at least, we can have people from Fort Good Hope, the Wells could have some connection up to Inuvik. There are family members...There are needs from the communities of Good Hope to drive up to Inuvik. There are people in the Inuvik Regional Hospital from our communities.

Mr. Chair, I want to bring these general concerns up from our region. l look forward to the Minister’s response to other areas that certainly would bring

regional economic stimulus to our region and also to regions. As he spoke of how to distribute the monies across the board here and I’m asking in the Sahtu, because we have seasonal access to roads outside of our communities, that we look at some other areas that would make it cheaper to travel and bring the cost of living down in our communities. As well, we have the winter roads, or even with the extension of our runways we’d take advantage of these areas. I thank the Minister for his opening presentation.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Next on my list is Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I’d also like to highlight my main issue with transportation and that’s, of course, the fact that transportation, not the department, but transportation is a phenomena in the Northwest Territories, and in most jurisdictions accounts for 50 to 67 percent of our greenhouse gas emissions. This is the major contributor to climate change. This department, of course, is one of the biggest recipients or experiencers of the impacts of climate change; perhaps poetically so.

I’m always looking for what the real costs are, and somehow they always seem to be buried and obscure and maybe they are difficult to identify. But I think to the extent that we can, we can perhaps make some progress on the issues in a more effective way.

I notice the reference to the winter roads connecting in the Nahendeh and Sahtu regions are going to be improved to withstand the challenges of climate change. I’m pretty sure that’s true in most other regions, so I’m not sure why those were selected over North Slave, for example. I’m wondering if it’s possible to know what those additional costs are, what the trend has been over the last five years or a decade and if there’s any projections into the future so that there are no big surprises there, given that our models are getting more and more accurate on what’s happening.

I note the volume of traffic steadily going up at 7 percent per year. I’m not aware of any efficiencies in fuel standards there and perhaps it’s just because I’m not aware. I don’t hear this department talking about this. Obviously, a responsible government would be one that takes this on head-on, and I think more and more they are across North America. I’d like to see this government establish meaningful fuel and mileage standards for vehicles and, increasingly, jurisdictions are doing this for aircraft. This can start in a straightforward manner, for example, by simply doing the research on what are the most fuel-efficient aircraft that meet the particular needs of a region and making sure that information is known by those who purchase aircraft and so on; of course, as well as vehicles.

I also see the reference the Minister made to the substantial environmental and baseline socio-economic work planned for 2010, 2012, and I’m wondering if he would like to give us any more details on that statement so we have some idea where things are going there. Perhaps that’s something that we could envision a briefing for down the road by EDI for EDI if the Minister was open to that.

Finally, of course, I appreciate this department staying on budget and a 1 percent increase. That’s good to see and it shows that there is control at the helm. Of course, infrastructure dollars are going up which means it must be a challenge to administer that effectively and so on. So far we’re hoping that the Subcommittee on Infrastructure has reversed the trend, but so far the only trend we have in hand is increasing proportions of carry-over from year to year to year over the last four years. I’m wondering if the Minister can provide us with information, given that there’s four weeks left in the fiscal year, on what the carry-over will be this year as, perhaps, an amount and a percentage that shows that we’ve got that trend reversed.

Those are my comments. I’ll continue to ask questions in that area as we go through. Again, I appreciate the Minister’s opening remarks and the chance to participate in this review. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Next on my list is Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just have a few comments on the Department of Transportation. I think, for the most part, the department is juggling a bunch of different things and doing a good job at the task that they have at hand. I’ve been happy with the Yellowknife bypass road moving forward and thank the Minister and his staff for all the work that they put into seeing that road finally look like it’s going to be constructed. I think that will be a big boost for the city and for the region. Also, in the area of public safety, I think having another access in and out of the capital city will be good. Redirecting some of that truck traffic on that route will also be good down into the Kam Lake Industrial Park. I’m happy with that.

