Thanks, Mr. Chair. I will start on the revenue side. On the revenue side, there are a lot of similarities, as one would expect, given that the federal government set the criteria of how the carbon tax should be implemented and had jurisdiction that wanted to do their own, develop their plans, and then, had to check against the federal approach to make sure there is at least a level of consistency.
The one area that is different is related to the large emitters and their output-based pricing system, and we have had discussions about that with committee.
On the expenditure side, we have come up with an approach around offsets and rebates that reflect more of what the northern context is. For example, the heating fuel one is a big issue, as the Minister talked about in our small communities. Also, the way we are doing the cost of living offset, so it will be a quarterly payment rather than waiting for in other jurisdictions in the south, you would actually get that back as part of your income tax filing, so it would come once a year as opposed to quarterly. That has a huge impact on people's cash flow as they are trying to pay bills and those sorts of things.
To answer the question directly, no, I wouldn't be able to produce a very specific example of where those differences are, but what we have tried to do in the plain language summary is say, "This is what the feds are doing elsewhere, and we can't know for sure what they would do in the Northwest Territories if they were forced to impose, but they would make those decisions." Thanks, Mr. Chair
