Agreed. We’ll commence after a short break.

---SHORT RECESS

I’d like to call Committee of the Whole back to order. Committee, we have agreed to consider TD 22-17(5) Northwest Territories Main Estimates, 2014-2015. The Minister does not have witnesses to bring into the House, so we will commence with general comments. Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have a number of questions that don’t need to be answered today. Many of them are rhetorical, but in looking at the budget address, I found it raised a number of questions in my mind. I don’t need answers that are detailed, but I do want to raise a number of concerns that I have.

Right off the top, the budget address stated that Members had helped with the budget. Yes, we certainly had input into the budget. We certainly had any number of meetings where we provided our comments, but like other Members, I don’t really feel that this budget reflects the handprint of Regular Members.

I mentioned the other day, and I have to mention it again, I am particularly disturbed about the percentage of our resource revenues that is going to go to the Heritage Fund. The budget is based on 5 percent, and as I mentioned the other day, there certainly is evidence that 25 percent is a much more realistic number. It’s what I would say the majority of residents want, and it certainly is something that I think the Finance Minister heard during his consultations, but it seems to me that it was ignored.

I’m trying to understand the logistics of the way the cash is going to flow from our resource revenues. From what I understand of the budget, we’re intending to spend our resource revenues in this budget year of ’14-15, but we’re not going to actually receive the dollars until ’15-16. I think it’s some 16 months after the beginning of this fiscal year is when we’re going to actually get those resource revenues, so the only thing I can figure is that we are going to borrow in order to spend the resource revenues that are identified in the budget but that we don’t have the cash for yet. So I guess that is a question that I could appreciate an answer from the Minister on.

I mentioned the other day, as well, that there’s no new revenue source in the budget, and that really concerns me. I’ve mentioned this every year for, I think, the five or six years that I’ve been here. We certainly have an inflationary increase on taxes and

fees, and that’s a good thing. We’ve established a policy whereby liquor and tobacco, for instance, the taxes on those go up every year, and our fees, the fees that we charge, those are increased based on inflation every year. But we need, as Mr. Dolynny said I think it was last week, a new revenue source, and I have yet to hear from the government that they’re willing to identify and to look into a new revenue source, and so I would hope that the Minister, in light of the loss of tax revenue that we’re experiencing this year, I would hope that the Minister is going to commit to actually do something about finding a new revenue source and establishing a new revenue source, because we definitely need to increase our revenues.

I’m surprised, and I mentioned the drop in our corporate income taxes, and I think the Minister has said it’s somewhere around 30 or 40 million dollars, and I am quite surprised that that’s mentioned in the budget address, but at the same time, the Minister said that we still expect to spend $100 million on our capital. I’m having a little trouble reconciling that we have this huge drop in revenue but we are still able to spend more on our capital than we did in this current budget year.

The other thing is that the budget address states that our revenues are up 2.8 percent, and it says that our tax reduction, so the loss of our $30 million in taxes, is offset by an increase in our federal grant, so I’m having difficulty reconciling. We’re losing $30 million. We’re gaining $30 million on our grant. The net result is that our revenues are going up 2.8 percent, and yet it sounds as though we’re in a deep hole.

One of the things that again I have to ask rhetorically, is if, as was suggested by the Minister, I think, in answer to questions, is if we are so strapped, if we have to exercise fiscal restraint, what are we doing spending money on new initiatives? Why are we not funding those new initiatives from within? Why are we not using internal reallocation? I think it’s been said by Members quite often before, new initiatives don’t have to have new money, and when we don’t have new money, which is what we’re hearing, then we shouldn’t be using new money for our new initiatives or we shouldn’t have new initiatives at all. I’m not so sure I would agree with that though.

The Minister has mentioned in the last few days that we can expect a $30 million supplementary appropriation coming up in the near future. It will impact this particular budget year, and I think he said that it is cost-driven expenditures. I understand that, but every year that I’ve been here, we have overspent our budget, and I wonder, in the 2014-15 O and M budget how have we planned and how will we plan for the over-expenditure of budget which we know is coming. It’s something which I don’t think we do well. We basically set our budget, we

set a contingency for that budget, which I believe is in this budget as well, and then we overspend that contingency, I think, regularly just like clockwork.

We’ve heard, certainly in the last year and I believe it carries forward into this new year as well, that we need to do short-term borrowing in order for us to operate fiscally from day to day, from month to month, and that cash flow is a problem. So I don’t quite know how this new budget, how the 2014-15 budget is going to address our cash flow problem and our short-term borrowing problem.

I have some concerns about the Mineral Development Strategy. There is about $2 million that’s going into the Mineral Development Strategy actions to address that, and I am concerned that much of this $2 million is going to go to industry, who I feel are generally well financed anyway. Maybe some junior exploration companies are not, but I really feel that we could be putting a lot of that money, a lot of that $2 million into other areas where we have great demands. It makes me wonder whether or not there was a cost-benefit analysis that was done to prove the value of putting money into the Mineral Development Strategy.

Did we look at what we’re going to gain by spending this money on industry? Did we look at whether or not our social programs would be a better cost benefit than putting money into the Mineral Development Strategy?

I find that this government, almost to a fault, pushes economic development without considering the effect that that economic development is going to have on our programs and services. That is a concern that exists for me.

We have a number of major projects, I guess, which have been mentioned a number of times. The Mackenzie Valley fibre optic link, we have the hydro expansion dream, we have Stanton Hospital renovations, we have the Mackenzie Valley Highway and they are all great projects, but I wondered, as I considered the budget address, why we are struggling to do them ourselves. There was talk of P3s a little while ago. That seems to have disappeared. Private partnerships, Aboriginal governments, other government partnerships, where are they?

I am especially concerned about the hydro project. From what I understand, we are spending money in this next budget year to prove whether or not there is a business case. My recollection is that we have spent many millions of dollars to date trying to prove a business case for another project. Do we really need to spend another many millions of dollars to try and prove a business case for this project that, in my mind, is really quite circumspect in terms of whether or not it’s going to make us money.