One of the things I’m following closely is the Deh Cho Bridge, obviously. In the Minister’s opening remarks the only mention of it was it will improve service in the North Slave region. I know that it will. Obviously, a bridge across the Mackenzie River is going to improve service because there’s not going to be a period where the ice road and the ferry are unavailable and people will be able to go across that river at any time of the year. So that’s good from that standpoint. But the question I have -- and the last government was never able to really answer it – is if you’re charging tolls on all the

trucks coming across the bridge, how is it going to lessen the cost of living in the North Slave region? Not just the North Slave region but all the goods that are transported across that bridge and end up in Yellowknife and are flown to outlying communities. If there’s a tariff or a toll on those goods crossing the river, that’s going to be passed on to the consumers not just in Yellowknife but all the other communities that the goods are flown into. It causes me a great deal of concern.

Also, I had some questions for the Minister last week in regard to what our financial exposure is as a government going forward. They’re behind schedule there and I’m just hoping that we’re not at risk for any further money. I also want to find out exactly what it’s going to cost us for the collection and administration of the tolls and when that’s going to be coming forward. Also, the bridge itself, if there are...I know we can’t get into specific cases, but if the government is named in any suits, I’d be interested in knowing that as well.

Aside from that, I’m quite happy with the department and will have some questions as we go through the detail. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I won’t speak long. I generally think the Department of Transportation is doing a good job. They oversee quite a number of areas. One area that I am concerned about is their procurement policies. I know the Minister is aware of this instance, but where the department underestimated the cost of work, they went out to tender, the three contractors bid. Anyways, I’ve already stated this in the House. Then to go back out to tender, basically only changing the date by which the project needs to be completed, is very unfair.

I’m also very concerned about the fair distribution of work. We’re heading into an economically difficult time and in the South Slave there are numerous contractors. There surely must be a way to ensure that we are not allowing some businesses to fail who have invested a lot of money in overhead, equipment, property, by the policies of this government going to things such as negotiated contracts where certain businesses in communities are precluded, where it’s a large project. On smaller projects, I can see there being a lot of merit in going to a community and negotiating a contract, but when we’re talking in the millions of dollars for a contract, to negotiate a contract of that size, eliminating the possibility of participation from other businesses that have, like I said, men, employees and equipment on the ground, I think is insensitive in a time like this.

Generally, I have found the Minister very responsive to those kinds of concerns, but I can’t say that always for...Well, concerns that have been brought forward have been met with a rather strange response from senior staff, kind of to the effect of well, if you...If constituents talk to their MLAs about it, well, then that’s the end of the discussion with the department about it. I find that stance and that demeanor very, very odd. I don’t see it in any other department. I don’t like it. I think that people in the North are used to going to their MLAs about just about anything they want and we’re here to serve the public. That is not a correct attitude to have. People should always feel at liberty to talk to their MLAs about things. This is, seriously, the only department where I have met with that kind of resistance at the senior management level. I hope the Minister can do something about that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. I don’t have anybody else on the list for general remarks, so I will go to Minister McLeod for a response.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Many issues raised very interesting comments and some of these issues, of course, are going to be discussed further in our budget.

I do want to quickly respond to a number of things that were raised today. First of all, the comments made by Mr. Menicoche regarding Highway No. 7 and Highway No. 1. We certainly agree; most of our roads across the Territories need to be considered for reconstruction. Most of our highways are at their mid-life cycle and need to have some significant investment. Mr. Chairman, I also have to point that we have to recognize that there was an inability for some time within our government to attack some of these deferred maintenance issues and deferred reconstruction projects that we are now trying to play catch-up on. We are investing significant money in Highway No. 1 and Highway No. 7. In the long term our plans are to chipseal it at some point but, of course, priority has to be right now to have safe, reliable highways that our residents and our tourism traffic can drive on and be quite comfortable.

We also recognize that there is going to be capacity challenges in the communities as we move forward trying to do the many projects that are on our drawing board to try and accelerate the Building Canada Fund. Mr. Chairman, I have to point out the fact that we haven’t totally been at the point where we are in a position to agree to the two-year acceleration or disagree. That is still being debated and we are awaiting the outcome of that. We are quite interested to hear what would be the next steps in terms of investment if we’re going to agree to accelerate everything under a two-year plan.

We are, and have been quite up front in trying to have a working number for all the bridges across the Territories. There are five major bridges that will probably need to be done at some point. They’re not in our capital plan at this point and that includes the Liard River Bridge. We do have a working number and we try to keep that fairly current but we have to recognize that these are based on conceptual design and fairly early estimates and working estimates. I’m glad Mr. Menicoche is happy that the changing of the ferry systems to on-demand rather than schedule is working for his communities.

