The franchise in Hay River, the decision to seek out another provider was driven by not the Power Corporation alone, but rather by the Town of Hay River. They made an announcement in late 2014 that they would be seeking other providers. The Power Corporation has put in a bid which, as I understand, has been accepted by the Town of Fort Smith. The Town of Hay River, I'm sorry. They already supply power to the town of Fort Smith directly.

We are anticipating that should this negotiation be completed or when it is completed, rather, Mr. Speaker, that this will result in lower power rates to the citizens and businesses in Hay River, and there will be no extra costs borne by other rate payers.

Yes, Mr. Speaker, there have been increases of the power rates over the last few years. These were driven by increases in costs, many of them unavoidable by the Power Corporation, such as the increasing costs under collective agreements, increasing costs of fuel. Also, too, the actual amount of power that is distributed each year by the Power Corporation has not been rising to meet these costs. Therefore, increases were asked for of the PUB and granted. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. There seem to be a lot of questions in that question. I don't think the Power Corporation is currently contemplating any large hydro developments that will flood communities. If they are, they haven't informed us on this side of the House. The corporation is committed, of course, to providing reliable power to all of our communities. In fact, there are initiatives to encourage people to reduce their power bill. It is, in some ways, difficult for the corporation because, as people conserve power and use less, they receive less revenue. We are committed to providing safe, reliable, and energy-efficient power to all of our communities. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, Mr. Speaker. I understand that the deputy ministers do have two roles in the sense that apart from their usual responsibilities they also will be directors of the corporation. The Energy Plan will be rolled out in the next few months as the Premier mentioned last week. I am confident that the directors of the Power Corporation will be able to fulfill that role and also their usual role as deputy ministers.

As the House heard last week, we will be proceeding with a new energy plan. The Premier spoke to that before the House last week. As a Crown corporation, the Power Corporation will play a critical role in the proposed energy plan. We already play a critical role in the development of alternative and renewable energy systems, including the recently opened Colville Lake plant. There are also solar plants in Fort Liard, Fort Simpson, and Wrigley. Hydro itself is a renewable resource, a green source of power. As the energy plan is rolled out, the Power Corporation will play an integral role in its development.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As a result of two consecutive low-water years, the Power Corporation sought expressions of interest in November of 2015 with a closing date of February 5, 2016. They received 29 expressions. At that point, the Power Corporation and the government and Arctic Energy Alliance evaluated the proposals and decided not to proceed to the next step which would have been a request for a competitive procurement. So they were simply seeking expressions of interest. It was not cancelled by the government. Twenty-nine were submitted. They were found not to be economic so it didn't proceed beyond that stage. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, one of the things that the commission looked at was salaries of other judges and I think the salaries of our judges are on a par with other jurisdictions. Mr. Speaker, there are some challenges certainly in living in the Northwest Territories and the judges must travel far more than judges do in the south, so it's more demanding from that point of view. The salaries certainly are not out of line with the salaries in other jurisdictions. Thank you.

No, this is quite different in my understanding from other negotiations, because it's not a negotiation in the normal sense; it goes to a commission. It would be more like a binding arbitration. So I would suggest, Mr. Speaker, that this is quite different than any other negotiation the government is entering into or conducting at this time and could not be treated as a precedent. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, one of the hallmarks of a democracy is an independent judiciary. In 1997 the Supreme Court stated that there were three components of judicial independence: security of tenure, administrative independence, and financial security. As a result of that case, every jurisdiction set up a commission, a Judicial Remuneration Commission, including ours, and every four years they give us a report. I think this is the third or fourth report.

It's not a negotiation in a sense but both sides, if I can put it that way, represented by counsel, put their arguments forward. The commission determined that an increase was merited. In the first year it'll be approximately 4.5 per cent and the three following years it'll be the Consumer Price Index plus 1.5 per cent. There is an increase and this increase is not really subject to any further negotiation. We've agreed to be bound by the findings of the commission. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.