There has been a lot of talk about the increase to the borrowing limit. Some people are for it, some people are against it. I can see a value in increasing our borrowing limit to the level that the Finance Minister would like to see it, but it really depends on how it’s used, in my mind. If we have a borrowing limit of $1.8 million, it would allow us to do some of the major projects that we can’t do right now because we are so close to our borrowing limit.

I think we have been fiscally prudent as a government and I think that we do manage our debt quite responsibly, so if we had the room in our borrowing limit and a major project did come along, it would give us the opportunity to be able to do it. But I’m not advocating that because we get a $1.8 million borrowing limit that we need to immediately borrow up to that limit. That’s not at all what I would want to see.

Mr. Chairman, I see that my time is fast evaporating. If I have an opportunity to come back again, I would ask you to put me back on the list. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. We’ll definitely do that. Because there was a lot of information in that opening comment, I will allow the Minister the opportunity to respond to individual Members during general comments. Minister Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The fundamental question that keeps coming up, even though it’s in our consensus system, is the concern by some Members that somehow they don’t feel that this budget process is inclusive enough, that the budget doesn’t have clear and visible handprints of the Regular Members, when I would suggest to you that things like all day kindergarten was an initiative pushed by the Members, or on-the-land programs. If you want, I have a list on my desk upstairs of the things in this budget alone, let alone every other budget that we have reviewed, where we have tried to work collaboratively with the Regular Members, yet the complaint, budget after budget, is that somehow the perception is that it ends up being done in isolation.

As I said in the House the other day, this is a process where the government proposes a budget to the Legislative Assembly. The government proposes, the Legislature disposes. We have walked through this process now for decades, and when the budget is approved at the end of the day, it tends to be approved almost unanimously.

If there were significant changes, for example, if Members said we don’t support any new initiatives, we want all those funds taken out of the budget, we would be listening very, very closely. If the concern is that those types of things are there, even though we just got a letter that said you wanted all the previous initiatives that were agreed to funded, and you want all the new initiatives in this year over and

above what was in the budget funded, if there was a reconsideration of that position, that would be very helpful as we look at the management issue of sustainability.

With the budget we have before the House, if it’s approved as is, it would leave us with $142 million of borrowing room.

The press didn’t quite get the story right when they said that there is a $200 million surplus. What they didn’t mention was that we passed a capital budget in October worth considerably more than that, and we‘re obligated to find savings within the O and M budget to help offset that cost, which is what the $200 million is for. We did that and we are still borrowing money for capital and we are going to be in the borrowing mode here for the next four or five years.

Yes, the resource revenues don’t flow to 2016. We have set ourselves up to manage our way to that date and we will continue to do that.

The issue of no new revenues versus building our economic base, the issue of taxation versus building our economic base, increasing our population, putting in that critical infrastructure that’s going to promote economic development is a path to the same end. If there is debate over taxation to industry, resource tax, land rent tax, mineral tax, we can have those, but we know we have at least one mine, or two mines that are within the end of their life, and if we add to the cost to Northerners, if we increase income tax, if we increase other costs in one of the most high cost territories, jurisdictions in the country, it seems to be counter-intuitive that somehow that is going to encourage people to move here, it is going to encourage business to do business, it is going to encourage people to stay, it is going to encourage students to come back. The much more productive and constructive way, in our mind, is to expand our economic base.

When we’re in the House with Mr. Kalgutkar and Deputy Minister Aumond, I would be happy to walk through the whole list of percentages that the Member, in her mind, didn’t seem to add up. The supps that we bring in are demand driven, and the one that’s going to be coming into this House, you will see has fairly significant demands on the health side, which we know it’s coming, we never know how much it’s going to be and it depends on the uptake. It’s in keeping with some of the concerns that were raised in this House during question period about mental health, for example, and what are we going to do about it and there’s a huge demand, and sometimes it reaches a point where there is an intervention by the government or Health and Social Services.

We are going to continue to use short-term borrowing to keep us moving. But the reality is, and it feeds into the debate over the Heritage Fund and

how much money should be going in there, we are basically spending almost every cent that we take in, plus we are still borrowing. We are managing and working very hard to manage that issue because it can easily tip the wrong way. We are very concerned about that, hence the 5 percent in the Heritage Fund versus the 25 percent which in a perfect world I think everybody would like to see. But given all the concerns and the numbers that the Members raised about how come we are doing this and why are we spending this money and why, if we don’t have new money, are we spending it is a good question.

The issue of funding from within is one that’s easy to say and hard to do. We have to keep in mind that when we touch inclusive schooling and what we are proposing to fund with the junior kindergarten, that’s being done through some reallocation. It’s a very, very modest amount and that alone causes significant angst.

The issue of the Mineral Development Strategy and what’s better and why are we putting it into business development and not into social programs, the reality is we are spending $1.2 billion on social programs, roughly, out of our budget, $1.1 billion or $1.2 billion. What we need is to be able to have a strong economic base to support and pay for those social programs, so you need to invest some money at the front end to promote and support and sustain and balance environmentally sensitive resource development and other economic development like the Mackenzie Valley fibre optic link. We always have to keep in mind, as legislators, the whole 360 degree, full circle of demands on the table. We can’t just focus on one at the exclusion of the other. At the end of the day, we have to keep in mind how do we pay for everything. It’s a very significant question and it’s an important one. Growing our economic base is where the issue comes back to.

The hydro and why we are doing a business case when we already did one, we did a business case for hydro development that was going to go straight from the Taltson straight to the East Arm to the mines with the mine as the only customer. That did not work out. The diamond mines were not prepared to sign on for power, take or pay, for the whole life of the project when the lifespan of the mines was in question. There was not clear support for the route of the transmission line. What is being proposed now is up the west side down an established right-of-way, but still requires a review. We want to bring a major transmission line with an intertie from the South to connect the North and South Slave. We want to work with the industry to see if we can put a spur or have them come and get power once we get that transmission line up to Behchoko.

