Thank you, Mr. Chair. As the Minister referred to this, the purpose of this amendment is twofold. The primary purpose is to address immediate need to make the $65 million on March 31st , and on April 1st the GNWT will be back
under even the current limit when we get our first payment from the Government of Canada on our territorial financing grant.
The second element of this increase is just to recognize the growth in our operations since 1995. They’ve essentially doubled since then. The volume of cash that flows in and out of our Consolidated Revenue Fund is quite significant and it’s become harder and harder to project what our year-end cash flow needs are going to be. So all this amendment is doing is providing the authority to manage that cash more efficiently. We’re certainly not planning to utilize that full amount.
As the Minister also referenced, our current fiscal strategy does start to recoup our cash balances by the third or fourth year of that strategy. We won’t be anywhere near this limit. Thank you.