I, once again, appreciate the Member’s comments. The one thing that’s difficult to get an average on, of course, is, while we can do it for the money, is the weather.
If I could just point to British Columbia for the previous two fire seasons where they had a budget in the neighbourhood of $50 million and had these extraordinary weather conditions where they spent nearly $500 million. That’s part of the challenge. But I take the point of the Members that the base budget is too low. We know that come July even just the starting of costs is going to put us close to exhausting our budget. I make note of those concerns.
Some of these other investments in the supplementary appropriation are good investments. We didn’t really count on it because we didn’t know it was coming. For example, the Inuvik school is going to possibly save us money and allows the project to be completed sooner. It’s a cash flow issue, not so much as a cash issue. We’re challenged to be able to respond to those kinds of good investments that put pressure on us in the short term but in the long run are to our collective benefit.