Mr. Jacobson has indicated that he’s pleased with the outcome of accelerating or the proposed acceleration of the Tuk highway. There are still some approvals that are required to move this forward. We have some money in the supp that has to be dealt with and we’d need approval to ensure that this continues. I would certainly agree with the Member; I think we would all share the enthusiasm to see this as a long-term investment for the start of the Mackenzie Valley Highway.

We recognize the Member has raised today in the House and again tonight that there is quite a concern from the aircraft carriers that have contacted him about being able to operate in this environment where we are seeing companies move in. Mr. Chairman, the industry designed for very little market disruption abilities from us as a government, especially as a Minister. I would probably be in a very potentially libellous situation if I did take any kind of protection measures. I am trying to be very careful so we don’t end up as a government with legal challenges from the industry.

The airport manager is a position that has been look at for some time now in the community of Tuktoyaktuk. It is part of our sponsor reductions, but it was also recognized that traffic volumes have been decreasing. It is an area and the position that can be covered off by the person in Inuvik and handle all the different issues that are of need in that area. I also want to state that, as and when and if things pick up, this would be a position also that would be reconsidered for re-instatement, but at this point it is really difficult to make a case to continue this position.

Mr. Hawkins raised and pointed out that we had potentially a printing problem, Mr. Chairman. There is really no typo in this document. The need for airport expansion has been brought to the table many times by this Member and has been working really hard to make a case that there is a lot of potential to increase in the Yellowknife Airport. We are looking at a $20 million-plus project to do that if that was going to be the case. We really don’t have it anywhere in our capital budget and can’t really see it as part of our foreseeable capital investments

until we can identify a source of revenue. That includes additional dollars to provide O and M to maintain this facility. The study that ITI did looked at accommodating the desire from the community and from the MLA to attract lower flights and large aircrafts to increase and stimulate the tourism economy. Mr. Chairman, that still could be accommodated as was mentioned in this study. There was a desire to do what they call a double drop, which is basically to land a large aircraft in Yellowknife, but in order to leave when they did leave the community, they would have to use two smaller planes to connect back in Edmonton. That is an issue. I think that is going to be ongoing as we try to find ways to accommodate the many needs. This is one of them. Mr. Yakeleya has raised once again the options and the desire to see some discussion move forward. Mr. Chairman, we are regrouping, trying to package up and discuss with our colleagues and that will include the standing committee at some point to see where we could go with this.

Mr. Chairman, we have recognized that the Mackenzie Valley Highway would be a project that would be an economic stimulus. Yes, of course, but there would be a lot of preparatory work in the event that the federal government did agree to backstop it. We have probably several years of permitting that would need to take place at a fairly high cost. There has been, as the Member mentioned, $4 billion in economic stimulus mentioned in the budget. Our understanding, and although it hasn’t been finalized yet, it is going to be based on a per capita allocation. If that is a reality, our per capita amount would probably not be much more than $5 million. We can’t build a whole lot of Mackenzie Valley Highway with that. The Members pointed out that the Bear River Bridge is ready to go. We agree. We need money to be able to move any further on that and we would need committee and Members in this House to support it.

Mr. Chairman, we are working on the Oscar Bridge. The engineering for that project is being done right now. We would expect, all things considered, that we would be able to start on the realignment next year.

The communities of Fort Good Hope and Tulita have been approved in the communities that will have their airport runways extended to 4,000 feet. There is still a desire from both Fort Good Hope and Tulita along with Deline that we look at extending it further. We had agreed with one of the communities to sit down and talk about some of the actual technical requirements that really never transpired. We need to be able to look at that before we can come back to this House for further dollars. It will be probably $2 million-plus just to look at the actual physical capital investment. It would be more than that. We would have to add the

operation and maintenance on top of that. We are quite reluctant and we have indicated to all the communities that going past 4,000 feet is a new standard. It has new additional requirements that are involved. I would want to make sure we are all on the same page while we discuss this and consider this and look at maybe being creative or look at ways. I am not sure there is an answer there but, at this point, it is not in our budget. We need to be convinced that there is a way to do it.

