I thank the Minister for that. When you are looking at potential partners, it’s often been discussed locally and in this House and certain circles around the Territory about the lack of a university north of 60. I think if you are asking the right questions in pursuing the federal government, there may be some dollars there if a university is going to be built north of 60. I’d like to see it built in the Northwest Territories, built here in Yellowknife hopefully.
Obviously it’s going to be a big capital expense. I think 60 or 70 million dollars would be on the low side. If you look at the school in Inuvik, that’s $120 million. So I think it would be something in the magnitude of that type of expense.
We just don’t have those types of capital dollars right now. I guess I’d implore you to seek out the federal government. Start talking university. There’s no reason why we couldn’t have a university here in the Northwest Territories, a degree granting institution -- I think it’s long overdue -- and the research dollars that would go with that. There are options out there and I think we need to, again, look at everything.
The facility needs assessment that was conducted last year, how the college fits into that and whether or not you could have gotten something into this capital plan, I guess that’s a little bit debatable because we did have that and that was a year ago. So I’m a bit disappointed. I think nothing related to the college shows up in this capital plan. But I know it’s a big one and I know you guys are working on it, but again I think there was some time there to come up with a workable plan, a solution, and it’s just not here. That’s just the way it is. So, again, for next year I think we have to be working towards that. The utilization of existing facilities has to be
addressed. We have to get down that road. If that involves a dedicated college campus for Aurora College, that’s something we need to know.
Again, thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I hope to be around next time when it’s discussed again. Thank you.