This is page numbers 6699 – 6756 of the Hansard for the 17th Assembly, 5th Session. The original version can be accessed on the Legislative Assembly's website or by contacting the Legislative Assembly Library. The word of the day was going.

Topics

Kevin A. Menicoche

Kevin A. Menicoche Nahendeh

The Minister doesn’t address why they weren’t paid. He says everybody else has been paid, and that’s a well-known fact, but the referees that analyze this situation, look at all the claims – there were, I think, about seven or eight of them – and for the most part there were only two acceptable, and those are the referee’s recommendations.

I’d like to ask the Minister to seriously consider these recommendations despite keep going back to the books of a failed company, ATCON. The government took over the project and came to this House for more money. Why can’t we pay all the contractors that are due?

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Tu Nedhe

The report looked at five different claims by this company. The referee indicated that two of the five claims had technical merit, meaning that he felt that Rowe’s Construction had done the work, so he priced out what he thought had technical merit. Technical merit doesn’t mean that the Government of the Northwest Territories has a legal obligation to pay. It just says that he believes that Rowe’s did the work.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Menicoche.

Kevin A. Menicoche

Kevin A. Menicoche Nahendeh

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Yes, Rowe’s did the work, and like any other contractor agreement, even if it’s verbal, they should be paid. That’s what I’m asking the Minister. Why have they not been paid to date?

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Tu Nedhe

As much as I’ve answered, we are still continuing to work with the company and also with the Government of New Brunswick. As I indicated, Rowe’s has a claim. Two of the five claims add up to approximately what’s left in the budget, and it also adds up to approximately how much deficiencies will cost to complete all of the deficiencies. We would like to have had enough money to pay everyone. Go to New Brunswick. If they had the documentation that we felt that that government would support, then we would have paid it, filed it with the government and had confidence that the money would have been paid. The problem is we needed to prove to that government and the government was going to approve the payment after we made it. Had they not made the approved payment and we didn’t have the proper documentation to make the payment then we would be paying it from this House.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The Member for Range Lake, Mr. Dolynny.

Daryl Dolynny

Daryl Dolynny Range Lake

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m going to chime in here with my colleague Mr. Menicoche. What we’re hearing here today is absolutely hogwash. We’ve got a northern contractor here, the only northern contractor left that has yet to be paid for the work and services they did on the bridge, and we’ve got a referee program that we’ve clearly documented and the government has said we agree with the terms, we just don’t have the money left.

What kind of message are we telling our contractors out there? Please do the work for the government and we’ll pay you when we think or when we feel?

The Minister talks about ATCON and monies left over. Let’s talk about the facts. I’ve got correspondence from June 26thsent to my office from the department that clearly says that the terms of the agreement with the Government of New Brunswick, who secured the ATCON letter of credit, that these funds were to be used for deficiencies in the project caused by ATCON. From the Minister’s own words to my office, we have an amount of $690,707. Why isn’t the Minister using those funds and putting a little pressure on New Brunswick to pay our bills?

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. The Minister of Transportation, Mr. Beaulieu.

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Tu Nedhe

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The deficiencies, I think that seems to be the key here. The work was done by ATCON. The money given to us from the New Brunswick government was to clean up the deficiencies. There are deficiencies on the work that Rowe’s had performed for ATCON, as well, and that’s part of the work that we are doing. But the deficiencies to finish the bridge, we have about $700,000 to $800,000 worth of deficiencies still on the bridge. We have about $750,000 in that account. We want to use that money to finish the deficiencies.

Daryl Dolynny

Daryl Dolynny Range Lake

Let’s actually speak about all the numbers, shall we, because we’re kind of dancing and skirting around the issue. As I said, ATCON has a holdback of $696,707, plus this government has a holdback with Ruskin and ATCON for over $958,000. Clearly, we’ve got two pots of money here that could be used to pay the bills that are outstanding to the project. Will the Minister commit to paying this bill?

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Tu Nedhe

No. Not in this forum.

Daryl Dolynny

Daryl Dolynny Range Lake

Can the Minister indicate why?