We also know we will be able to hook up communities along the way. We will be able to provide back-up and more efficiencies in the system than we now have and relieve some of the pressure on Jackfish, which is fully subscribed to. So it requires both a business case and a technical case. We know technically it can be done, we just have to get it costed out. Once we have the numbers, we need to include the business case that’s going to show that this, in fact, is a revenue generator.

When we talk about revenue generation, it’s more than just what are we going to charge for power. If we can provide reasonable, affordable energy to resource development initiatives like the mines, which the existing mines already add over $2 billion to our yearly gross domestic product, and if we can work with the mine and extend mine life to about $250 million per mine per year, then if you do the math, one year of mine life extension could conceivably pay for the cost of that particular hydro expansion by providing that kind of basic infrastructure.

If you think of the negative and we just do nothing and we let the mine close and let nature take its course, one of the biggest costs, 30 percent, is energy, then just in direct employment in those mines is over 1,500 Northerners, not to mention probably at least another 1,000 or so in related industries. So we have an interest here about how we pay for social programs that consume the majority of our budget and we have to balance both of those needs and I think this budget tries to do that.

Why are we paying? We are taking on the responsibility of devolution. We have a vision, we have a plan, we have a responsibility, but we will also look at what other available programs are there, for example, federal P3. We were not successful at looking at the fibre optic line, something as big as transmission lines may meet the test, we’re not sure but we will, of course, look. As we look at generation expansion, we are going to be looking for equity partners. We have the door open on the fibre optic line, and as of yet, we have no takers for Aboriginal equity. But the door is open and we are prepared to look at all sorts of partnership arrangements to minimize the direct cost and burden on the taxpayer. Clearly, if we don’t drive this initiative as an Assembly, as a government, if we don’t provide the vision and the plan, nothing will happen and if we come up with a plan that has a $700 million or $1 billion price tag for two major projects, for example, and if we go to Ottawa and expect them to somehow write us a cheque, it will be a frosty, frosty, frosty Friday before that would happen, I would suggest, because the federal government is not in that business anymore. Their job is to enable folks to do their job, which is what we are asking them to do.

Give us the tools, untie our hands, enable us to use our authorities and our good proven governance skills here to manage our way to some development that is going to support our economic base and allow us to continue to fund at the level we all expect of our social programs. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. Moving on with general comments, I have Mr. Bouchard.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. It’s been a few months since we’ve been here now, and learning this budget process is interesting because there are certain things in the budget I like and certain things that I don’t like. Ms. Bisaro did point to a lot of those issues, those concerns, so instead of talking about it all, I’m going to focus on just one area that I have a concern with.

I have a concern with the amount of money we are putting into the Heritage Fund. The Minister has put together a budget of 5 percent, which I don’t understand where that number comes from. That’s the minimum that we’ve heard from anybody. The Minister has gone out to the public, heard from a whole bunch of different people and some people said for the first four or five years, let’s put 100 percent in so we can actually accomplish something for the future generations, for them to have capital money to do these projects.

I understand we have a lot of capital needs. Our side has indicated in the past, in June and in the fall, we want at least 25 percent to go to the Heritage Fund. The Minister has gone to the public and said we’re going to put money into the Heritage Fund and we’re going to put money to pay down debt. So the general public believes we are sitting here and we are looking at decreasing the debt, saving money. They are all for that. They see that as responsible government and I see that, as well, but in the same breath when we’re talking about borrowing another billion dollars, we’re not doing what we just told the public we were going out to do. We are basically only putting 5 percent away and the rest is being used to service debt maybe, but not reduce debt.

The Heritage Fund at 5 percent is not a very big number. I think it’s a couple million bucks. I don’t think it’s appropriate that we’re only putting that minimal amount away.

I think we need to put money away for the future. Most of these resource revenue sharing dollars are coming from non-renewable resources. These non-renewable resources aren’t going to be here forever, so in the future generations they aren’t going to have the opportunities we have to generate that revenue. So we need to be putting some of that money away now, so people of the Northwest Territories, who are the owners of this thing, have the ability to reap the rewards from them in future generations, in five, 10, 25, 35, 55

years from now. This is something that is fiscally responsible to do now, put 25 percent away.

I don’t understand why we have to sit here and have a debate over this, whether it’s 5 or 25 percent when this is new money coming from the federal government. This is money we’ve never had in the past and now we are fighting over it just like we’ve already spent it. I don’t understand how that can be. This is new money, the projects that we’re putting into it are new concepts. So how can there be a debate over we can’t afford to put 25 percent away? That shouldn’t even be an argument. Like I said, this is new money coming from the federal government. This is the first year we’re getting it. We should be sitting here and we should be happy on both sides of this House, but yet we’re fighting over the money that we just received from the federal government because that government on that side has already committed the additional 20 percent, but that’s not what they heard from us and that’s not what they heard from a lot of the people in the public. We want to have 25 at a minimum. Like I said, that argument, some people did say 5 percent, some people said 25 percent and some people have committed to 100 percent. So I believe 25 percent is the number that has to be the minimum of us putting away.

I know they want to argue with us and say okay, well, let’s start at 5 percent now and we’ll build the 25 percent. That’s not what you do when you’re saving money. Let’s do it right away when we first get the money. Once we only put 5 percent, we’re never going to get up to 25 percent. So, I mean, the numbers are too minimal at 5 percent. It doesn’t work for me and the government are making us look like we’re the bad guys that have to find the cuts to make the 25 percent happen. I think that’s ridiculous, and the fact that this is new money, this money has never been spent before and the departments will say well, yeah, we don’t get the money for a year and a half, but that side of the House is spending the money like we had it. So they’re borrowing against it, as far as everybody here understands. So we’re supposed to hold off until we actually get that money. That doesn’t make sense from my perspective as a Member of this Legislative Assembly.

