Thanks to the Premier. That’s good. I would like to see that. If a statement is made and a Minister or a Member believes it to be true – Ministers in particular, if it’s a policy commitment – what action takes place on the part of either Cabinet or staff to follow through and ensure that that information is correct or not?

I guess, first of all, we don’t go back and review all of the Hansard to make sure there were no incorrect statements. But going forward, if we have staff that track Hansard to make sure that if there are incorrect statements that are not consistent with government policy, they bring it to our attention, either to the individual Minister or to Cabinet. Then we take the appropriate action to make sure that the statements that we make are accurate, correct, and up to date.

Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Thank you to the Premier. I wasn’t going backwards. I was referring to the current Assembly. The Premier said that action would be taken. Does that action involve informing the Member that the information in the House is incorrect and advising the Member of what the correct information is?

Generally, the individual Ministers that make commitments, their departments will bring it to their attention. In other cases where we have Cabinet Ministers that have experience in the different departments and if they become aware of it, then we would bring it to the Minister’s attention. Then we would deal with it appropriately.

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

Thank you, Mrs. Groenewegen. The Minister of Human Resources, Mr. Abernethy.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. That’s done on a regular basis by the individual departments themselves. They always have to look inwards and make sure that the services that are provided are being met and that they have the staff complement to do that. The Department of Human Resources does offer advice and guidance with respect to organizational design and workloads and work flow, but at the end of the day, ultimately, it’s the responsibility of every department and the deputy head to do that analysis and make sure that analysis is done.

As a note, I think in the last vacancy report that was provided to Regular Members, it identified at least 180 positions that need to be deleted within the Government of the Northwest Territories as they are no longer utilized and are sitting vacant with no expectation to fill. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Abernethy, in his fulsome answer, actually went on to some of the other questions I was going to ask, like when was the last time we actually identified obsolete positions within the public service. I’m not just thinking about those that are vacant. There may be some that are occupied that are obsolete, if that may be possible. The Minister is saying that it is the deputy minister’s role. From what we see of deputy ministers around here, they are pretty busy people. Deputy ministers are pretty busy folks. I’d like to ask if there is any other way of monitoring this to ensure that everybody that is in one of those government cubicles has enough of a workload to constitute a full-time job. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, the Member is absolutely correct; deputy ministers are incredibly busy. But in every structure, as everybody would know, there is a delegation of responsibilities and there are ADMs, directors, managers and line supervisors. All of those individuals are responsible for ensuring that staff is adequately resourced and that they have work to do. When they don’t have work to do, that’s an analysis that has to be shared up the chain of command so that the individuals at the higher levels can make informed decisions.

With respect to individuals in jobs that may no longer be required, we as a public service have an obligation and responsibility to our employees to keep them busy. If we can’t keep them busy in their jobs, they’re redundant, then we have policies and procedures to move people to different positions. But before we can ever delete a position like the 180 that I have previously referenced, we do have to have them deleted or vacant before we actually officially delete them from our system. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I will try and be more brief. I’m sorry. It doesn’t seem like there would be much incentive for directors or people in management positions to identify obsolete positions within their organization. Really, I don’t know what incentive there would be to report that because that means less people working for them. That might diminish their role as director. I know that sounds like kind of a sinister conclusion, but what incentive would senior managers have to identify positions that are no longer needed or not busy enough to constitute a full-time job? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I’d say that that’s one of the first things they’re looking at, especially in times of passive restraint or when we’re trying to make sure that we have the dollars to deliver programs. We need to make sure that every dollar we spend is being spent efficiently and effectively, so deputy heads would be pushing that pressure down into the bureaucracy to make sure

the people are utilizing the resources to the best benefit. We have a lot of programs and services we have to deliver here in the Government of the Northwest Territories. The vast majority of our dollars are going to salary, so if we want programs, we have to look internally and where there’s no work, we have to make the hard choices to eliminate positions. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. Final, short supplementary, Mrs. Groenewegen.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Has the government and has the Minister ever contemplated an outside review of positions by department to ensure that we are not overstaffed in various departments? Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, we already have the program review office which has reviewed different divisions and different sections and different functions, so they can provide us advice on eliminations if they think they’re necessary. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. Mr. Hawkins.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to use the occasion of oral questions today to reaffirm my concerns I highlighted in my Member’s statement, which were the cost of the royalties associated with the gravel cost. The issue is quite simple as far as I’m concerned. I would like the Inuvialuit to agree to waive their royalty fee. Now, that doesn’t mean they don’t get to charge for the gravel. I think fair market rate is fair in whatever they decide to do, but it is the royalty fee to be very clear. That would also, in my view, demonstrate two things. The first one, it would show that they have skin in the game on this particular project. To my knowledge they are not investing in this project. Second of all, this would be something so critical that we’d be putting the money into the construction of the road rather than paying for the royalty fee. It would actually cause me to sway towards supporting this particular highway initiative.

My question is, of course, to the Minister of Transportation. At this point, what is the estimated royalty fee that the Inuvialuit would demand for the construction of this highway on the gravel fees? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. The honourable Minister of Transportation, Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The granular royalties are part of the Inuvialuit Land Claim. It’s their right to charge granular royalties on that material. Today we continue to try to work with the Inuvialuit on a royalty regime for the Tuk-Inuvik

highway and we are trying to negotiate the best deal for both parties. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I’m trying to phrase this in a manner that makes the most sense. I’d like to support this highway. I’d like to have reasons to support this highway. We have clear issues. Last week the Minister of Transportation said we had a $299 million estimate for this particular highway construction. So the royalty fee must be built into that estimate as the cost of the highway. We have a $299 million estimate to build a highway, so we must know what the royalty fee is and that’s what I’m asking the Minister to lay before the House. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, the Member would know the answer to that question. He was at the briefing two weeks ago. Again, we are trying to negotiate with the Inuvialuit. We hope to get a discounted rate on the royalties that would enable the Member to be swayed to support the project. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, last week I was asking him questions, or maybe it was the beginning of this week. After five weeks the weeks and days roll together. The other day I was asking the Minister to lay this type of detail down in a public document, one that everyone can see, but the way it’s looking at this point is nobody is going to know the details of the information until the deal is done. How is that fair for public accountability? That’s why I’m asking once again. It’s the Minister’s right to put this number out in the public. It’s not a confidentiality issue with committee; it’s the Minister’s choice. Would the Minister finally lay this price out on the table so we know what we’re talking about in reference to the $299 million fee? What is he afraid of? I dare him to do it.

It’s a good thing it’s not truth or dare, Mr. Speaker. We have our Premier discussing it with the Inuvialuit. We haven’t got a negotiated settlement on the royalties. When we do have, we fully intend to make all of the information public. The Member was privy to the discussion at committee two weeks ago. As soon as we get a completed deal – we don’t negotiate in public, we don’t do that – we’ll share it with the Members, we’ll share it with the public, and everybody will know exactly what it is we are getting ourselves into. Thank you.