Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Like every other arm of government, we are very aware of the fiscal constraints that we operate under. When we looked and we did years of work mainly with Meyers Norris Penny, looking at all the planes and it came down to also having the hat of the Finance Minister on, and as I was looking at this, what can we come forward in good conscience to tell the Legislature to make the case of what is the best way forward. The discussion was very quickly that the 802s could meet our needs at a fraction of the cost of getting four 215s or four 415s, three times, four times more for a plane that has a season that’s three months, four months long and what would meet our interests and what would we afford, what could save us money if we bought them, what’s easier on gas and what is able to do the work.
So we know that we’ll be able to keep the fleet of 802s in the air for less than what we’re currently paying to keep the 215s in the air. If we were going to pay, and it comes down to money, if we’re going to pay for the 802s and keep the 415s operational, flight ready, forest firefighting ready, then it would be if not the $4 million, it would be probably well over $2 million to $3 million a year that we’d have to add to our base budget.
Back to the issue of if the 802s are overextended as they would have been this year, or the 215s were this year, then we would be invoking the clauses in the MARS Agreement with the other jurisdictions and we would look at bringing in equipment and planes like we did from BC, Alberta, Alaska, Ontario, Nova Scotia, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, wherever they were available.
I guess the other thing to keep in mind, as well, the 802s, if we have a mild fire season, we would be able to put to use wherever they’re requested. Right now the 215s that we have in operation for us are so old and so behind the times in terms of liability and risk management that we can’t export them because the other jurisdictions do not want to have the issue of things that may go wrong, plus the access to avgas. So they’re not exportable for us, to us in Canada. So they’re basically stuck here, so standby would be a very expensive proposition. Thank you.