Thank you, Mr. Roland. The honourable Member for Nahendeh, Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I won’t be asking the Premier any questions. Mr. Speaker, my questions are actually for the Minister of Transportation just with regard to the commitment to get the section of Fort Providence junction towards Fort Simpson, I believe is Axe Handle, chipsealed in this coming fiscal year. I would just like to ask how much work has begun on the process of awarding the work or getting the work underway early in this spring. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. The honourable Minister of Transportation, Mr. Michael McLeod.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am trying to remember if the Member asked this once or twice before. Mr. Speaker, I could actually go to our staff and get some firm dates of when we are anticipating the contract to start. The contract went out for tender last year, I believe. We have a contractor that was awarded the contract, except timing of the season and

weather do not permit or was not favourable to move that forward, so we expect that would happen as soon as the weather warms up and the conditions are favourable; early in the summer season or late spring I would anticipate. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, constituents want assurance that work will be completed with all the talk of the Deh Cho Bridge and debt wall, et cetera. I think the Premier did indicate in yesterday’s Minister’s statement that this coming fiscal year there will be no impact. I would just like to get the Minister’s assurance as well. There are several other Transportation contracts for the Nahendeh riding that work will proceed this coming year. Once again, I urge to get these contracts out of the gate as early as possible. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, so the Member could sleep at night, we will assure him that all the projects are moving forward as we have projected and as we have reported to the Members with our capital planning over the last year and this year. We don’t anticipate any effect as a result of the Deh Cho Bridge. The projects that were carried over will move forward as soon as possible if conditions are permitting and the other contracts are already being considered for awarding too. I think we are going to see a lot of work happening this summer. We should have a good construction year, again depending on rain and weather. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I am glad to hear those reassurances from the Minister. My constituents will be pleased to hear that. As well, I would like to ask the Minister, come this spring, if he will come to the riding and we will do a bit of a tour to each community and discuss all the other Transportation related important projects. Mahsi cho.

Mr. Speaker, I would welcome the opportunity to attend a visit to communities in the Member’s riding given that we are investing so heavily in his riding that we have the opportunity to share that information and to also discuss other issues that the Member has been raising over the last while and have a chance to talk to the leadership. So I would certainly accept the invitation and make arrangements to travel with the Member to his riding. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Hay River South, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The honourable Premier, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think those benefits in a number of ways are felt throughout our communities. For example, the IBAs that are signed with the mines to do that. More importantly, through the contracts that the mining companies have in a number of our communities, through the growth of our communities, because we have new residents who moved into our communities and bought homes.

It was not too long ago when we looked in our communities and Hay River would be one of those where the housing market wasn’t as strong, has now turned around and is healthy. I wish I could say the same in a number of other communities.

I think when we look at those pieces to try to find the benefits, there are a number of factors and that would be for our corporate tax, for our personal

income tax that flow into our general revenues. The other issue which becomes a problem for us is if we looked at connecting a new grid to our existing rate base. The cost that would be borne by that rate base is too heavy. For example, right now we are living off the life of industry in the past that has provided hydro now to our communities. We have benefited largely from that, but if we had to replace those facilities purely on the rate base of our customers now, that would be very difficult indeed. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, the Premier went on to elaborate more on the benefits of having the diamond mines here. I am not arguing that at all. It is a tremendous benefit to the Territory. Hay River, Yellowknife, the IBAs, the many benefits that we have realized from the development of these diamond mines is unquestionable. However, we also have amazing hydro potential. What the Premier is saying is that we do not have the ability to finance that or pay for that for the private customers and residents of the Northwest Territories, but this single customer base by way of the diamond mines is the only business case that can be made for the distribution of additional power from the Taltson. Is that what he is saying? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, without a customer at the other end, the project itself from a government perspective is unviable unless we are to get a huge influx of cash from the federal government or if we at this Assembly were to say take a portion of the dollars and put it purely towards this project.

This business case has been built on a customer; a number of customers in the sense of the mines. Future development, for example, and the Member has raised this issue of Avalon going forward, is important for us and looking to the future, but until we know if they’re actually going to make a decision to proceed, we have to weigh that with the fact that we know there’s a customer in place now.

