We will return to page 10-7. Due to the deferred motion of 10-17, does the committee agree they will defer the final consideration of Department of Education, Culture and Employment?

Thank you, committee. I would like to thank Minister Lafferty. I would like to thank Mr. Devitt and Ms. Iatridis for their time today. I will ask the Sergeant-at-Arms to please escort them out of the Chamber. We will be continuing with the next department.

Okay, committee members, I’ll just direct your attention to section 11, Transportation. I will be going to the Minister of Transportation. Does the Minister have any opening comments?

Yes, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

Then does the committee agree?

Go ahead, Minister Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is my pleasure to present the 2012-2013 Main Estimates for the Department of Transportation. The main estimates itemize the department’s requirements to carry out activities detailed in our annual business plan. This plan will continue to protect our transportation infrastructure as we work toward our primary mission for providing for the safe, secure, accessible and reliable movement of people and goods, while looking toward the future and responding to the needs of the communities and industry.

The department’s main estimates propose an operations expenditures budget of $120.4 million, which is an 8.7 percent increase from the 2011-12 Main Estimates. The increase is largely due to the debt service payment associated with the Deh Cho Bridge which will be part of the operations budget once the bridge is complete.

In 2012-13 the department will continue to champion partnerships with Aboriginal and northern governments toward improving the transportation system, such as the Mackenzie Valley all-weather highway. The partnerships we foster along the valley and to the Arctic Coast are instrumental in moving the project forward. As indicated in the Commissioner’s opening address, this government is committed to doing things differently, which is evident by the Department of Transportation reaching out to involve Northerners in project development right from project inception. The project description reports for the southern portions of the highway, completed with Aboriginal groups along the valley, are being combined into one document that could be submitted to regulators for initial screening, pending future funding. The department is continuing to work on potential next steps, including seeking additional funding to advance this project through the environmental review process. The added bonus of the Mackenzie Valley Highway project is the common transportation corridor that may be shared with the Mackenzie Valley Gas Project and the Fibre Optic Link Project, supporting these two other strategic infrastructure priorities of this Assembly.

The department will continue working on required planning for the Inuvik to Tuktoyaktuk highway. The environmental review is underway and is currently in the technical review phase. The draft environmental impact statement has been subjected to detailed scrutiny by the review board and interested parties. The assessment examined the impact of the proposed development, the significance of those impacts, proposed mitigation measures, and follow-up and monitoring programs. This technical review identified a number of information gaps and commitments for additional follow-up work that will be addressed this summer. We will continue to keep Members informed as the department moves forward with project planning activities.

A sustainable future for our territory includes responsible stewardship of the land and environment. The Department of Transportation’s O and M budget includes $142,000 in incremental funding from the Building Canada Plan for continuing research to address infrastructure challenges due to climate change. Various best research initiatives related to climate change are currently underway and a Climate Change Adaptation Plan will be completed this summer. The Department of Transportation has also

partnered with Transport Canada to help lead two national networks of expertise on climate change, one focusing on permafrost and the other on Arctic waters. These networks bring together researchers, scientists and practitioners to develop adaptation strategies and technologies to help mitigate the impacts of climate change. These activities will return dividends with valuable information leading to best practices for mitigating and adapting infrastructure to a changing climate.

In 2012-13 the department will continue construction of the Deh Cho Bridge. The bridge is the largest piece of transportation infrastructure in the NWT and the first to span the Mackenzie River. The historic opening will herald a new era of all-season access for people and goods into the North Slave region while increasing the reliability of access into the Slave Geological Province, thereby supporting the NWT economy and communities. The bridge is now in the final phase of construction, with the installation of the second tower and cables nearing completion. The bridge decking, grouting, paving and abutments and approaches are planned to be completed during the warm weather this summer and fall. The construction schedule remains a critical risk factor and the contractor has deployed extra workers over this next period to help meet critical milestones. The department is monitoring construction progress and costs very closely and is working with the contractor toward achieving the fall completion date.

Forced growth accounts for $1.198 million of the increase to the department’s O and M budget. The additional funding covers increasing fixed costs to deliver programs in various NWT regions. Much of the department’s forced growth is attributed to operation and maintenance contract increases in the airport, highway and marine activities, as well as additional operational pressures related to a more rigorous regulatory environment. Such investments are critical to maintain public safety and the integrity of the NWT highway system.

To increase employment opportunities where they are needed most, the department will continue in delivering the Marine Training Program, the Aviation Career Development Program and apprenticeship positions, with the goal of increasing the number of Northerners training and working in transportation-related fields.