The other issues with the budget I will deal with over the next couple of weeks, but I do believe that the Heritage Fund needs a minimum 25 percent down from those resource revenue sharing dollars. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Bouchard. Minister Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the Member for his comments on the Heritage Fund. We just remind the folks that are listening that this is what we do agree on. We agree on a Heritage Fund because

we spent three years in the 16th Assembly putting a

bill into place that would give us the legal authority and looking forward to the day that devolution would be upon us. We know we have to put money aside and the one figure that the Member didn’t say, and there were some folks that said it, more than one, and more than one community, that we shouldn’t put any aside, that we need it all today, but two Assemblies have agreed that we need to put money aside, so now we’re talking about how much.

We know we’re getting $120 million a year. That’s been planned for some time. Half of it goes back to the feds. The remaining 25 percent goes to the Aboriginal governments and then we will look at the remaining roughly $45 million. At the same time, we’ve finalized, to the extent possible at this point, additional costs like the $350 million Stanton renovation that has to be paid for and that’s a long-term commitment. We’ve got to conclude the commitment on the Inuvik-Tuk highway and we have a $3 billion infrastructure deficit that we’re trying to pick away at. So when that money comes in, modest as it is, it has to do three things. We want to put money in the Heritage Fund and we want to service our debt to keep us below interest payments of 5 percent of our revenues and we want to try to add money to our infrastructure plus meet the constant demands for more program enhancements and service expansion. We hear it in this House, we hear it wherever we go, to manage all that money, put money away, give us all this money, usually in the social program area, to expand programs and services and keep the money the same, try to do some economic infrastructure or in some cases don’t do that, let’s just put it all in the social programs, but let’s just keep growing government.

So it’s a challenge and it’s easier to sit here and suggest on one thing, just put in 25 percent and those other issues will sort themselves out, which we don’t have the luxury of looking at.

Let me restate, we’ve started a process here. We’ve got a budget on the table and now we’re in the process of having a discussion and it’s come down to the Heritage Fund, which is a very specific topic, which points out to me once again that we agree to a significant vast majority of the budget that’s before this House. So now we have to sort out the Heritage Fund and the issue of other requests for additional funding over and above what’s in the budget in addition to the Heritage Fund.

We’re interested in resolving this and this is the forum where we’re going to do it, and we’re committed to having that discussion to get us to that point. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. Moving on with general comments, I have Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I was reading the budget and the highlights over the weekend. I made a comment in one of my meetings that it’s not a bad budget, and then I woke up.

---Laughter

Mr. Chair, I want to say that when I looked at the budget and looked at it from the perspective of the communities and from the Sahtu region, it’s the first time I’ve ever seen in budget history that the budget is going to be shared with the Aboriginal governments. In all my time with the Legislative Assembly I have never seen that. There’s a significant amount of money going to the Aboriginal governments. For me that’s history making. That’s something I have never seen. The Aboriginal governments will be receiving their 25 percent of the net fiscal benefits and they’ll be sharing a budget with us. I have never seen that before, that amount of money and commitment. That’s history making in any type of government in Canada with that kind of money going to our partners in the Aboriginal governments. I thought that was good news to see that.

The other part of the wake-up call for me was that the communities now in the North will be receiving, and how long they’ve been at these on-the-land healing programs, it’s the first time it’s showing up in the budget. You have committed dollars going to specific on-the-land healing programs and it’s the implementation of these programs that are going to make it so. I haven’t seen that over the years that I’ve spoken on it. Other Members in this government and the last government spoke on the on-the-land healing programs that are going to be now in our system. I’m hoping for the implementation, and that’s what the people have been asking for.

I just received the wellness plans for the Sahtu communities, and people have aspirations, they have hope in implementing these wellness plans. I’ve received a report from the RCMP, monthly reports on what they’re doing in the Sahtu communities, and still the number one factor for our people that we’re still wrestling with has to do with the amount of alcohol that’s being used.

Our communities have a high percentage of residential school survivors who are still asking for help, and these survivors are certainly looking for some help from this government providing these programs for our communities.

Over the years, sometimes we are speaking and our words don’t feel like they’re being heard or it takes a long time in government to move the system. For myself, I’m saying yes, it’s not a bad budget. It’s something that I could live with, and

certainly that the investment around the hydro, in one of the statements on the transmission grid between the North Slave and the South Slave hydro system and the Canadian grid, I need to ask some questions on what it will cost to build this business plan. I heard some astronomically high numbers as to what, if we went ahead with it, would be the payback, while our communities such as Norman Wells or Inuvik are dealing with the high costs of energy there, especially with Norman Wells. This summer, 2014, the natural gas will be turned off to that town and there are families there that are stressed right out. They’re asking for help with the conversion. They just don’t have 10, 15, 20 thousand dollars in their pockets to pay for the conversion. I know there are plans in there to how do we help them out. I haven’t heard yet. I heard from the Minister earlier as to what gaps need to be looked at, what gaps need to be filled, but we certainly, in our small communities, are looking for help from this government.

When I look through the profiles of the Sahtu communities and we look at communities where the unemployment rate is quite high in our small communities. one example in my communities is only 38 percent are working. That causes me a lot of concern. Or there is the potential of 47 graduates in the Sahtu this year, 50 next year and 59 the year after. That causes me some concern. What type of career are we setting up for them in our communities? What’s the record to track these students? We have the Minister or the government saying there are 47 graduates this year. What do we have planned for them? Aurora College and the three campuses or post-secondary or work, job-related skills? Where are we going to find work for them, because there’s only so much work in our small communities and people are going to hang on to their jobs. They need those jobs. I’m looking at the future for them.

