Mr. Minister, do you have any comments in regard to the supp? Minister Miltenberger.

Yes, Mr. Chairman. I am pleased to present Supplementary Appropriation No. 3, 2009-2010 (Operations Expenditures). This document outlines an increase of $13.326 million in operations expenditures for the 2009-2010 fiscal year.

The major items in this supplementary request include:

1. A total of $8.3 million for the Department of

Health and Social Services for increased costs primarily associated with the adults and children receiving care outside the Northwest Territories, the provision of supplementary health benefits, the vaccination program implemented by the department in response to the H1N1 pandemic, the purchase of blood products from Canadian Blood Services and the provision of services to non-NWT residents. The costs being incurred for non-NWT residents will be recovered from the home province or territory of the patient.

2. $1.6 million for the Department of Education,

Culture and Employment for the increased costs associated with the higher utilization of income support programs.

3. $1.4 million for the Department of Human

Resources for increased costs being incurred for medical travel assistance provided to

GNWT employees and increased dental premiums.

Also included in this supplementary request is funding for a $50,000 donation from the GNWT to the Canadian Red Cross to contribute to the aid relief efforts in Haiti.

I am prepared to review the details of the supplementary appropriation document, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

At this time I’d like to ask the Minister if he’ll be bringing in witnesses.

Yes, Mr. Chairman.

Does committee agree if the Minister brings in his witnesses?

Agreed. Sergeant-at-Arms, escort the witness in.

For the record, Mr. Minister, can you introduce your witnesses?

Mr. Chairman, Margaret Melhorn, deputy minister of Finance; Charles Tolley, the director of the Management Board Secretariat.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Welcome, witnesses. If we can turn to page 3, Executive, operations expenditures, Minister’s office, not previously authorized, $50,000. Agreed?

Total department, not previously authorized, $50,000. Agreed?

Page 4, Human Resources, operations expenditures, employee services, not previously authorized, $1.394 million. Ms. Bisaro.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. A question here. I guess I’m just a little bit surprised that we didn’t anticipate these increased costs. We’re almost $1.4 million in increased costs for benefit payments basically on behalf of our employees. Could I get an explanation from the Minister as to why we couldn’t foresee these increased costs? Thank you.

Minister of Finance.

Certainly those explanations make sense, but I guess if we know those things, why are we not budgeting for increased costs at the time

that we put the original budget on the floor? Thank you.

The two that are related, most directly related, are the aging workforce and the growing number of referrals. While we know we have an aging workforce, it’s hard to anticipate the amount of referrals. We tend to base our budget numbers on the previous year’s expenditures and the other thing as we go from budget year to budget year the number of employees we try to budget are based on actuals and not projections. Thank you.

The Minister just leads me into sort of my next thought, my next question. I mean, why do we budget on last year’s numbers if we know that we’re going to have demographics that are going to likely cause us to have an increase? So it’s kind of a rhetorical question, I’ve said this before; I have great difficulty in the fact that we establish our original budgets based on numbers which we expect to change and then come back three or four times during the year and say, oh, gee whiz, we need more money. So more of a comment than anything, Mr. Chair.

Minister, did you want to respond to the comment?

I just thank the Member for her comments and her rhetorical question.

Okay, we’re on page 4, Human Resources, operations expenditures, employee services, not previously authorized, $1.394 million. Agreed?

Total department, not previously authorized, $1.394 million. Agreed?