Thank you, Madam Chair. So, Madam Chair, when the main estimates are tabled, the focus of the attention generally is predominantly on the ability or the authority to spend the money that we have in that budget. But another item that's in there, and it certainly does get some attention although perhaps not quite as much, is the sheet that includes the authority to borrow. And it's that number now that we're looking to have amended by way of this supplementary appropriation.
So you have the authority to spend, which is the department by department budget lines that we all look at and that are -- as you typically see as a supplementary appropriation. If a department, for example ECC, needs additional money to support their wildfire fighting efforts, that goes in as their ability or authority to spend. However, in order for the government to actually spend money, they have to have the cash on hand. The timing on when we have cash on hand depends on a few things.
It depends, for example, on the timing of receiving taxation revenues and, in particular, the timing of receiving revenues from the federal government, which I think most folks are aware that is the dominant amount of our budget in revenues does come from one form or another of federal transfer. We don't necessarily get those as one lump sum. We get the territorial formula of financing as a lump sum, but the rest does come in over the course of the year at different times. And at present, because of the significant outlay of additional cash over the course of this summer, significantly because of the wildfires but certainly not exclusively, there's been -- the low water levels have also resulted in a higher expenditures, all of those things combined put us into a situation where we are concerned that, particularly with an election and the scheduling changes around when the Assembly's sitting, we were expecting that there's a reasonable possibility of running into a state where the government won't be able to pay with cash without increasing the short-term borrowing. So the short-term borrowing just gives that ability of flexibility to increase the amount of cash available to us if needed. And let me stop there so that the clock doesn't run down further. Thank you.