Statements in Debates
He has now decided to enter the political arena and is running for the presidency of the Gwich’in Tribal Council. I’d like to welcome him here and also wish him the best of luck.
Mr. Speaker, we do have all communities working on an integrated sustainability plan for the long term, and part of that plan is to have the capital plan included, the human resource plan and also a community energy plan. Thirty-two communities have already completed their portion of the capital process and the capital plans. We have eight communities that are working on energy plans.
Now, we have a system where we have resources and will continue to support the communities to look at other sources of fuel. At this point we have not indicated and earmarked any sort of alternate energy or...
Mr. Speaker, the issue of oil, fuel, and the associated costs, and supply is certainly something that we wrestle with on a daily basis. Today I think the price of oil is pegged at over $1.28. All our communities across the North face the challenges of not only the high costs but the additional costs of transportation and having it delivered to our communities. In most cases our communities are responsible for their own supply. There is a market in most of the communities.
We, on the other hand, as a government look after the supply and storage and sale in 15 communities across the North. More...
I want to recognize a couple of people. First of all, Blake Lyons, former president of the NWT Association of Communities, and also a guy I went to college with: Norman Snowshoe, with whom I spent many long nights… studying.
Laughter.
I’ve already committed to meeting with one of the communities in the Member’s riding. It wouldn’t take a whole lot more effort to meet with the Member in the other community he represents, Fort Resolution. We’d be glad to talk about budgeting and being able to redirect financing and things of that nature with the communities, along with the Member.
Mr. Speaker, I think we’re starting to see some of that already. Today the federal government announced that they’d like to move forward with the Kakisa Bridge, something that’s in our interim appropriation, so we’re quite excited about that. I’m already getting the sense that we’re campaigning for projects in the different ridings.
Mr. Speaker, we fully expect to have and be able to have some discussion with my cabinet colleagues and also the Regular Members. Sometime in mid-March for sure, if we’re going to do anything this year, we’ll have to have them approve it in the main. That will be...
Mr. Speaker, we have a two-phase process that’s identified for the initiatives under the Building Canada plan. The first phase was signed off today, and that includes the amount of money we’d be receiving through this fund and also a commitment for ongoing investment in the gas tax program. The next step will be to sign off on the financial agreement, and we expect that to start taking place. We have identified the areas that the investments will be required in, and those are the areas of transportation and municipal governments or communities.
On the municipal side we’ve started the discussion...
Mr. Speaker, first of all, I have to correct the Member: we were the ones pitching the concept of bundling the project. We had serious problems attracting people to bid on these projects when they were put out on individual tenders. The costs that did come in on some of these other projects that are a concern to us were very high. We went to the communities. We sought out a company to give us a feasibility study on this concept, and we presented it to cabinet and decided to go on an open call for, first of all, a request for qualifications. We had five companies respond. We went to the next...
That is correct. In the case of an RFP, if the RFP process allows for further discussion and negotiation to the highest-rated company, that can be done.
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to advise that today the Government of Canada and the Government of the Northwest Territories announced the signing of a framework agreement that will provide the Northwest Territories with funding of $245.8 million in total over the next seven years.
Applause.
These dollars are to address public infrastructure needs and priorities in the Northwest Territories.
This funding is made available under the Building Canada plan, which is the Government of Canada’s new long-term infrastructure plan first announced in the 2007 federal budget.
Today we announce the first project...