Kevin A. Menicoche

Mr. Speaker, throughout discussing the budget here for the past two weeks the biggest concern, of course, is how do we as regular Members help our government in the exercise of reducing $20 million in each of the next two years. My recent experience kind of concerns me as how much input will we really have. Can the Minister again explain to me how we can have input into reducing the size of our expenditures in order to match our revenue?

Mr. Speaker, thank you very much. I will direct this question to the Minister responsible for the Financial Management Board Secretariat. With reference to my Member’s statement and budgeting cycle, while the government might be a government function, can the Minister explain to me what role as a regular Member do I have in terms in influencing the budget for the benefits of my constituents and my riding in the near future?

Mahsi cho, Mr. Speaker. I, too, rise and I would like to talk about the business incentive policy. That is of great concern to residents and businesses I represent in the Nahendeh riding. They have indicated to me that they want the BIP enforced and used at all times. It was put into place to recognize the high costs of our northern contractors who have to endure year-round costs where southern competitors don’t pay taxes here or have overhead. The North is a great place to live, but if we don’t keep and utilize the business incentive program, the whole of the NWT will just become a...

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just with regard to this appropriation, I know there was some significant debate in the 13th and 14th assemblies, but I'm just wondering how the regular budget impacts a supp. Does the department have to plead their case that there's absolutely no money in their budget? We're just going through this whole exercise where we do think that there is some money in the departments' budget. So for the Minister, Mr. Chair, what qualifies departments to claim a supp?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. One of the things that I have been telling the people back home and I'm going to be consistent about, is that it would be unrealistic to come to government and try to get more. We cannot get more programs, more services, but we can hang on to what we have. Unfortunately this tax is one of the ways we do it, and I would like to look in the long term as well. I do want to achieve a balanced budget and this is one of the ways we're going to have to do it.

This afternoon I had the pleasure of being at a presentation where one of our organizations that we support was in...

No more questions, Madam Chair. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I think one of the things when we were contemplating this early in our term here was that I had thought that when we suggested the two percent increase to the corporate income tax it would have helped us alleviate the personal income tax increase, which is something else I am going to have to think about later. Is it true that we are only going to be expecting to raise $8 million per annum with the two percent increase to our corporate income tax?

Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I’d just like to recognize Mr. Frank Pope, a former Fort Simpson resident now residing in Inuvik. Thank you very much.

---Applause

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I won’t use up the committee’s time anymore in procedural matters. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I have concluded my comments. Thank you very much.