Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, just along the same line, that has always been a bit of point of contention for me, actually, the capital project money going into the municipalities hasn't changed since the new deal, I think. I think the money has been $28 million, and then now it's decreased for Deline, but that's actually not really a decrease because that's just a transfer.
I think the Minister's answer is trying to live within the economic realities of today, but I personally see it the opposite way. If you increase the money going into the communities, I think that it would save money. Like money being spent, actual money being spent in the communities, has proven to save money in social spending. If we look at one of the things that they've done a model on was the National Guardianship Program and similar programs like that, where leveraging $1 was reducing social spending in Australia, as an example, by $3.70, and the money spent with the Nihat'ni Dene in Lutselk'e was saving $2.50 per dollar spent in the project.
My feeling is that we should not use that reason for not increasing the budget, because when you spend money, you reduce a lot of -- plus there are all kinds of other benefits, too, to GNWT spending money at the community level. I think that the department should take a serious look at increasing that budget at some point down the road. Like I said, no change. There are quite a few departments that have spent quite a few dollars during those 10 years or 12 years since the new deal has been signed. I do not know the exact year, but I know in 2007 when I became an MLA, there was a new deal then. There is no change in that money. I guess I cannot ask the Minister to increase the budget now. As a committee, we did not discuss that, so I am not going to ask the Minister on the floor to contemplate that, but for the future, I think that we should consider moving this money up. This is really good spending at the community level, and I think that it is important.
Also, with the same pot of money, I guess my question is that it is at $27 million some-odd dollars going into the communities. Some have surplus. There is an indication that the reason to have surpluses is they are having some difficulty spending the money. There have been legislation or policies put into effect that will allow the community to use this money to borrow money privately in order to do projects.
I want to ask the Minister if they have any sort of structure that would support the communities who wish to carry out their projects or advance their community projects using this money. I do not know if that is really clear, but that is my question. Thank you, Mr. Chair.