I’m very happy that there’s housing going into our communities and there are different avenues how to get this housing. There are a lot of people who own their homes. I’m looking at what sort of programs and services could help our people. When I look at the budget and I compare what we have now in our communities, I’m saying, well, how do we match that, that unemployment, the skill, the employment, the housing, the economics?

A lot of people depend on the land in the Sahtu. They depend quite heavily on the food. For example, in Deline 77 percent consume the traditional foods from the land, so how do we strengthen and continue to increase that number? A lot of people want to go on the land and hunt caribou and take fish from Great Bear Lake. When you’re looking at government, how do we support each other?

I, like Ms. Bisaro, have other concerns. I might have to ask to get back on the list so we can go through the detail. I wanted to say that with all the funds and some of the uncertainty that we have, this budget is being presented to us to hold the government accountable for the next five weeks. Certainly, I heard earlier on the vacancy of jobs in our government. We are going to have some discussions on the Heritage Fund. When I look at the profiles of each of my Sahtu communities and I look at the budget, when there’s 19 of us that have our fingers in this budget, is it enough for me, is it enough for the rest of the Members? Well, we’re going to have that debate for the next five weeks. I want to say that our people are looking forward to how do we continue to address some of our critical needs in our smaller communities. I will probably ask more questions in detail. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Minister Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’d like to thank the Member for his comments. I appreciate the comment that it’s not a bad budget, and then he woke up and realized that it was true, it was not a bad budget. I appreciate those comments. We do share the sense of success that we’re the only jurisdiction in the country that has worked out a renewable resource sharing agreement with Aboriginal governments where a share goes from the gross revenues of 25 percent.

The Member and I have had many discussions about how long it takes to move government and how long it takes to change things or get things added. In the Member’s case, he mentioned the on-the-land healing programs, the long-term care facility that was started probably back in the 15th Assembly. In discussions we’ve had – I think I was Health Minister at the time – we’ve moved on, and if I can speak just a bit to the Sahtu, I mean, there was a significant reference to it in the budget address both in terms of concerns with the development. If the Member searches back through his memory, he’ll have seen reference to the Wrigley to Norman Wells road, for example, and we are going to work with communities.

You asked what is the cost of hydro and what about the other communities down the valley that aren’t on hydro, and we have a full perspective when it comes to energy initiatives. I think we are almost national leaders when it comes to biomass development. We are doing some unique things with solar. We started in Simpson. We have a very interesting pilot project that’s going to be going into place in Colville Lake with combining solar, wind and batteries, as well, potentially offsetting up to 50 percent of the diesel. If we can get that worked out, then we see small communities being in a situation where we can put their costs of energy down. We

also see an opportunity to expand the LNG rollout to all those communities that are on a road system. It might not apply most immediately to the Sahtu until they get their Wrigley to Norman Wells road, but it would definitely apply to other communities like Liard, McPherson, Tsiigehtchic, Wrigley and those types of communities. We are very serious about that.

There will be a full debate on the hydro, and it’s all predicated on us getting our borrowing limit increased. If we are unsuccessful getting our borrowing limit increased, then life will be a whole lot simpler. We won’t be talking about the road to Norman Wells or Wrigley, at least not in our political lifetime, and we won’t be looking at hydro grid expansion. We’ll be looking at constantly managing to try to live within an $800 million borrowing limit with the pressures we face right today, which for a jurisdiction that is as big as ours with a budget that is as big as ours is an administrative constraint that is not reflected in the fiscal reality of our debt to GDP ratio and our credit rating and our percentage of revenues that we spend on interest payments, which is less than 1 percent when our policy caps us at 5. So with devolution, if we don’t get that ability and devolution is going to be in, our development, an advancement is going to be severely constrained by our inability to make critical investments that are necessary.

When we talk about critical investments, you mentioned all the graduates coming out of Sahtu, which is a significant achievement after you have worked long and hard to reach that point. We have acknowledged that we want to do a better job of how we deal with our post-secondary graduates. We want to encourage, of course, high school graduates to carry on their education, be it in post-secondary institutions or as apprentices. The average job requirement now requires 16 years of education, so there are things that you can do out of Grade 12 as you sort yourself out, get your thinking clear about what you want to do, travel, do these other things, but at the end of the day we want to encourage Northerners and northern graduates to carry on with their education because we have, as we’ve heard in this House since we’ve started this Assembly, concerns about vacancies not only just in government but across the territory in all sectors, in small communities, in Aboriginal governments, in major mining industries – everybody is looking for skilled individuals – administrators, technicians, engineers, doctors. We’ve spent millions with nursing programs and social work programs, the ENRTP programs and business admin programs in addition to working out relationships with various universities so you can get your degrees.

We have a lot of infrastructure in place but we know we want to do better. I would like to congratulate the Sahtu, and of course the Member here is

justifiably proud of that accomplishment. We are looking at jobs, we are putting in millions of dollars of housing in small communities so that we can fill positions, and we are going to do a better job at recruiting, hopefully, our young graduates to come back and live and work in the Northwest Territories. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Moving on with general comments, I have Mr. Bromley.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to start very bluntly by saying I am very concerned about the narrow thinking that persists from the Minister, despite years of very consistent input from Regular Members. I think that is really the main point, that we have the opportunity to do a better job. But, I suppose, the Minister has said very flatly that these are cooperatively developed budgets and we’ve had a big role to play and so on, and I’m not saying that we don’t have a role at all. But I think what the Minister is hearing is that there are clear examples out there that we have consistently attempted to work with Cabinet on through the years. Probably the best example here today before us, of course, is the Heritage Fund, which my colleague Mr. Bouchard has addressed very thoroughly. These are new dollars, as he mentioned and as we know, so let’s do it right from the start. The Minister says, well, that’s very simple to say. No, no, it’s not simple to say, but it is very clear, and in fact this House passed a motion directing this Assembly to institute a 25 percent set-aside for the Heritage Fund. Cabinet ignored it.

