Mr. Speaker, I am not sure if that was something that we had indicated in our response to the Member at the time. I believe we had discussed the merits of the program. I had raised that there were some NGOs that were raising concern and that we needed to further investigate. That is where the situation still stands, from my standpoint. I would have to have further discussions. We will provide correspondence to the Member. Thank you.

Time for oral questions has expired. I will allow the Member to conclude his supplementary. Mr. Hawkins.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the Minister for making sure that question will be answered as well in the coming correspondence. I just want to make sure that the Minister is well aware that this is a territorial initiative, not a Yellowknife initiative. There are companies, construction, various other types of service type industries getting on board with the Certificate of Recognition through the Territory whether they are in Hay River, Norman Wells, Inuvik. It is quite a broad program involving large and small businesses. Is the Minister aware that it is a territorial program that several businesses are investing in the certificate program and they are doing a large focus to make sure that they could be on board just like every other jurisdiction is? Is the Minister aware of this? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I, unlike others, can see past Yellowknife. We have, of course, recognized that this is an initiative. It has a bearing on companies across the North, outside of Yellowknife. It is an initiative that is receiving a lot of attention. A lot of other jurisdictions are buying into it. We are also looking and reviewing what is being done in other areas. The short answer is yes, we are looking at it from across the board standpoint. Thank you.

Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I request agreement to go back to item 7 on the orders of the day. Thank you.

The Member is seeking unanimous consent to go back to item 7, oral questions.

---Unanimous consent granted.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would like to follow up with a few more questions about the Joint Review Panel process and the government’s plans. I am squeezing these in on a Friday because there is a very aggressive table. It is a schedule that is laid out by the Joint Review Panel for the public to participate in the response. My first question is to the Minister of Environment and Natural Resources -- and this is following up my Member’s statement -- will the GNWT prepare a financial analysis of the implementation costs of the Joint Review Panel recommendations? Thank you.

Minister of Environment and Natural Resources, Mr. Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Part of the assessment process and response process is going to be to look at the cost of the recommendations and our response to what that may cost so that we, in fact, know what the bill will be if we are going to recommend a certain course of action. Thank you.

Thanks to the Minister for that. Can the Minister commit to making this financial analysis public, especially before a Cabinet decision is made on the Joint Review Panel recommendations so that the public can have some input and response to the government? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, in due course, that information will be public. I can’t at this moment commit to making anything public before it has gone through our internal process. Thank you.

Final supplementary, Mr. Bromley.

Does the GNWT intend to file a submission with the National Energy Board on or before February 11th , 2010, that responds to the

Joint Review Panel report and recommendations and, if so, how will we involve the MLAs and the public in the preparation of this submission? That’s February 11th . Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I’ll take that question as notice.

The question is being taken as notice. Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask a few more questions of the Minister responsible for the Executive in relation to the program review office. The Minister mentioned in one of his responses that Regular Members did not take advantage of the opportunity to sit on the Refocusing Government committee and I have to say that I’m dismayed to hear that any sharing of information is contingent upon the fact that Members are not part of that committee, but that shouldn’t be the case, Mr. Speaker. Whether or not there are Regular Members on that committee should not inhibit any sharing of information.

I’d like to ask the Minister in relation to the program review office, he stated that it was established late in 2008-09 fiscal year. So it’s been in operation approximately a year, if I take that as an actual fact. So in that time, I believe contingent on this budget was some investigation that was done relative to a reduction in the provision of funds for inclusive schooling to education boards. I’d like to know whether or not the program review office did any investigation in regards to inclusive schooling and

funds that are allocated for boards in the ‘10-11 year. Thank you.

Mr. Premier.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Just to be clear, the Members were involved in the refocusing initiative, but then decided that they did not want to take part in that process. So we’ve gone back to our traditional way of doing things. As we collect the information we will present to standing committee, with a dialogue in committee to look at what initiatives go forward.

Specifically in the area of inclusive schooling, the program review office has been involved with that area, but none of the information has affected the development of this budget that’s in front of the Assembly today. The work that is going forward will need to go through the process, as I said earlier, where the Minister leading the Refocusing Government initiative will be before standing committee and present the information and the work that has been done to date. Thank you.

Thank you. We could argue about the participation on the Strategic Infrastructure committees all day and I’ll leave that one for now, thank you very much. Perhaps the Minister and I could have a conversation later.

I’d like to ask, relative to the work of the program review office in the past year, if the work they’ve been doing in terms of education has not had an impact on the budget, I also understand there’s been some work in terms of medical travel and so on. I’d like to know whether or not that has had an impact on the budget. Thank you.

Thank you. The ongoing budget program initiatives of the Government of the Northwest Territories are something that we continue to do. The program review office has taken the initiative to look at those areas that we see the highest growth in as a Government of the Northwest Territories, it is reviewing that information. So the initial work had to be pooling the information together, then looking at it to see what those initiatives had accomplished and from there going forward. The initiatives underway, aside from the one that has been mentioned on the office review, is the work that is going to lead into the next year’s process. So, again, Minister Miltenberger will be able to come forward with the work that’s been done to date.

There are quite a number of areas, a large volume of work that has had to be undertaken to do this work and I’m sure when Members see that they will be able to get right into much discussion about where it should go from there. Thank you.

I thank the Minister for his response. He’s mentioned that there are a number of projects underway and I guess as an aside I have to say that I find it difficult to believe. I know there’s a lot of

work that’s required when you investigate a particular program area and I appreciate that the background work is being done, but it’s hard for me to believe that there’s only been one project in the last 12 to 13 months which has come to fruition. But I’d like to know, the Minister has mentioned that there are a number of things in the works and he’s suggested that they’re going to have an impact on the 2011-12 budget. Can he tell me what those areas are that are being looked at?

Thank you. Instead of getting into, it’s a large volume of work and trying to respond in answer here, the Minister has got time with committee, will present the work that’s being done and start the dialogue in that fashion as we go forward. So I would say that that is the avenue that we should continue to honour and work with, otherwise I’ll give a little snippet here and cause concern to people out there without full information. So again, I would say let’s defer it to the meetings that have been set up and the full information will be provided to Members at that time. Thank you.

Final supplementary, Ms. Bisaro.