Kevin O'Reilly

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I did not quite catch that at the end. The demand that we predicted is not there? Is that what is driving the reduced revenues? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

I can honestly say I think that's the most positive response I have ever gotten in the House from a Minister, so congratulations. Thank you very much, and I appreciate the Minister's work on the issue. My sincere thanks.

So my next question here: in my statement I referred to the fact that some of our residents, particularly the working poor and young people, are not covered under existing programs for prescriptions. If we truly want our students to come back, we need to look at making sure that they can access prescription drugs, which are now covered in Ontario for young people, and the...

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I have been on record as expressing concerns about raising, perhaps, unrealistic expectations by submitting all of these large infrastructure project proposals at the same time, so I will leave that one at that. That's all I have got. Thanks.

Merci, Monsieur le President. [English translation not provided.] I would like to welcome the students from William McDonald school -- it's in my riding of Frame Lake -- and their exchange students from Quebec. Merci, Monsieur le President.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. So the estimated balance of March 31, 2019, that does not include anything related to Mackenzie Valley Highway, Slave Geological Province Road, Taltson Hydroelectric Expansion, yet our government continues to make application to the federal government for these things. How could we possibly carry those out when we are so close to the debt limit already? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thanks, Mr. Chair. They know what I am going to ask. Every year I come back, and I ask the same things: what are we doing about indexing the Northern Resident Tax Deduction, and what are we doing about the continuing frustration of NWT residents about audits of our travel receipts and so on? CRA will not set what the lowest northern air fare is. People have to try to guess it on an annual basis, and then we get audited.

What are we doing about those issues? I keep coming back and asking. I know the Minister says he is working on it, but what we need is for the Minister to put pen to paper and...

Thanks, Mr. Chair. Yes, I appreciate that. Is that conversation going to start with standing committee sometime in the next two or three months? Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Chair, this is going to be more of a comment. I appreciate the Minister's response, talking to the standing committee first, but I am certainly advocating for the public process, revenue options paper like was done a couple years ago, and I have continually given the Minister ideas about how to stabilize and make our revenues more predictable through a resource tax, capital tax. There are lots of different instruments out there. I think it is time we start to look at those. All of our effort so far have been on the expenditure side of the equation, and we need to start to focus more...

Thanks, Mr. Chair. Great to get that Valentine's gift from the Minister of Finance. Is there not somewhere in the business plan or in the main estimates that that total can be shown? We have got “liquor revolving fund presentation” as an information item in the main estimates, but something as fundamental as the Heritage Fund, I have to ask on an annual basis what the balance is. I am sure I could go and check in the public accounts, but, by the time we get the public accounts, they are more than a year old.

Is there not some way that we can show what the balance in the fund is through a...

That causes me a little bit of concern, so what is it we can do as a government to make corporate income tax or taxes in general more predictable and stable? I will start with that, thanks, Mr. Chair?