Mr. Chairman, the area I would like to comment about and ask questions about is the area of devolution of programs from the federal government. It is a program goal to have devolution of federal programs to the GNWT and that the GNWT move toward provincial-like authority in all areas, and there are a couple of other references I'll get to later on. I, for one, support this and I support it quite strongly.

Over the past decade, as we have taken over as a government more responsibility from the federal government, I think the respect and impact that we have with the provinces and the federal government has increased a lot. I think our efforts during Meech Lake and the Ministers' efforts during the Charlottetown Accord discussions raised the profile of the NWT and, I think, raised the level of our credibility with the provinces and with the federal government. I think the Minister did an excellent job in representing us at discussions leading up to the Charlottetown Accord.

I think it was very unfortunate for the Northwest Territories that both Meech Lake and the Charlottetown Accord failed because if either one of them had gone through, even though we didn't get anything we wanted, the reality is we would have been recognized as a viable political entity for all time. I see the danger of us staying in the situation we are in now, as half province, half municipality, where a lot of parts of the NWT are carrying on their own little negotiations with the federal government, whether it is on treaties or self-government agreements that flow out of land claims. Division is also going to happen and so what was already a relatively weak jurisdiction -- economically and politically vis-a-vis provinces and the federal government -- unless we're very careful, is going to be a very weak number of jurisdictions.

In fact, the way the world is changing, with the globalization of the world economy and with the increasingly competitive nature of the world, there is every danger that we will become a small backwater on the federal and international scene. I think it's very, very important that our government aggressively pursues the remainder of the provincial-like powers from Ottawa. There are, obviously, a lot of internal negotiations that are going to have to take place. We're obviously going to have to take into account whatever self-government agreements that flow out of land claims, and we have to respect and take into account whatever treaty arrangements are made.

But, I don't think any of us in the NWT should lose sight of the fact that we are a very weak, very dependant jurisdiction. If we don't aggressively try to increase our self-reliance and to pull away from our overwhelming dependence on Ottawa -- and 85 per cent of our funding comes from Ottawa -- if we don't get these powers from Ottawa and we wait until we work out our own internal politics in the NWT, by the time we work it all out, there may be nothing more to be had. There is every danger of that. With all due respect to the various regions and the groups that are negotiating their own deals, the reality is that a Nellie Cournoyea who speaks for the Northwest Territories is a much more influential politician than a Nellie Cournoyea who speaks for her region. A Steve Kakfwi who speaks for the Northwest Territories is a much more influential politician than a Steve Kakfwi who speaks for his region.

I think that regional leaders in the constitutional process that we've embarked on, will hopefully recognize that there is a very important and realistic approach that we have to take. We have to speak with one voice. I'm concerned that if we back away from the approach we've had in the past of trying to pursue devolution that it will be a self-fulfilling prophecy. Not only will we never become a province, we will become essentially irrelevant in the constitutional family of Canada.

My question to the Minister is, how does he see his role as Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs pursuing the goal of trying to get as many powers from the federal government as we can? And how does he see his role coordinating with the Minister of Finance, who obviously has an important role to play in devolution, with the Premier, who is going to have an overall and large role to play dealing with the Prime Minister and Premiers, and with other government departments? For example, Mr. Todd is aggressively pursuing the mineral and northern accord which I, for one, support wholeheartedly. I just wonder where the Minister sees his department fitting in and what sort of positive direction can the Minister give to the whole devolution exercise?

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Then would we expect this initiative to be put into the package of initiatives that the government now is negotiating with the federal government?

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Could the Minister give us a time frame where we can expect the Minister to report back to this House as to what progress he has made in these negotiations?

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I find this process very interesting for us, probably as much if not more than other jurisdictions. It's a very, very important one. As the Minister has said there is a lot of overlap now. Many programs that DIAND carries out I am quite sure we are very capable of carrying out. Is the Minister of Finance the designated Minister in this process?

Thank you, Madam Speaker. My question is to the Minister of Finance, and it's to deal with a meeting that the Minister attended in January. A meeting that was put together of the federal Intergovernmental Affairs Minister, Marcel Masse, about the possible elimination of duplication between federal, provincial and territorial programs. I wonder if the Minister could give us a brief report as to what transpired in that particular meeting. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

I don't want to debate it. I think the Standing Committee on Finance was very careful to have a balanced approach. The reality is that, at the present time the fiscal situation is pretty good. On the other hand, I think we are very clear that we're very, very vulnerable in the future. I think Mr. Pollard is also well aware that not only does the Department of Finance in Ottawa listen to our debates, but they read all the financial records coming from all the jurisdictions so they are quite aware of everybody's relative position. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would just like to make a few general comments in a couple of areas. Last night the Premier brought up the Beatty report. In my reply to the budget speech I want to actually give an explanation of the Beatty report from when it was created. I don't think that has been done, but I will do that on Monday.

But there is another area that concerns me. This is not a harsh criticism of the government, it's as much a criticism of the media as anything else. Over the last ten years, our debate of the title of the Premier indicates what has happened. This jurisdiction has matured at an incredible rate. The word "Finance Minister" and the word "Premier" have very powerful significance now. Anytime a Premier or Finance Minister makes any kind of a public statement about the state of the financial affairs of the Northwest Territories, a lot of very important people listen, and listen very, very carefully. I think it's extremely critical for the Finance Minister and for the Premier to be extremely precise with the information they give out, extremely precise with the information they make public, that they give to MLAs. The media has never ever been able to do a lot of homework, for whatever reason on financial matters. It's boring, it takes a lot of work. So basically, they will report superficially whatever is said.