I won’t repeat all of Mr. Bouchard’s points. The Minister said again how cooperative we are and referenced junior kindergarten as called for by committee. That, in my mind, is not true. In fact, my impression is that committee is somewhat or quite equivocal about junior kindergarten. In actual fact, what we called for repeatedly, and have done for years now, is a clear focus on early years programming. That’s age zero to three. Junior kindergarten starts after that period. Even, in fact, when we insisted on that in previous budgets and ensured that there was additional monies dedicated to that, for example, for family resource centres, midwifery and so on, the work was not done. I don’t know what happened to the money; the money was provided.

I guess support for mining again. Has the Minister not noticed that more and more workers are coming from the South, or essentially commuting, and it is at our cost? I think some valid questions are being asked out there. How many Northerners, how many additional Northerners want to work in mines? That is a legitimate question to ask. We know that as the number of workers in mines increases, so does the southern labour force that’s commuting to our mines. How beneficial, in fact, is all this training to

work in mines? I would say again, the data is pretty uncertain there. We know that people are getting trained here and leaving to work elsewhere in Canada in mines. We know that they are also leaving to commute. They are deciding to live down south. I was talking to a person today that falls into that category.

The Minister said that we have to expand our economic base; that’s the only way to deal with this. That again assumes that it is a job shortage that is always the problem, and in some areas, undoubtedly, that is the case, but in my mind, I don’t think in those areas that mining jobs are what is being sought. So there are some fundamental assumptions here that I will be using the various vehicles that I have to address these as we go through the budget.

On this one, expand our economic base apparently means building big, costly, low job infrastructure that is very expensive to maintain and does not have proven economic benefit analyses to support it, or data that is demonstrably economically beneficial, such as the bridge. So, again, this is a consistent comment that this Minister has heard for a couple of Assemblies that indicates that, yes, we do need to do things differently. This whole argument of doing it the same way harder is starting to sound very hollow to me and I suspect to some of my colleagues. The world has changed and there are many new realities that must be acknowledged. I’m not seeing that happen.

We have heard, during the life of this Assembly, Cabinet spend over and over and over the net fiscal benefit, so now here we are with this approach and we are confronted with a bunch of closed doors and a failure to do the basic thing of putting significant dollars aside into the Heritage Fund as if it’s a surprise to the Minister.

I’m afraid we’re reflecting the immaturity that many are faced with these days of instant gratification. We want everything right away. It used to be that there was some reality in the North and we developed things as we could afford it and as we knew it was needed, but we now are going full tilt. Let’s get our $3 billion worth of infrastructure out there as fast as we can, hoping it will have some return when, at the same time, acknowledging some of the fundamentals that are changing in our society.

I will have lots more comments, but I will leave it at that, Mr. Chair. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We are at work on the Heritage Fund and we will come to a successful conclusion. If I have misstated the support for junior kindergarten, I will use other examples of the input

and involvement and significant influence that MLAs have on this process overall.

We agree there are too many fly-in/fly-out workers, which is why we struck a high level committee. We set a target of trying to increase our population by 2,000 in five years, and one of the things we want to look at – there are a number of things; there are four things, actually, we want to look at – the fly-in/fly-out workers, the immigrant Nominee Program, our own vacancy rate and vacancy rates across the territory; and of course, doing a better job of encouraging our own students who graduate to come back and live in the Northwest Territories.

It is an important issue. The Member says, how beneficial is all that training when they get trained and oftentimes they leave? Well, the reality is we want our children to have as many opportunities and be as well educated as possible. Right now a significant portion of our young people leave, but they leave educated and they have choices. As a parent and a grandparent, that’s what we want for our children. Our job is now to convince a significant number of them to, in fact, choose to live in the North and work in the North, and we’re going to do that. Hopefully, we’re going to collectively apply ourselves to that.

The issue of big infrastructure is not the answer; I agree. It’s not a silver bullet, but it is an important issue when so much of our territory lacks basic infrastructure. The issue of immaturity and folks wanting everything right away and not being content to be patient, the actual fact is, in my mind, we are a patient people but we have needs. There are communities that are extremely well served with every kind of resource and infrastructure that other communities can only hope for, then there are others where we don’t even have roads into the communities and we need to pay for everything. While people are patient, they’ve been waiting for, in many cases, decades.

It’s something to say that people that want roads, people that want jobs, people that want infrastructure in communities are immature and they should wait and somehow it will trickle down to them I don’t think is the way we want to do business. If it is, then we would have a lot less ambitious plans for trying to make sure the economy and the economic base grows.

It doesn’t have to grow just in mining; we’re talking about filling the jobs in the communities. We’re putting in fibre optic lines that are going to give us a whole knowledge-based industry, hopefully. We’re going to put services in the communities that will allow things to work, systems to work more efficiently and effectively for us as a government, for people as individuals and for businesses. We have to look at all areas, but we cannot be blind to the reality that $2.5 billion a year comes out of the diamond mines.

If we want to roll back the clock to the good old days and take that out of our economy, then I would think we’re talking a very, very deep type of recession. I don’t think anybody wants to say that, but we have a very important role in our economy at this point, and I think we have to be working collaboratively with them in an environmentally friendly and sustainable way as possible to expand our economic base. We still are of the mind, and for me it’s very clear, that increasing taxes is not what’s going to get us to where we have to go.

I look forward to further discussion with the Member as we go through department by department. I’m sure in 10 or six weeks, with give and take with the Member, hopefully my narrow thinking will be somewhat broader. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. Moving on with general comments, I have Mr. Nadli.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just some general comments in terms of what’s before us in the main estimates and the budget, of course, of government. Just my comments in terms of the content and the process, or more so the content.