The winter road, of course, is still a work in progress. We continue to invest on the grade improvements, the bridge approaches. I think this year we have in this budget $20 million for investment in the Mackenzie Valley Highway in the Sahtu region. We do not have and will not have plans right now, Mr. Chairman, to look at the extension. It is actually the first time I am hearing it, that we consider extending a winter road to the Dempster and it is not in our budget. We would anticipate it is probably $2,000 a kilometre to invest in this stretch of winter road. I think it would be very difficult to put a business case together. It is a 300-kilometre stretch. We would need more than $600,000 to do that.

Mr. Chairman, Mr. Bromley raised a number of issues. Sorry, Mr. Chairman, you raised a number of issues.

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A number of these things are issues that we have been working on, have been discussing at the national level regarding targets for some of the new vehicles, some of the new planes or the type of planes that can be used. The federal government, I know, has been working with the auto industry and the carriers to discuss that. I would have to get a better understanding of that with our officials to see where it is at. Certainly I can commit to coming back to committee to have further discussion on that. I am very much interested to look at how we can do things and share that information of what we are doing on greenhouse gas reduction. I really appreciate the comments made by Mr. Bromley for us to stay on budget. As we move forward and traffic volumes increase and costs of doing business increases, it is a difficult target to meet. Our carry-overs have gone down, but I guess I should qualify that and state that it has gone down because we have introduced a negative supp, so it is really not a fair picture. I do want to offer and take up the offer to make a presentation on any of the initiatives and issues that committee would like to see.

Mr. Ramsay has raised a Yellowknife bypass road. The project is on track. We have awarded the contract and we should have that piece of infrastructure in service in the next couple of years.

Mr. Chairman, the Member also raised the issue of the Deh Cho Bridge. The Deh Cho Bridge is, as I indicated in the House, behind schedule. All the parties are working to bring it back on target. There are a number of things that need to be done before the temporary bridge is pulled out and all the piers have been poured and it is the pier vents that we need to be in place. It is going to be a challenge if we don’t have them before the ice bridge goes out or before we have to take the temporary bridge out. It is causing some stress. There is some concern between some contractors and the contractor. Still, we have a guaranteed maximum price, so unless things really go wrong, that’s within the realms of that. We have to remember, we still are the guarantor of this project so we do have the ultimate liability at the end.

Mr. Chairman, Mr. Ramsay also asked about how this lessens the cost of living. Mr. Chairman, the idea behind the bridge was to see how we can remove the bottleneck that prevents year-round access from the Yellowknife, Behchoko, Fort Providence communities and mines through to the South. Right now, the trucking industry and all the residents have to wait twice a year; in the fall when the ice is forming and in the spring when the ice is breaking up and we’ve had long waits. It’s not every year, but some years we’ve had 30, 40 hours’ waiting time. Those costs are incorporated in the freight costs right now. Right in the times when the ferry is not running, the freight is brought across by chopper. Those are passed on to us. So even the rolling in the toll, at the time it was going to be considered a cost-savings. Now the price has gone up considerably since then and I am not sure if we’ve done another additional study to see what it is right at this new price level, but that’s probably something we could look at. We are also anticipating the cost of incorporating a toll collection system at around $300,000. That’s what we had budgeted for and this has not been designed as of yet.

Mr. Chairman, the Member for Hay River South raised the procurement policy and it was raised as a question to the Premier during question period. There has been some concern. It’s been raised by both MLAs from Hay River who are quite concerned that a contract went out for a gravel haul and it was significantly higher than what we had budgeted. We did look at the ability to negotiate, Mr. Chairman, the difference between what the tender price comes in and what our budget is, and there is really little ability to negotiate down to what we can afford and it’s not something that we embark on. In this case, it was quite a bit higher. We did consider then to cancel the project and we did cancel the project and decided to retender based on a different season, a different time of the year. That’s allowable under the rules, Mr. Chairman. We are

anticipating that because it will be a summer haul versus a winter haul, that we will have a better response and better price.

Mr. Chairman, I certainly recognize also the other issue that was raised by the Member regarding negotiated contracts. We have to be very careful to ensure that we have balanced investment in all the areas of the Northwest Territories. Some areas are more, there is more desire to have negotiated contracts than others. Mr. Chairman, there are land claims agreements that we try to follow. We have MOUs that are part or are supporting the land claim documents, in some cases, that we try to abide by. We also have interim measures agreements that we have to also accommodate, and a lot of times these projects are right on the doorstep of an aboriginal community, small community or right in their traditional lands.