If the Finance Minister comes to the Standing Committee on Finance, unless the Finance Minister is very precise about the nature of the information, the public statements or the reports from the Finance committee or other committees could actually be the type of reports about which the media will make headlines, that really do scare off investors, scare off bankers

and scare consumers. I think every year this is going to be more and more of a factor.

I will give two or three examples over the last couple of years of what, at least I perceive to have been a problem in this area. One, lack of precision and, secondly, the fact that the media didn't do their homework to really look at exactly what the Finance Minister was trying to get across or what the Premier was trying to get across.

In the area of short-term borrowing. The area of short-term borrowing is very different and distinct from the area of long-term debt. It's in an absolutely different category. What has happened over the last two years, those two categories, that of deficit and that of short-term borrowing have been coming together in the public mind and that compounds the problem.

Our government over the last ten years has really had a luxury that no other governments have had because we've had large accumulated surpluses. We, like every government, have cash flow problems. Everybody does. Businesses do. So what we're talking about here is really a line of credit. We're not talking anything to do with accumulating debt or long-term debt. What's happened over the years is we've maintained pretty consistently the level of our accumulated surplus. It's been between $35 million and $60 million for ten years, and that's about where it is now. It goes up and down, but it's there. But some of that accumulated surplus can't be used the same way it was before because we have debentures out there, or what have you. So from time to time we have to go and borrow money. I'm not sure what the limit is. When I was Finance Minister the limit was $40 million, but I don't know what it is now. But it's not a big deal. That aspect of it is not a big deal. The problem is -- I just hope the Finance Minister takes this right -- the media didn't understand the difference between the real significance of a long-term debt and short-term borrowing requirements. I said that the public, when they're hearing both at the same time it compounds the message and it really scares a lot of people. That's one example of precision.

Another example of the precision of what I'm talking about is when we talk about the formula financing agreement. Now the formula financing agreement has a couple of flaws that we talked about. I think most people understand perversity, it's basically that the level of our taxation has to match some average level of provincial taxation or we're penalized for the difference. Then the GDP cap that was imposed in 1988.

Talking about precision, I think the Premier in her statement talked about the fact that we're trying to get rid of the problems that we have in our formula financing agreement that the provinces don't have in their equalization agreements. If you look at the formula financing agreement and you look at the provincial equalization agreements, we talk about losing hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue. The precise fact is a little bit different from that. Though that is true that we have lost millions from what we would have had if it had have stayed the same as it was pre-1988. The way I think that should have been put is that in 1988 the federal government imposed ceilings on provinces and on the territories. The provinces and territories, collectively, lost hundreds of millions of dollars. The question you want to ask is how did we fare with the formula financing agreement, compared to a province that has equalization? The reality is, compared to the other provinces, in that five years, we went ahead in revenue by $150 million and they dropped in revenue by $50 million. So because we had a formula financing agreement, we actually saved ourselves $200 million.

The other aspect, and I think the Finance Minister told us about the new deal that the provinces are getting. I think that was what the Premier was alluding to, perhaps, but it wasn't clear in her messages that they have been given a five per cent increase over the last couple of years. In the last two years, using the government's own statistics, but in the year 1991-92 to 1992-93 we actually went down. In that year there was a decrease of $4 million. But then from 1992-93 to 1993-94 we had an increase of eight per cent. So we're up almost at historic levels. Then, from 1993-94 to 1994-95 we're about four per cent. So I guess the question is, the difference from what we anticipate compared to that five per cent is really what we're talking about. The problem, though important, shouldn't take away from the fact that the formula financing agreement has saved us a couple hundred million bucks over the last four years. That's, again, another example where it's very important to be precise.

A third example of that is when this government first came into power. Mr. Pollard, who I think has done an extremely competent job as Minister of Finance and I think deserves a lot of credit for being able to maintain the fiscal situation that we have right now. It's a real tough job and I think he's done very well.

Another example of where precision -- and this is not the intention, I'm sure, at all on the Finance Minister's part -- is really important, the Finance Minister, for instance, quite rightly, would brief the Standing Committee on Finance of worst case scenarios. That's what Finance Ministers have done since the beginning of time. Out of that, unless there are very precise instructions about how the information is used, the Standing Committee on Finance says in the paper we're expecting a $380 million deficit by 1995. The media, of course, don't go to the Finance Minister or the chairman of the Standing Committee on Finance and say, what's this. Mr. Pollard would have said, look, we're talking as if everything went bad, we just wanted to be realistic. That doesn't happen. There's a headline. It stands there on its own. Bankers and people who are thinking of investing in the north see these headlines and there is nothing there to qualify it. I know for a fact that with bankers in this town, anyway, that has a big impact.

My point is here -- and I'm not blaming him, this is as much as the media's fault as it is anybody else because they pick the juicy part and that's the juicy part of that. They don't report a well thought out presentation. The one line is the headline. But it's the headline that does the damage. My point is, more and more every day for the Minister of Finance and the Premier to be extremely precise with the information they give out, because that information and those words have a very profound impact on how the financial world looks at investment opportunities here in the Northwest Territories. Whether banks are prepared to lend money to businesses. It's quite extraordinary. I'm not sure if you actually both recognize how important your positions are and how much people read into what you have to say. Thank you very much.

Perhaps he thought he would be there longer.

---Laughter

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I have a question for the Minister of Finance concerning the payroll tax. Again, referring to the form, as the Minister looks into the details of what is on this form, there is another real problem. Taxpayers are asked to put down their gross annual remuneration and the calculation is times .01 to get their payroll tax calculation. The problem, of course, is this was started on July 1. So if they put their gross annual remuneration times .01, they will pay twice as much tax as they should and a lot of people are confused by this. I wonder if the Minister would look into this also?