I think it’s fair to say there’s much less than what we wished for on behalf of our constituents and their desires to improve their communities and to ensure they have healthy families and they have opportunities for jobs and businesses. Whether those points are reflected in the budget at this time remains to be seen, but for the most part it’s just the process of which we have taken this far and the sense, at least from this side of the House, that we need to ensure that we have input into this process and ensure that this system of setting the budget for this government is determined on a collaborative basis and, at the same time, with mutual respect on the whole principle of consensus dialogue.

From this perspective, it’s been stated very clearly that it’s been a concern. I’m hoping that we learn from this exercise that on a go-forward basis we heed to these experiences and to try to improve the system that we’ve embarked upon and that we ensure that all voices are heard. We’re here to serve the people of the North and especially our constituents, and that we’ll learn from this exercise.

One thing that I’ve always tried to highlight is the traditional economies of the communities. As you know, the northern economy, at least from an historical sense, is based on hunting, trapping and fishing. Increasingly, as people move to the communities, the reliance on mainstream educational institutions to ensure our residents are able to achieve a great level and move on to secondary education to get their diplomas or degrees in technological fields or the sciences and ensure that they become productive members of society has been a challenge in terms of ensuring that we have citizens of the North that live in both

worlds and, at the same time, ensuring that we have a vibrant economy and a very good lifestyle for people.

There are indications that things are changing. We have an aging population, so our elders are moving on. At the same time, we have a younger growth of people who are trying to make it within the mainstream in terms of getting into education, getting training and jobs. That still remains as a challenge in terms of trying to at least put some support mechanisms in terms of supporting the trapping industry. I know there have been efforts in terms of the fishing industry as well as hunting. Recently, we had efforts in terms of the Wildlife Act and the development of their regulatory mechanisms to ensure that that’s implemented within a year. At the same time, we have measures in place in terms of wildlife population and management so that wildlife populations are on a sustainable level and managed properly for future generations.

We’ve seen, over the course of this year at least, a very successful trapping season where people are once again enjoying the labour of going out on the land, enjoying the natural elements of winter and being successful in harvesting furs and bringing them back to their communities and families and then selling them. We’ve seen a very successful year. Hopefully it will continue. We need to ensure support mechanisms in terms of ensuring that there are programs out there for our trappers and harvesters and that we try to make things work for them.

Of course, it’s always been a challenge of this government to try to meet the needs of the communities. In terms of infrastructure, there are always needs that our communities want, and of course, in the communities that I represent there’s always been a very keen interest to ensure that communities are reliant, they’re self-reliant, they’re independent, they take care of their residents locally and that, so it’s always been a challenge to try and meet the community needs, and of course, way back in partnership with governments and allowing, of course, that spectrum of possibilities to blossom, and the fruits of working together usually is manifested, at least in very good structures that are established and constructed locally with local labour and brought into the community and creating jobs. But that’s been a challenge because there’s only a limited source of funding out there that communities can tap into.

One possible area that I feel that this government needs to explore more, and it’s been highlighted by colleagues, is the concept of P3s. We’ve seen it initially in its infancy in terms of introducing a concept of that nature to a community, and that was the Deh Cho Bridge. That was a prime example where communities, governments and industry can

partner up to build a massive structure of that nature. I’m hoping, as we go down this path, that those kinds of concepts will be able to be maintained at least locally with local residents and local leaders to ensure that a partnership of that nature could be struck and successfully leading to the construction of infrastructure that sometimes is aging and sometimes is really needed. As an example, water treatment plants.

A few other comments are ongoing initiatives in tourism. I know the Economic Development Strategy outlines in general how it is that we could successfully take advantage of tourism. I look forward to the ongoing initiatives in terms of biomass initiatives ensuring that there are initiatives from the community level right to the regional level, right to territorial level that are continued. The prospect of perhaps seeing the major initiative in my riding is something that communities look forward to, hoping to see at some point at least the discussion reach the point where we could successfully look into a manufacturing plant successfully being opened and operated and creating jobs.

On a last note, on the Heritage Fund, it’s something that has been fairly, in my sense, emblazoned on the mind of this side of the House and this government, and it should be the priority of this government to see the increase from 5 percent to 25 percent. It’s something that we’ve set for ourselves. We need to realize it. I think it’s in the best interest of future generations, and at the same time, just basically listen to the basic principle of governance, which is listening to the public and what they had to say and not turning our backs on them but ensuring what we heard is founded on the idea that this democratic system works and we’re going to put into motion at least the increase of 5 percent to 25 percent of raising the Heritage Fund so that at least there is a sustainable pot of funding out there that is going to be invested for future generations.

Those are just a few comments that I had. Mahsi.

Thank you, Mr. Nadli. Minister Miltenberger.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Given the common theme of many of the opening comments, it seems to me the issue of process would be a fine item for August’s Caucus agenda to spend at least one time going around on protocols and those types of things which are important. If we need to have that discussion, I think that would be the place collectively to do it and see where we end up. Of course, we can always learn from the processes as we work our way through them.

The issue of the traditional economy and the challenges, I appreciate the Member’s comments, and we are committed in many areas to try to

support local businesses, the traditional economy, fur programs. As Minister Ramsay said on his trip to China, it’s a banner year for northern fur. We, as well, are working very closely with all the Aboriginal governments and co-management boards to look at the issue of wildlife management, in particular the bison recovering from anthrax in the Mackenzie sanctuary and the pressure that the two main herds are under, the Bathurst herd and now the Bluenose-East.

There is potential for P3s, but in reality, at the end of the day, the bridge was not a P3. It was a government funded, government run, government constructed project. We took it over fully partway through the process. But in regard to federal P3, there is a process that we will look at. We are, in fact, obligated under our own policies for projects over $50 million, to try to see what the opportunity is, so things like Stanton, for example, we’ll look at what’s possible under a P3. If we ever move into significant economic infrastructure, we’ll look there, as well, to see what’s possible.