Mr. Chairman, there is also the reality at some points within our system when we go for permitting, we are also directed by the Mackenzie Valley Environmental Review Board to negotiate or ensure that there is significant benefit to the communities.

So I certainly agree and I am trying, along with our staff and our government, to be very mindful that we follow and support the balance investment in the Territories. Also, that’s the same as we move forward. We try very hard to balance or present our budget where it’s looking at all areas of the Northwest Territories. But, Mr. Chairman, there are occasions where need comes first. There are times when our road collapses or unexpected challenges come forward, so we really have to fast track some of those, but we are always trying to be mindful that we need to invest in all the different areas.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. I agree, surprises are coming down the pipe. Good to be prepared. I think that completes general comments. Sorry, Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. One area I forgot to raise in my opening comments was about two years ago I raised the issue of updating our licence plates. The issue has sort of fallen off the table and disappeared. I didn’t know if the Minister could comment on it. I don’t have anything else other than that issue. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. McLeod.

Mr. Chairman, of course, we took the request very seriously.

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We are working on it. We hoped to have something to present to committee for their review after we have everything worked out for this licence plate

design and I think it will probably be in the next month or two.

Thank you, Minister McLeod. Does that conclude general comments?

Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just one question to the Minister. In his presentation to us, on page one of four, I think it’s the fourth line, bottom page here, it talks about “The Tuktoyaktuk gravel access road marks another major step towards our long-term goal of a Mackenzie Valley Highway.”

Mr. Chair, the Minister has indicated on numerous occasions as to projects that are contributing to eventually a Mackenzie Valley Highway. The bridge work, the upgrades, the access road here and I wanted to…Blackwater Bridge has been looked at and hopefully the Bear River Bridge does get some attention. In light of these specific projects that are going towards the safety of our winter roads and all-season roads, can the Minister consider a heading -- it doesn’t have to be any dollars -- going forward on his Transportation budget. Can the Minister put a heading on the Mackenzie Valley Highway with the heading “Tuk access road, Blackwater Bridge, Bear River Bridge upgrades”? Can that be considered?

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Minister McLeod.

Mr. Chairman, the goal from our government and the direction and support of the motion we passed yesterday and the many strategies we’ve worked on from the longest time has been to incorporate a road, the Mackenzie Valley Road. When we say Mackenzie Valley Road, we are talking all the way from the Liard River Bridge right to Tuktoyaktuk. It incorporates all the different parts and components of it. We are hoping this investment in the Tuk gravel access road will attract attention from the federal government and maybe encourage them to spend more money on that. We are also doing the same thing in the Sahtu and other areas on the road upgrades and the bridge enhancements in the new bridges. So when we refer to the Mackenzie Valley Road, we mean all the infrastructure, all the bridges that are required at Liard River, Ndulee, Bear River and all the other different stream crossings, the smaller ones, all the way to Tuktoyaktuk.

I understand what the Minister is saying. I guess the one question I do have for the Minister, if he would consider in future in terms of going forward on the budgets, maybe next year or the year after, hopefully it would be sooner, that he

would have a specific heading. You don’t even have to put dollars beside it, but you could have a specific heading that says Mackenzie Valley Highway. Then he could list his projects there. Right now it seems to be all over the place, so that is something I am asking if he would consider. He has given me his round-about way as to all of these projects that are going forward, all the highways in the North that are being looked at as the Mackenzie Valley Highway. I am asking to put them together under one item here, and put projects here that is what I am asking for.

Yes, Mr. Chairman, I think it was requested before that we be more specific in our investments. If the Member and the committee agree, we could take all the different capital projects under Mackenzie Valley and lump them under one, but I am sure we would be requested to provide the breakout. But certainly we could accommodate that if that is the desire. Right now we have it in three different areas.

I know we are looking at three different areas, but if you can accommodate it to put it down as the Mackenzie Valley Highway, then I certainly would be interested in looking at that, of course with the other Members. I certainly welcome what the Minister is saying and certainly that would satisfy my question here, so I thank the Minister for being open and flexible to my questions.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. I believe that concludes general remarks unless there is anything further. I am not seeing any. Does committee agree that this concludes general remarks?