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Tu Nedhe

Because we need to provide the documentation to the Government of New Brunswick that will validate the payment. This is not exactly what we got the money for. We got that money to do the deficiencies on the bridge, pay for the deficiencies on the bridge. There is more work to be done on the bridge. There are more deficiencies. This money wasn’t given to us so that we could pay companies that didn’t get all of the payments for the work that they’ve done with a company that went bankrupt.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Dolynny.

Daryl Dolynny

Daryl Dolynny Range Lake

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s clear this government expects private industry to pay our financing for projects, and this is unacceptable.

As we said clearly, we went to an arbitrator, we agreed with the arbitration that we owe this contractor money. We’ve got two pots of money that are clearly in detail to use for such things as a payment back to a contractor. We’ve got holdbacks. We’ve got workings with the government. Again, this is a perfect, clear-cut case that we should be paying our bills.

Why is this Minister, why is this Cabinet, why is this government refusing to support local businesses and why aren’t they paying this bill?

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Tu Nedhe

This government supports lots of local and northern businesses. This is an issue where we need to have the proper documentation and we need to have the legal grounds to pay out of what is not considered to be exactly the reason that we got money. We weren’t given the mandate to just spend the money wherever we felt, wherever we felt pressure, wherever we felt that individuals were coming and trying to present this from a political perspective. We have a referee’s report, number one, and number two

, the referee

s report said two of those had technical merit, that they felt that two of those claims were work that was actually done by Rowe’s but they weren’t necessarily deficiencies that are left on the bridge.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The Member for Hay River North, Mr. Bouchard.

Robert Bouchard

Robert Bouchard Hay River North

Thank you. I’ll chime in, as well, and I think this is exactly what I was talking about in my Member’s statement about us working with businesses in the Northwest Territories.

The Minister indicated we were working with the company, yes, and that’s the problem. We were working with the company on a whole bunch of different problems and it’s taken four years with me as an MLA to get this to the floor of the House. The company has been very leery to take it to the House because they want to deal with the Department of Transportation. They have many contracts with them. We have them over a barrel. We paid out Ruskin.

Why did we pay out Ruskin and now are not willing to pay out Rowe’s?

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

Thank you, Mr. Bouchard. Mr. Beaulieu.

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Tu Nedhe

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Ruskin built a bridge for us. We had to pay them. Thank you.

Robert Bouchard

Robert Bouchard Hay River North

I am referring to Ruskin was on the job before ATCON started. We paid them out. We paid out several contractors that were doing work for ATCON that they held us accountable for the bridge. Rowe’s didn’t have that leverage. Why did we pay all those other contractors and we’re not paying Rowe’s?

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Tu Nedhe

As I indicated in one of the responses, I don’t have the list of individuals that were paid out or the circumstances surrounding the payout. What I’m dealing with is the payout of a company, Rowe’s Construction, at this point. What we’re indicating is that we have the money to finish the bridge, clean up all the deficiencies. If we’re going to pay over and above that, if we’re going to pay for a deal that somebody made with another company that went bankrupt on the job, then we’d have to come back to the House for more money. It’s that simple. We can’t take money out of there and then pay somebody and then come back in here and say we need more money for deficiencies.

Robert Bouchard

Robert Bouchard Hay River North

We know and the government is willing to say we’re using ATCON, a company that’s no longer there, using them as leverage. But when the government has inspectors in the project, they inspect the whole process. We had a whole bunch of stuff that was outside of the scope of the project. We hauled a whole bunch more rock from a longer distance. The Department of Transportation knew that. They gave approval to it and Rowe’s did that work.

Again, the Minister is indicating that there’s a merit there. Why are we not paying the bills based on a merit that we’ve given?

Tom Beaulieu

Tom Beaulieu Tu Nedhe

We’re not paying it because we don’t have the proper documentation indicating that there was a contract between Rowe’s Construction and we’re not paying it because the money that we got was not for this. The money that we got from the New Brunswick government was to pay for the deficiencies of the bridge, not to cover unfinished business by ATCON that wasn’t paid out. We don’t have any written authorization from ATCON. We don’t have any documentation. There is really nothing there other than the discussions that Mr. Rowe has been having with DOT, and based on that we are continuing to work on solutions. Thank you.

The Speaker

The Speaker Jackie Jacobson

Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Bouchard.