Is committee agreed that we have concluded consideration of Environment and Natural Resources?

Thank you, committee. Mr. Miltenberger, if I could get you to please thank your witness and, Sergeant-at-Arms, if I could get you to please escort him out, that would be great.

As agreed earlier, the next department on our list is the Department of Finance, which is in section three of the binder. Michael Miltenberger, do you have witnesses that you wish to bring into the Chamber?

Yes, Mr. Chairman.

Sergeant-at-Arms, please escort the witnesses into the Chamber.

Michael Miltenberger, please introduce your witness, for the record.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have with me Margaret Melhorn, deputy minister of Finance.

Thank you. We will proceed with the Department of Finance. Page 3-2 is the summary page so we will move to the next page, which is 3-4. Finance, activity summary, infrastructure investment summary, total infrastructure investment summary, $925,000.

That concludes the detail. We will go back to the department summary, which is on page 3-2. Department of Finance, department summary. Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I wonder if I could just have a little explanation of this fund, the $925,000. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. We will go Ms. Melhorn.

When did we purchase the SAM system and how much was it?

Are we anticipating any further expenditures other than just about a million dollars in this case?

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With this new system we have taken on a commitment to maintain and upgrade, and in the IT world that’s an ongoing commitment. While we’re not expecting any, hopefully, yearly major changes, we do want to keep it up to speed with the changes in software and programming so that it continues to provide the service that it was intended to, but it is going to be an ongoing commitment. Thank you.

The Green Procurement Policy, I understand, is currently, I believe, either farmed out to each department or under Public Works and Services. But I think it’s the hope, perhaps optimistically, the intent is to move that into the Department of Finance so that it could be done under one hat. I’m wondering, currently it’s a rather hollow policy but should some teeth be provided in the Green Procurement Policy, would it fit under this module for implementation administration? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Ms. Melhorn.

Well, we’ve had discussions in this House where it was identified that the Green Procurement Policy might rightfully belong in the Department of Finance so that it would be applied and implemented. Whereas it’s not now, it would be applied and implemented across the government. I am interested in what it would take to configure this module to be able to handle it. I recognize that

there must be other policies that this software is responding to and if we should move that policy into Finance, I hope that the potential for this to be useable to administer that policy would be part of this purchase. So I’d ask the Minister if he would consider that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We’re buying a module, basically off the shelf and we’re going to be able to tailor it to the requirements, our contracting requirements. So it will be able to reflect what the Green Procurement Policy will eventually end up being. It will be configured to accommodate the BIP requirements and those types of things. So, yes, we will have the capacity to have it tailored to the specific realities of our contracting world with the Government of the Northwest Territories.

Thanks to the Minister for that commitment. That sounds good to me.

I’ve raised the concern in the past about how much we’re actually saving with these sorts of things and I’m hoping here that there will be clear savings. I will be interested in what the costs of these configurations are as well as the maintenance, so I will be watching this in the future, possibly. Thank you.