Michael McLeod

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...

I certainly would commit to working with the Department of Education to look at how we can improve the numbers for qualified recreational staff. Aurora College already has a program, the Recreation Leaders Program; however, there is no real mechanism for an apprenticeship type of program in the community. Some communities have gone as far as to develop training plans for their communities, but it’s a kind of one-off situation designed specifically for their community. I would like to see that brought forward as a template.

We also have a number of programs geared toward our recreation facility...

Mr. Speaker, of course, our capital investment is based on some of our surplus and our ability to borrow. This actually helps us in a way, that any projects that are on our capital list or on our needs are now being invested in from our side with 25-cent dollars. So it will help us. It should free up some dollars for reallocation and maybe loosen up the tight squeeze we’re in. Thank you.

Mr. Speaker, in the discussions that we had earlier on with committees, it started out that there was some desire to see a long-term investment plan put together that would cover all the seven years. That’s something that’s up for consideration. However, as the Member knows, that would have to be approved on an annual basis. We’re trying to put enough information together so that we can have a good discussion on it and identify the different areas that need investments. I should also point out that there was a motion passed in this House for a couple of projects to be considered.

This whole...

There seems to be some assumption that we went into this with a decision that was already made about whom we would select. Of course, this is not at all correct. We haven’t awarded the contract; there is still more discussion ongoing. The process was fair. We had a committee, an independent evaluation ongoing. We’ve had advice from Justice, and I don’t know what more we could add to that. The company that has been informed that they weren’t ranked the highest has been given some time, and they will get a debriefing.

As for the cost, I would really beg to differ that it cost $400,000. However...

Mr. Speaker, it is not at all unusual for a company to have further discussions with our government if there is an area that needs clarification or further discussion.

Mr. Speaker, the only person pretending here is the Member. He’s pretending not to hear my answers.

Laughter.

Mr. Speaker, any time we work with a company or a company has been involved with some of the earlier stages, whether it’s a feasibility study or other studies, we ensure that the information that goes out is equal to all parties involved.

In this case, and in most cases, we will enlist the help of a fairness commissioner or somebody of equal stature. We also set up committees or independent bodies or hire independent evaluators to work with us. That usually gives comfort to everybody that this is a fair process.

Once again, I can certainly relate to the Member’s messages and some of his recommendations. We have had all the communities make those points and reaffirm those points on a number of occasions. We’ll do what we can. We are quite concerned about where we are with replacing water plants. This is a possible remedy to that, though. We’ll follow it up.

The policy that we follow and abide by is the Business Incentive Policy. In this case it was applied.