I appreciate the Member’s comments on the Heritage Fund. We do consult. We do listen. We do incorporate. In this case, there are a lot of other variables we’re considering, but the process is underway, and as we work our way through this budget process I’m confident we’ll once again come forward with a budget that will have the support of the Assembly, including the direction on the Heritage Fund.

Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. Continuing on with general comments, I have Ms. Bisaro.

Thanks, Mr. Chair, and thanks to my colleagues for your indulgence in letting me finish off my list.

I wanted to just say that at the outset I think the Minister misunderstood what I was saying about the hydro. I know that the business case that we did before was for a different project. I think my concern is that we haven’t done preliminary analysis to determine that there’s a valid reason to go ahead with a detailed business case. The term throwing good money after bad kind of comes to my mind. I just wanted to get that out of the way.

My other point that I want to make on the hydro is that I’m fine with connecting up the transmission lines or the systems that we have within the North. I’m very skeptical about being able to make money by connecting to the South. That’s my main concern there.

I’d like to just say, that in terms of the budget and the increase in the budget due to devolution, I welcome devolution and I want to welcome our new employees. I appreciate that we have budgeted for a contingency in the money that we’re getting from the federal government to deal with devolution. I

think it’s about $9 million, and I appreciate that the government has been prudent in planning for devolution. I would hope that that $9 million is going to be used only for devolution activities and that we’re not going to think of it as a bit of a $9 million slush fund, so when we determine that we need extra money in a particular area because we didn’t plan – and plans are always fluid – that we didn’t plan exactly and we need a little bit more money, that we have it there.

To the Minister’s concept of increasing the population, absolutely, I agree with that concept. It is one of the things that has affected us over the three, four, five years. As our population has gone down, obviously our revenues have gone down, and it is something that we need to seriously take a look at. I’m concerned about the details, and I know the Minister has mentioned a number of things, but they’re ideas at the moment. There’s no detail behind them. I think, in general, that it’s going to take wide-ranging, across-government changes for us to implement some of the things that have been referenced in terms of keeping people here, bringing students back, keeping people here, that sort of thing. I’ve heard, unfortunately, too many stories of students who have finished their schooling. One example is somebody who graduated as a doctor tried to get a job in the Territories and just couldn’t, couldn’t, couldn’t, waited, waited, waited, and finally took a job in the South and is not coming home. They wanted to come home and wanted to go to a community outside of Yellowknife. Why couldn’t we make this happen? In my mind, some of the things that we need to change many of the departments, not just Human Resources but I think all across departments we have a problem encouraging and getting our people to come back to the North.

I am concerned about the impact of the reallocation of internal funds within Education for junior kindergarten. I appreciate the Minister’s answer to my written question. He said it’s no more than a 1.2 percent reduction for any board. But still, you know, it’s going to have an impact on boards and boards are going to be receiving this pretty much in the middle of their planning cycle, so it’s not going to be easy for them to adjust. The Minister of Education has said that this was done in consultation with the boards, but that’s not what I’m hearing. I’m hearing that the boards have basically been told that this is what’s going to be happening, that the boards and their superintendents have not really had an opportunity to provide input into whether or not this is a good idea.

The other thing that I have to mention, and it was pointed out to me actually after the budget address by somebody at the reception, in this whole budget there is no new money for education. We consistently state that education is extremely important, we need to educate our people, we need

to get them to graduate, we need them to have skills in order to get jobs and be contributing members to our society, and yet we’re not putting any money into the education budget.

Also on education, the budget address mentions a review of adult education and a review of the college. We have been hearing about this for a very long time and I think, actually, there was a review that was done a couple of years ago. I’m quite skeptical about are we really going to review adult education, or is this just hot air in the wind? I don’t believe we heard any results from the review that presumably happened a couple of years ago.

A couple of other comments. I think the budget commented about the need for efficient government and I guess I challenge the Minister to tell me what efficiency we have achieved over the last year. How has this government become more efficient over the last year? We have a program review office, which we haven’t heard much of in the last little while, and what has that program review office done in terms of efficiencies? Have we gained any savings? Have we made ourselves more efficient and more responsive to our residents?

The other problem that I have is that we say we want to be more efficient, we say that we are being more efficient and yet our budget increases every year. I know we have lots of initiatives, but if we really are being more efficient, I wouldn’t think, for instance, that we would have cost overruns every year as we do.

To the Minister’s suggestion of discussing the process at Caucus, I think that’s a very valid suggestion. I know it was done once before, but as I sit here listening to Members and the Minister responding back, it seems to me that we either need better explanations either from Regular Members to Cabinet or from Cabinet to Regular Members, or we need better communication of what each side is saying. There seems to be a disconnect in what I hear versus what the Cabinet thinks they’re telling me and what Cabinet hears versus what they think I’m telling them. So, we seem to have a communication problem. We seem to have an understanding problem. We seem to have a reporting problem to a certain extent. Committees report to Regular Members; Ministers report to Cabinet, and I just don’t think we end up on the same page although we may have all heard the same thing. I think it would be a good idea for us to discuss process.

One of the things perhaps, although this seems a bit strange, but I’m going to say that I think we need to get the government’s plans in detail sooner so that we, as Regular Members, can better understand what actions the government is proposing. I know we certainly get an awful lot of information when we discuss business plans. We discuss a lot of things, but there are often

somewhat visionary statements and I think the government assumes that we know the detail and we wait for the detail and don’t get it. Then when we do get the detail it’s like, well, you never told us about this and the government thinks that probably they have. So, it goes back to my concern about lack of understanding, communication and so on. It’s a long way of saying that I think we need to discuss the process and try to find a better way to do this.

That’s all I have, Mr. Chair. I do want to say to the Minister of Finance that this budget isn’t all bad. I’ve asked a lot of questions, but again I think it’s because there are a lot of things that I maybe don’t have a good explanation for. Certainly, we can agree to disagree, but this is not a bad budget. Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Ms. Bisaro. Minister Miltenberger.