The potential for our hydro development is to sell that power to a southern customer base is another option, but without a grid from southern Canada up here, again that is not economical for us. The future can spell that out for us and we have to keep those open. That is why I have directed and had our staff looking at having discussions between the Minister of ITI and companies like Avalon as well.

Let’s just say going forward that our 30 percent interest in this project, in this business case as the Premier speaks of it, if the dividends from that flow to this government are significant, is there any way of channelling, designating, allocating that dividend to do something to explore green and affordable energy options for other residents and businesses in the Northwest Territories?

I thank the Member for that clarification. In a forward looking position with PPA signed, with energy flowing, with the dividend being paid, and that’s how we would be able to do it. Right now through our Power Corporation, for example, we received a dividend to help offset our Territorial Power Support Program. We could use those funds as a dividend and target it towards alternative energies and enhancing that throughout the Northwest Territories. That is a possibility that we could do that as a shareholder in this partnership and draw down that cash and use it for things of that nature.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. The honourable Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to pursue our long-suffering Premier here with another round on the Taltson project. This project, of course, is embedded within the context of our NWT Hydro Strategy which was put out in 2008. I’ve commented in the House here and in committee a number of times on that draft strategy. I believe other Members have. There is no evidence that I have seen that any of those comments have come to roost anywhere. I think that it’s time that we did finalize that strategy, because a good vision would help guide the development of projects such as this and avoid this sort of situation where we’re trying to do things a little bit johnny-come-lately.

Will the Premier commit to leading now a final discussion towards a vision for a 50-year Hydro Strategy?

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The honourable Premier, Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would say I believe one of the Members mentioned 2003; 2003-2010 is not a johnny-come-lately approach. In fact, it has been well thought out and coming up with a business case that makes this work more. So towards the Member requesting that the Hydro Strategy be looked at again and updated with a more updated vision as to where we go, yes, let’s sit down together in committee. I believe there has been some commitment made and the Ministerial Coordination Committee along with Members would be glad to sit down and renew that strategy and update it. Many things have changed since that was initially put together.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I said johnny-come-lately because this side of the House at least is not convinced at all that sufficient consideration has been given to the public good in this project.

New considerations such as we have seen here today will not stop the process as the Premier implied. In fact, just last month Deze Corporation and the Hydro Corporation came up with a brand new un-contemplated place to cross Great Slave Lake. So now there’s a whole new process starting there. Of course, that means we don’t know what the routing is from the north side of the lake to the mines.

Another clarification is of course that what we’re saying does not preclude servicing the diamond mines at all. I don’t think we want that. So there is no settled route yet to the mines from the north side of Great Slave Lake, nor obviously a crossing point. This is an opportunity to focus on a crossing point that is selected in a way that provides the benefits of which we have been speaking. Will the Premier direct the Hydro Corporation to acknowledge and act on this direction?

The developer’s assessment report is out there. It has gone through hearings and, in fact, the Member has stated that the alternative line or routing in that one area is a result of that environmental review and the request by the band to go around the very significant and important area of the Lockhart River. That is being looked at. That option is being developed and will be presented on that basis. That additional cost would have to be borne by the project. That is what I keep going back to, to look at other routings, and we have provided that information to Members of those estimates of alternate routings, then add to the sale of kilowatt hours we need the customer base to be able to sell it to. If we can’t sell it, then we are unable to build it as we would have it in this day and age.

Again, I could request the Hydro Corporation representatives to make a presentation to committee on the latest.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. The time for question period has expired; however, I will allow the Member a supplementary question. Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate both commitments from the Premier there. Just to follow up on the greenhouse gas emissions, again the alternative routing does not preclude this, indeed, nor would we want it to. I think that’s a major objective that we want to retain.

The Hydro Corporation has shown incredible patience in awaiting agreements with the diamond mines for the power. Would the Premier direct the Hydro Corporation to also have discussions -- and this gets to his last point -- with Avalon, with Tyhee, with NICO, with Yellowknife, with Behchoko, to establish their interest and ability to pay for additional power, as some or all of these are somewhat diesel power consumers, as are the mines?