Thank you, Member for Yellowknife North. Minister of Finance. ADM Courtoreille.

Thank you, ADM Courtoreille. Member for Yellowknife North.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Okay, this is something that I'm interested to look into further, but I'll leave it there for now. Thank you.

Thank you, Member for Yellowknife North. Any further questions? Please turn to page 172. Sorry, Member for the Sahtu.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm looking at medical travel assistance here. In previous years, it was a lot higher, and we're anticipating a lower number here. I'm hoping that maybe some detail on explanation could be provided. Are we getting better at booking travel than we were? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member for the Sahtu. Minister of Finance.

Thank you, Madam Chair. And, Madam Chair, just first for any members of public who may be -- just want the explanation, just to be clear, this is medical travel for employees. It's an employee benefit, just as other private sector employers might provide benefits of some nature or another, this is the benefit that is provided to public servants. And we are -- let me just say first there has been a modest increase that's been proposed in the department for this line item from the main estimates of 2023-2024. So in the actual base budget, that has gone up by a couple of million.

There was a fairly significant backlog of medical travel after COVID. So in 2022-2023 and in 2023-2024, backlog due to surgeries having been cancelled, dental not happening, so on and so forth. We are hoping that that number will not be as high as it has been those last couple of years coming out of COVID. And as such, hoping and expecting, projecting that the number therefore doesn't need to be as high, again, as the numbers you're seeing, but some additional from what the original base budget was.

As far as the actual booking of travel, I mean, again, the process does reside in financial employee shared services. We do track how quickly things get -- how quickly people are able to be serviced, and, you know, again, hoping that if there are issues, I would be happy to hear about them. I certainly do hear about them but there are service standards in place, and we do track to them. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister of Finance. Member for the Sahtu.

Thank you, Madam Chair. My last question is on the entry there for environmental liabilities. And whenever you see the word liabilities, one cringes. Is this a one-time cleanup that happened a couple years ago and it's over and done with; there's no repercussions to this environmental liability? Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member for the Sahtu. Minister of Finance.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, there was a change in 2022-2023 as a result of a change in accounting standards and the way in which we were then being required under public accounting standards to consider what was an environmental liability and where to account for it. It's not a cash item today per se. It is a projection that when a government asset at some point in its future no longer is in use, that you have to account for what potential costs there might be to remediate that asset. So for historical assets, that's, you know, classic case of asbestos or led paint, but even more modern assets do continue to have some amount for clean up that has to be accounted for. That's what this is. And when there was a change in asset retirement obligations, that change is reflected there as to what we now -- yeah, the change in how we account and what things we have to account for. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister of Finance. Member for the Sahtu.

Okay, Member for Great Slave.

Thank you, Madam Chair. So just because I want to get this out to the public, could the Minister please elaborate as to why the interest on both long-term debt and short-term interest we saw quite a large jump from these budgeted dollars in the main estimates from 2023-2024 to the revised estimates of 2023-2024? And although I'm sure the Minister of Finance is possibly happy that the interest rate has dropped slightly lately, I'm curious as to why this is being budgeted for so much lower in the mains. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Member for Great Slave. Minister of Finance.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I think this is actually a fairly important series of accounts to look at or numbers to look at in the main estimates. This is money that is paid on debt. So this is the money that we pay to the banks. This has no asset in the Northwest Territories, no program or service that is being serviced. It's just money that we're paying on the debt.

And well, yes, I am happy that there has been a small reduction in interest rates that had not -- you know, in the last couple of years, we had to come back when rates were not dropping as quickly as what was at times being projected, in addition to the fact that then when you wind up taking on additional short-term debt, particularly, for example, over this summer when we wound up in a situation of having to burn through what money we had for relief and recovery and emergencies, you then wind up taking on more short-term debt. That comes at a higher interest rate. So between needing to take on more and the costs of debt being higher, we wound up requiring more.

As far as projections for 2024-2025, again, you know, everyone can read the financial news and there's been ideas that the interest rate would come down, and so the folks are doing their best estimate of what interest rates will be over the next fiscal year and what the impact of that will be over the next fiscal year and then building that into the main estimates here. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Minister of Finance. Any further questions? No further questions, please turn to page 172.

Finance, Office of the Comptroller General, operations expenditure summary, 2024-2025 Main Estimates, $91,458,000. Does the committee agree?

Thank you. Are there additional information -- there are additional information items on page 175 to 180. Are there any questions? Member for Inuvik Boot Lake.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Just because I'm new and I'm interested, on the heritage fund, the $62 million, who manages this fund?

Thank you, Member for Inuvik Boot Lake. Minister of Finance.

CIBC Wood Gundy manages it on our behalf. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Minister of Finance. Member for Inuvik Boot Lake.

Is there an investment policy that -- I don't know if it would be -- if that would come to Cabinet or how -- is there an investment policy and if there is, who sets that up?