The department has also made significant gains in the area of prevention. The Northwest Territories has been fatality-free on our roads, trails and waterways for more than 15 months and counting. I sincerely hope this unprecedented safety streak continues. Drive Alive, the department’s education awareness program, continues to advocate for individuals to make safer choices, including wearing seatbelts, helmets and personal flotation devices. Recent legislative changes that prohibit the use of

hand-held devices are now in effect and should help to reduce incidents of distracted driving and help keep our roads safer.

As a department which provides a broad range of services to the public, I also wanted to note that the main estimates are forecasting an increase in general revenues for the 2012-13 year of approximately $500,000. The revenue increase is representative of the modest traffic increase projected on our highway and air systems and the resulting revenues related to user fees such as landing fees and commercial vehicle registrations. The department is currently conducting a rigorous review of all service fees to ensure they are fair, equitable and reasonable.

Thank you for the opportunity to provide a short update on the Department of Transportation’s main estimates. I look forward to discussing them with you in detail. Mahsi.

Thank you, Minister Ramsay. Does the Minister have witnesses you wish to bring into the House?

Yes, I do.

Thank you, Minister Ramsay. Does the committee agree?

Thank you. Can I get the Sergeant-at-Arms to bring the witnesses into the House, please?

Thank you. Minister Ramsay, would you like to introduce your witnesses to the committee here?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. To my right I’ve got the deputy minister of the Department of Transportation, Mr. Russell Neudorf and to my left the assistant deputy minister, Department of Transportation, Mr. Daniel Auger. Thank you.

I’d like to welcome the witnesses into the House. I hope you’ve caught your breath. I saw you racing in here on your bike, so that’s good. We’re going to be opening up the floor here to general comments. What we’ve been doing here is opening comments to the Members, and the Minister will have an opportunity for reply at the end. We’d ask that the Minister take notes and hope to address the individual Members if there are specific questions in the opening comments. With that, I will open up the floor to general comments on Transportation starting with Mr. Menicoche.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I won’t go on too long. I look forward to deliberation as we go through line by line. I press the case for most particularly Highway No. 7. I’ve been leading that charge for some time now. I look forward to, I’m going to have to agree with government, I guess, and look forward to the fall deliberations to get some capital funding and hope

that we do get our fair share to address highway concerns on Highway No. 7.

Just with that, it’s just around the corner and I’m pleased that the Minister of Transportation will be travelling with me down Highway No. 7 this coming Friday and I look forward to that. The constituents are anticipating that visit as well. That’s something that I think is important for any Minister, is to see and feel the issues that are out there in the constituencies.

I’m still dismayed that there’s no money in this year’s capital budget, but I do look forward to maximizing the capital carryovers that will happen. I think about $1.3 million. We’ll make our best use of them this year.

I think earlier in the year, too, I think the January-February session, I got the commitment from the Minister to expend all these funds before August-September when we run into rain issues. I just, once again, would like the Minister to reiterate that, that he will convey to his department that they’ll complete the work that’s scheduled for the Nahendeh riding. I think there’s also some chipsealing around Checkpoint towards Fort Simpson that’s got to be completed when the weather’s good, not when it’s bad.

Constituents have always raised with me that due to the wet roads, the chipseal falls apart quickly. There’s probably no need for that. Once again, it would be timely to capitalize the early time this season to complete our construction work. There should be no issue and I think that we would look forward to that. That was one of the commitments and I’ve conveyed that to my constituents, as well, that the commitment is there and I certainly look forward to the early work being done.

There are other concerns, as well, out there, especially driving up to the continuation of the highway up to Wrigley. It’s gravel. In some places it’s very thin. I think in the past I’ve actually identified those kilometre areas for upgrades or widening. I’m not too sure if it’s on the books either, but the residents of Wrigley want to see completion of their projects there as well. I know there’s some maintenance issues scheduled there. I’m not too sure if there are any culverts at all, but the culverts that were being worked on last year really improved the highway system up towards Wrigley and we certainly look forward to more work on that section of the highway as well.

With that, I just wanted to raise those few issues here in the opening comments and I look forward to further deliberation as we move into the budget.

Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. On general comments we have Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Transportation department is going to be a very

important department in the next five to 10 years from now. I see that there’s an 8.7 percent increase from 2011-2012 Main Estimates and I’m hoping that the increase will be higher and larger in the coming years.

I do want to take this time here to let the Transportation Minister know that we really need to get specific down to some of the highway strategies for the upcoming years. We have put some money aside already for the Mackenzie Valley Highway. Specifically, the federal government’s contribution to the Tuk-Inuvik highway. That highway is on the books, there’s commitment, and that’s a fact.

