Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to provide a few guiding comments to the overall budget process. First and foremost, the process, I am very pleased we continue this with the fall capital budget. As I’ve indicated for a long time, it’s good to see that it continues this way. Our budget numbers are summed up in groups, therefore we haven’t spec’d out individual numbers and we haven’t made it too easy for those people who are bidding on the maximum of what we estimate our potential budget on a particular item is.
I have had a number of contractors tell me, though, even though the government has switched the capital plan to the fall, that some contractors still cite there are still issues with timing, tendering, and they are curious as to why it is still taking so long to get tenders out in a timely way. And if I may be so bold, that’s the whole idea why it shifted to the fall session of October, to ensure we get them out in a more timely way.
That said, my suggestion to the Minister would be I would encourage the Minister and his staff to reach out to the NWT Construction Association and poll its members and ask them how they feel it’s working. It’s great to be sitting here in the Assembly to be able to say this is how it works, but we should be asking and polling some of the real people out there who do this type of work, and accessing the advice, and even guidance at times from the NWT Construction Association would be a good place to start. I think it would be quite useful for our organization.
That said -- that’s from a contracting point of view -- I would also encourage the Minister of Finance and his officials to perhaps reach out to the NWT Chamber to ask them if the timing of the way we release our budget has positively or negatively affected its members on opportunities of bidding in a fair and reasonable way, to make things like construction seasons or, for example, freeze-up and breakup, when you have to get office products or hospital products up to a region, that the only way to get it there is either over the top or up the Mackenzie River. Are we appropriately setting the timing of our budget that works for them?
Again, it’s more a point about getting the appropriate feedback. It’s great that we can sit in these towers here and say things are great on the
land, but once in awhile it’s certainly worth the walk down and asking the people on the ground what it’s like and is it working for them. These decisions, devoid of their input, are really just decisions that could have little or no meaning.
Mr. Chairman, one particular issue I raised during the review process -- and I’m getting the sense that there is positive feedback early on -- is the full capital planning operations cost. What I mean by that is it’s easy to do a quick shift and replace a building and realize the operational cost would be relatively the same. It’s easy to assume that. But when we establish a new facility, whether it’s, for example, a hospital, a seniors centre, a new school, quite often what we are voting on is the ideals of a particular project. When we support that project at its construction costs, we are not fully taking into the lifecycle costs and, therefore, it’s difficult to predict that. So we are making decisions, in essence, without the full information.
As I understand it, there is some agreement within the Department of Finance and probably Public Works to say we’ll work to include some of that information. That’s a very important point I was trying to get at. We have to realize what we are agreeing to.
I once heard someone say we’ll help a person buy a truck, but they weren’t going to buy them the insurance, not going to pay for the gas and the operations, those types of things. So it’s easy to get a free truck, but can they afford to operate that? That’s my point here: understanding the operational costs over the lifecycle of the building. Building or asset, I should define it that way. It doesn’t hit us that year when we agree to put in a new health centre, for example, it hits us two or three years down the road when all of a sudden we now have to add another $1.5 million to count for the electric bill, we have to count for the oil bill, the water bill, those types of things. We need that information. Like I say, as I understand it, there is some willingness to consider those things.
Another area of concern of mine is the stimulus effect of investment of capital dollars. I raised during the capital planning process here that I think it’s very important that we find a policy framework that can help identify regional investment even if it was a regional investment based on a minimum theory. Every region is not the same, so it would be difficult to come up with an ideal framework that works every time, but the point being if we could find a way to stimulate every region, ensure that capital investment happens in a way that suits a particular region best, and certainly territorial capital dollars are being spread throughout the Territory and I think that creates a bit of a network where people are pleased. They see the government and no region feels like it’s being left behind.
Certainly, in a consensus style government, my view is we have to double check everything we do, to make sure every region feels they are part of the process and not being ignored. At times I find that these capital plans spend more time worrying about what the department feels, but from time to time I think there should be more outreach to MLAs, asking MLAs what they think should go into their area. I’ll tell you, when you hear concerns in the House, quite often you hear we’ll look at it, we’ll think about it, but that’s where the end of that discussion goes. But I’ll tell you, if you are in a community region, as many of my colleagues here in the House are from, they will tell you about specific on-the-ground projects that have a major impact on their community.
So it’s important for a Yellowknife Member to support community Members in reasonable ways and I think that’s certainly reasonable.
Mr. Chairman, I did want to highlight just a small area specifically in the budget, or I should say what isn’t in the budget, and that is the continued lack of investment in a couple of schools in my riding of Yellowknife Centre; namely Mildred Hall and Sissons School.
Mildred Hall has already been cited by one Member previously as having had received most of a renovation when it had a renovation a few years ago. It’s a shame and considered an embarrassment that the government didn’t fulfill what I believe is its full obligation to make sure that we had things like their windows replaced, which was part of the renovation plan, but never got in. As well as the fact that the gymnasium that it has is still not adequate for the school. I’m not sure if the fact that it keeps not showing up in the budget is a plan by divine intervention or whatnot, but I think it’s very important, because it affects the operating costs of the school board. They have to make sure they adjust properly, work around these problems. Maybe it’s the Finance Minister’s or the Public Works Minister’s choice not to invest in these particular areas and hoping that maybe the Health and Social Services Minister will pick up the fact that the kids may have more colds and need winter jackets to be able to sit in those classrooms because of the fact that the windows leak with cold air coming in in the winter. I’m not sure what the theory is behind that.
As well, Mr. Chairman, Sissons School continues to be shown as a school being overlooked. Now, you’ll hear from the Minister of Finance or certainly the Minister of Public Works say we’re still working this out with the school boards about how to balance schools fairly throughout the capital. That is very true, but the reality here is we are avoiding proper investment into a school that needs to be upgraded mechanically, as well as to facilitate educational
planning and delivery that’s happening in the school, which is Sissons.
This is an important point that I certainly hope somebody pays attention to. This will still be a public institution, and the longer we continue to ignore that and we say we’ll wait for the school boards to sort it out and then we’ll support it, the fact is we are just continuing to ignore real maintenance on this particular school that needs to be done. So we are punishing the school or maybe the school system, in my view.
The fact that this type of support is being ignored until the school boards work it out, but as I said earlier, this will always be a public institution. If the government doesn’t want to maintain it and maybe it’s long-term plan is to maybe...(inaudible)...it off from the government plan such as to give it away, force the school to give it away, et cetera, maybe that’s why they don’t want to spend any money on it. I mean, you see that practice. People stop investing because they don’t want to be part of the system anymore. But the reality is, it’s my view that Sissons will always be a public institution in some form. It’s been talked about trying to work it out with YK No. 1 and the Catholic School Board and perhaps even Aurora College to do a shuffle there. These are choices that need to be made by those boards. It’s not for me to say one way or the other, but as I said, there will be territorial capital dollars under the umbrella of public institutions always there.
Mr. Chairman, that sort of wraps up an overview of my concerns and comments at this point. I will be speaking specifically to specific projects as we reach that page when we get there. Thank you kindly.