Floyd Roland

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Again I’d have to refer to the Minister of Finance as to that level of detail and if it’s been shared. I’m not familiar with it. I’ll go to Ms. Melhorn as to some additional information. I guess I’d have to refer to again the Minister of Finance and his staff to see if that is a meeting that can be arranged to provide that if it hasn’t been on that basis. The simple fact is the Member is saying he does not trust what he’s being presented.

As Members are aware and as we have briefed Members, the need for this session is based on the lenders requesting the GNWT assume the debt. If we do not assume the debt, then there will be a make-whole clause that would kick in. There would be a penalty on top of the repayment of the debt. We would have a project that is out of the water but yet to be complete. So it will cost additional monies on the Government of the Northwest Territories and without assuming this process and having the federal government work with us as they have committed to on debt relief, in future years we would have to...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Every Government of the Northwest Territories when taking office is faced with severe implications. I’ve been a Member of the Legislative Assembly for four terms and I think right at the start of my term we talked of debt walls. We’ve always avoided them by taking the right fiscal strategy and managed to keep the government in a place that keeps ourselves moving along.

The Member has talked about unrealistic expectations. The expectations that are presented are presented on a fiscal strategy that Mr. Miltenberger presented in his budget that the Members of the Assembly...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My understanding is that the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Transportation in meetings with committee members provided that information and we’ll be able to provide it again to the Members regarding the breakdown of that loan.

Now, we need to be clear on the language we use because initially the reason this project was put through the DCBC was to keep it off our accounting or off our books and we couldn’t guarantee the debt in that sense, but we indemnified or we, through the guaranteed payments on the 35-year concession agreement, we in fact backstopped as a...

Mr. Speaker, the whole Deh Cho Bridge Project, the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation, that agreement that was signed, all contemplated of trying to have this debt outside of our accounting structures within the abilities that we have already set or the borrowing limit set by the federal government. The debt limit was taken into consideration in trying to come up with ways of trying to get the large infrastructure projects of this nature off the ground. That is why this process was taken.

Previous governments have looked at the P3 initiative as well. Unfortunately, as we find ourselves now, many of the...

When we initially looked at this to see what package we feel would best suit our needs, we felt the five-year would give us the flexibility in future years that would allow future governments borrowing room, still have room for borrowing. That is why we requested of them the five-year extension or adjustment. Now, we’ve yet to hear back if they will do the full five year and to what limit. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’ll deal with some of the comments that were made and requests for information and then I’ll hand it over to Minister Michael McLeod to deal with some of the technical aspects of the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation and the structures and Associated Engineering, all that side of it.

A number of things that we need to put out in, as Members have said, clear English, plain English for the record for the public of the Northwest Territories, the first one is that, I think Mr. Bromley stated, he’d rather not be here. I’ve heard other Members say that and I share their frustration...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I wish to advise Members that the Honourable Robert C. McLeod will be absent from the House today to attend the Northern Housing Forum in Inuvik.

I also wish to advise Members that the Honourable Michael Miltenberger will be absent from the House for the remainder of the week to attend to a personal family matter. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I don’t believe I responded to that particular question. The area of a government’s outgoing days, the Cabinet, its authority, seeing if there’s an emergency of some nature that always has to be taken into consideration, but I would say that because of a project like this and the nature of what’s happened from it, we would have to get a process, a commitment, that outside an absolute emergency that it be business as usual that would go on and I mean that’s payroll, that’s your programs and services in our communities that are ongoing day-to-day initiatives. So you’ve...

Yes, Mr. Chairman.