Floyd Roland

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Apprenticeship Program still exists and is operated through the Department of Education, Culture and Employment. However, as a new initiative, we are looking back at trying to step up the Government of the Northwest Territories in the area of apprenticeships and training. We’ve looked at that through all those departments, came up with a number and put it forward to FMB. Unfortunately, it falls under new initiatives. It would be future year requirements and would require some new funding in that area. However, the existing programs are still operated...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in the area of the Territorial Power Support Program, that program continues to grow just by the fact of volume of people in their own homes and the subsidy we provide to residents outside of the capital. We have no plans of changing that program. It is set at 700 kilowatt hours at the Yellowknife rate, and then the rate zone is charged per community. That's the best we can do at this point and that program has now crept over the $8 million mark. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, because it refers to our operating surplus of our last budget, there is some impact in the sense that we book previous year's earnings or revenue into the fiscal year. As well, throughout the year we do adjust our numbers based on revenue indications we get from the federal government. In this case, this money is again for previous year's surplus situation. Our fiscal responsibility policy, for example in this fiscal year, requires us to hold a $30 million surplus to fund our capital infrastructure program. So that's what that money would get to use...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Right now within the Government of the Northwest Territories, the existing program we have, through the Department of Education, Culture and Employment, wage subsidies and so on for a private sector, as well as departments, to help fund if they are going to go into the area of hiring more apprentices. Within the Department of Public Works and Services, as I stated earlier, we have struggled in that area. At one time, we provided all of the maintenance, O and M in communities. Since then with hamlets and community governments taking on more and more of that...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Under the existing system that we are now under until the next agreement is signed -- and we expect we should have an agreement in place by the time the new federal budget comes around -- the interim formula financing arrangement we are operating under, we get to keep 100 percent of the revenues; or, if it slides the other way, we lose 100 percent. So in this case, there's no further adjustments to those numbers. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, at one point, Public Works and Services was the largest, within government, producer of tradespeople through the Apprenticeship Program. For many years, the government, past governments, have taken a different direction and the staffing levels within the trades side of our department was privatized and that initiative wasn’t used as much. What we have done within the Government of the Northwest Territories, though, recently was to look at the Apprenticeship Program, the involvement that we have. Each department already has, through a number of programs...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it’s not too often I get to stand up and get some good news out there. I’ll take this opportunity today to mention some good news for us here in the Northwest Territories, as well as for a constituent back in Inuvik.

Yesterday in New Brunswick the BDC honoured top young businesspeople from across Canada at the 19th Young Entrepreneurs Awards Ceremony. Out of the 19, the Northwest Territories was represented by one of our own out of Inuvik, Ms. Holly Norris.

---Applause

She started, along with her partner, a business called Delta Sun Services in Inuvik. It’s a...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this reference that we highlight the estimated surplus that we were targeting in the last budget reflects the previous fiscal year operations. So it doesn't have an impact on today's fiscal environment. It shows that through our final accounting and the measures taken and adjustments with the federal government, and those adjustments are not directly related to the formula, they're related more to the CRA, or Canada Revenue Agency, and how corporations file their tax and when those final adjustments happen there. So that's the impact. But the surplus...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, yes, I'll have to say part of it is due to the fact in management of our budget as a government, Regular Members' advice, our own work as we looked at the fiscal environment we operate under and the numbers that have come in. We also end up dealing with some of the adjustments that come after the fact from the federal government on some of our corporate tax revenues, and that also has an impact on those numbers too. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Territorial Power Support Program is aimed at residences, so 700 kilowatt hours per month. I might say, Mr. Speaker, my home in Inuvik with my family, I worked hard at keeping consumption below that because once you get above it you start paying your community rate and that can go up significantly. We do have a commercial portion of it. It is very small and it is application based. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.