The other fact is that the Minister of Transportation and this afternoon the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment talked about the oil and gas potential activity in the Northwest Territories. He talked about the potential that may happen in the Sahtu. We need to look at our infrastructure priorities and nailing down some specific infrastructure priorities in transportation in the Sahtu. That will be our next priority. I think that needs to be discussed.

Ottawa needs to know that we have our priorities set here in infrastructure and that we would like to see that part of the highway that’s been planned through the PDR and the other good work being a priority of this government and this Transportation Minister possibly looking at a road from Norman Wells south. Start working to be supported by industry or government. We need to see that this is going to take some effort from this department and put this into a new highway or from Wrigley south. Either way, we need to get the portion of that highway system on the go and up and running.

That is sort of the hard statement I’m making here. We’re here for three years. We have limited time here. We need to get these on the books. Mr. Miltenberger said there’s a surplus of $74 million and that the GNWT has plans for the surplus in this year’s and next year’s budget. They need to start focusing on expanding roads, schools, airports and other public service facilities. I’d like to see the government’s priorities for infrastructure. He’s talking about starting focusing on expanding roads. For me, expanding roads means building new roads. The one, Tuk-Inuvik, that’s already on the books. We can start with other priorities. Ottawa needs to know what our other priorities are. What infrastructure priorities. We don’t have the means to take out the resources. We’re lacking, surely lacking the infrastructure and support from this government to support this Northwest Territories economy. We need roads and marine services support. We need to look at that.

On the Northwest Territories/Yukon border there is a project going up there called the Selwyn-Chihong Resources. They’re putting permits in place to extract the lead-zinc. It’s one of the world’s largest

deposits of lead-zinc. Mind you, there’s about 85 to 90 percent of the mine on the Yukon border, but they’re using the Northwest Territories section to move the lead-zinc out down to the southern markets. They’re putting in the plan to build an all-weather road on the Northwest Territories side. They are downsizing because of the world market, just like the Mackenzie Gas Project is downsizing because of the natural gas prices. APG has downsized their office and one company has pulled out of the project and Imperial Oil has downsized their project. Selwyn Resources is going to use that section of the road. It’s going to hook to the North Canol Road going to the Yukon. We need to know if this government is going to put a few graders or a CAT or a truck to maintain that small section of the road. In our books it’s still our road. As much as you say no, no, this and that, it’s still on our books. In our books it’s still our road. Unless you take it right off and say it’s no longer our road, then I believe you. Right now you’re minimizing it by telling me it’s not going to be used much. Once Selwyn puts that road in and they start taking out that lead-zinc, that’s going to be a busy road.

I think you have a lot of surplus. You’ve got a lot of old dump trucks. I’ve seen them in some of your garages. Some of the old vehicles are still being used by them. You have good mechanics because they keep running and working well. You have a good staff there, Mr. Minister. They work hard. Kudos to them.

I’m looking at putting some of that old surplus there. I keep getting lots of reasons why we aren’t able or can’t and just won’t do it. We need to support that. It is a private road. Selwyn has a private road but they are going to go onto our road and there are going to be a lot of tourists coming through there to get to the Canol. That’s the Promised Land. I’d like him to see the work in that area.

The resources in the North are very rich. Yellowknife is very rich, very fortunate. They have a lot of things going for them. Very good for them. The department is doing some pretty good work. I support the Minister and staff. Get some good contractors doing the winter road. They do a good job on those roads.

We have good Aboriginal contractors who have negotiated good contracts with the department to build capacity in our regions. The principles of the negotiated contract are working. I want to support that with our contractors. I have seen where contractors have come from outside of the Sahtu that try to get into the Sahtu with low prices that just about drove our companies to their graves. Our boys stay there. Our women stay there. We pay the taxes, we pay the fuel and we live there. Thank God that negotiated contracts keep our companies alive. I want to say to the Minister we support – the other side is making me laugh. I want to say to the

Minister that the principles of the negotiated contract have worked for us. That’s what I wanted to say. I have seen it in my nine years. I want to say, continue working with the contractors in the Sahtu and other communities.

I have other questions for the Minister as we go page by page.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. On general comments I have Mr. Bouchard.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Department of Transportation is one of the larger budgets and one of the most interesting, and one of the ones that I probably get the most calls about.

One of the first issues I want to bring up with the department in the processes that they have, I know the department has reviewed and tried to deliberate on how to implement their contracts, their tenders and their projects. I’ve been getting a lot of complaints on the fact that a lot of the projects are getting overwhelmingly large and being bundled together. Whether it’s the culvert projects or whether it’s signage or whether it’s some of the drainage work that’s being done, it’s all being lumped into one big contract. Some of the smaller contractors and some of the manufacturers aren’t able to bid on the department’s contracts as they stand. I’d like them to spend more attention to allowing northern content to be maximized.

