Thank you. For that we’ll go to Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I will go to the deputy for some specifics, but just a reminder to committee that we deal with a huge range of contracts from small capital to larger capital to, sort of, more administrative contracts. So everyone would be slightly different. We’d use the same policies and procedures, but for specifics I’ll go to the deputy.

Thank you, Minister Abernethy. Mr. Guy.

Thank you, Mr. Guy. Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you. Do we have any policy that focuses in on northern versus southern type of contractor, whereas by way of an example we have an expectation that a Northerner can use either a deposit or a bond, but southern contractors with zero investment here in the North must go by bond?

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Minister Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. It’s not specific to that. It really depends on the size of the contract, the magnitude of the contract, the cost of the contract, not where a vendor happens to be located.

Why on large contracts – and I’m not going to try to be too specific or we’d be here all day – do we have a policy that it’s only bond versus deposit?

I don’t believe that is the case, but for specifics we’ll go to the deputy.

Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. Mr. Guy.

Thank you, Mr. Guy. Mr. Hawkins.

What is the typical deposit range asked for when someone cannot get a bonding, that is a southern contractor? Also, the same question, if they are a northern contractor what is the range?

Okay, well, in a construction-type contract where we’re building, say, a warehouse, by way of example, just to make life simple, and the warehouse is $2 million – perhaps not unlike the one that’s proposed in Tuktoyaktuk, $1 million planning, $1 million in construction fees, or something like that. A $2 million project on a warehouse. If a southern company won this bid, what would their deposit be if they couldn’t get bonding, and if a local company out of Tuktoyaktuk wanted to do this project and they couldn’t get bonding, what type of deposit would be in that range?

Would the Minister be willing to get me some information on how the application and some examples of both the bond and deposits are put on our capital works projects, as well as specifically break out northern versus southern contractors?

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We can provide that information to committee for Public Works and Services managed and administered contracts.

I’ll thank him for that. The next question I would have is: Do we have a policy on our projects that we implement or contract or sign on where they must pay their northern suppliers or their workforce or their subs within a certain amount of time?

I would suggest that payment schedules are negotiated between our primary and their subcontractors. We don’t have a position on that subcontract.

Is there any reason why we wouldn’t have a position noting the circumstance for an obvious dispute? That’s an easy one to say if there were disputes it may not be easy to fulfill, say within three weeks. Why wouldn’t the Government of the Northwest Territories have a policy to say that the general must pay a contractor within, say, 30 days of fulfilling their obligations met within the contract unless there is a dispute to ensure northern contractors get paid in a timely way?

Some of that would be dealt with by the bonding companies but also negotiations between the primary and the sub based on the accounting practices and operations of the primary as well as the sub. The accountability and liability in those contracts lie between the primary and the sub and not between the GNWT

and the sub. So it would be a responsibility of the primary to do that.