Along the same line of thought in the maximization of northern content are the negotiated contracts. I understand the department’s concept of trying to keep the work in the North and often to the Aboriginal companies or northern companies, but we also have to make sure that those companies go forward and maximize their expenditures in the North, in the region.

Some of the issues that the department is working with is the Tuk to Inuvik highway, and I look forward to the information that the department is going to spend on getting what those costs will be, the future debate and discussions with the federal government on this 75/25 split, and is that 75/25 split the same amount if that budget goes way up above our estimated costs right now.

I’m also looking forward to, like my colleague from the Sahtu, the continued discussion and the future plans for the Mackenzie Valley Highway and the future plans for that project.

The Deh Cho Bridge, obviously, one of the big issues for the incoming Minister, I would think, as he was a big advocate of getting this bridge done as quickly as possible so we can mitigate some of the high costs that are already there. Along with that bridge, I have some concerns on how the toll system will be set up in the future here, what the costs are going to be to the general public, and how

that’s going to affect contractors and shipping companies.

One of the other areas that I have concern with is the safety programs. The Drive Alive, I think it’s going well, but I think we need to work on some of the highways that are of concern. I will give a plug for Highway No. 7. I think it’s a key factor for tourism in the south and also Yellowknife. I think we have a big group of people that travel the Alaska Highway that are looking for ways to come back or visit another territory, and that’s one avenue. One of the issues out there is that Highway No. 7 is passable most of the time in the summertime, but lots of time you have to put it with the disclosure if it’s not raining, if it hasn’t been raining, it’s fine to go down. But if it isn’t, then there are a lot of people that are not recommending to travel it. That’s part of the year.

I’d like to give the department a little bit of a compliment. This is one of the rare departments where the jobs are out in the regions. I think it’s natural just because of the business they do, the grader work, the work out on the roads has to be done regionally, so I commend them on that. That’s one of the rare departments that I see that we actually have a decentralized department.

From Hay River’s perspective, we’d like to see some additional dredging being done in Hay River, dock maintenance, some dollars spent in that area. We’re seeing more and more difficulties with ships, whether it be large ships such as NTCL’s boats or the fishing industry having difficulty, even recreational vehicles having difficulty getting in and out of the waterways easily. We need to look at finding dollars to do some of that maintenance.

One of the areas that the department has just newly introduced is the new motor vehicle system. I’ve heard lots of complaints about the system. I think it was launched a little early and it needs to be updated. I think, again, the regions need some control and they’re not given those controls to change the system. The system is closed in and is being controlled by Yellowknife and is being handled by Yellowknife. That’s fine if Yellowknife is available immediately, but if Yellowknife is backlogged with complaints, then the system in the region is backlogged and those customers are backlogged. We need to get that system working better.

One of the other areas of concern in this department is the large carryovers. It is a large budget, and I understand it’s been a large budget in the last few years, even larger, but we have large percentages of the budget that are being carried over. I think we need to make sure that those numbers go down and we get those dollars out to the region, especially when we have an economic downturn right now in the territory. I think we need to put that money out to the territory and let the

contractors have that work, and like I indicated earlier, make sure that we’re maximizing northern economy and making sure that the money is staying in the North. I think this department is a large economic driver and I hope that we get all the carryovers completed this year.

I’ll have more questions in the detail. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bouchard. Speaking to general comments, I have Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I’ll keep them brief here. I know that the department is doing some work in the fuel efficiency area, particularly in the marine transportation and in some of the greening of the transportation facilities. This is good work that needs to continue and, in fact, needs to be government-wide. For the Department of Transportation, the potential gains compared to the emissions of greenhouse gases, for example, are pretty modest. So, much more serious is the greenhouse gas emissions and environmental impacts from transportation activity itself.

I’d like to know what this department is doing to ensure net emissions from transportation decline over time as per our goals of the greenhouse strategy, the goals of this government and hopefully all governments around the world, and particularly what programs of support does this department have for businesses and residents. What sorts of standards are they providing? What education and what legislation is being considered ultimately to achieve this?

Just sort of related to that, I want to comment briefly on one part of the Minister’s opening remarks where he refers a couple times to mitigating the impacts of climate change. It’s presented almost as a positive thing, and to some degree it is, because we need to adapt to the problems that climate change is bringing to us, but the basic message cannot be confused here that climate change has impacts. When we have to mitigate those impacts, those are costly and those are costing us more and more every year. What we really want to do is focus. We need to mitigate the impacts of climate change, but more important than that, according to all the science, we need to mitigate climate change itself. As with all of our programs, prevention is the rule.

I’m going to leave it at that. Thanks for this opportunity.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Speaking to general comments, I have Mr. Blake.