Michael Miltenberger

I would ask the Member to give one shred of evidence about pet projects, about the allegations he’s making. He says, why are we even here? We’re approving a $1.6 billion budget that provides services to every man, woman and child in the Northwest Territories. That’s why we’re here. We’re here to make laws that are going to benefit our people. We’re here to provide direction and oversight of a very complex organization.

The Member has some questions and concerns about positions. We have over 5,000 jobs. He’s talking about a few hundred vacancies, which we will lay out in detail as to where they...

The Member is making very harsh, unfounded allegations of criminal wrongdoing, which is what he said, and asking that people be fired on the basis of the fact that for the last three days we’ve been sorting through vacancy rate numbers and he’s now convinced that there is a criminal wrongdoing, which would mean, since the deputies all report to Ministers, that there was some type of complicity or conspiracy.

Very clearly, this Legislature votes positions, when they are part of the budget process, to fulfil functions in government. Once those positions are in place and they are staffed or in the...

I can appreciate the Member’s concern and his patience and his resolute pursuit of this issue along with his other colleagues from small communities. What I would suggest, since he’s referred to and looking for hope potentially, in his mind, with the review of vacancies that the committee asked yesterday for some more detailed information and we are in the process of finalizing that information. But once that information is reviewed and we all have a common understanding of the breakdown of the numbers, which I think will meet the concern of the Members, then we can have a more informed...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’ll speak first, of course, to the fiscal reality that we face, which the Member is very conversant with and well aware of. I can also speak to the fact that there are health and safety issues for employees now. It’s no longer a case of one nurse or one RCMP, but it’s going to be two or maybe even three to cover off all of these health and safety issues, which gets back to being a significant cost factor.

We are trying to profile our resources to make sure that we provide coverage for health and social services and for the RCMP to provide that security and comfort to...

The $120 million is booked for accounting purposes. The $15 million is a sign of good faith, but you’ll notice in my budget address I indicated in there that that money will not flow until late 2015.

Yes, Mr. Speaker.

Our plan is clear. I have laid it out. We’ve agreed to the adjustment of 25 percent. That money will not be available to us as a government until late 2015. We will book that money. We will agree to the 25 percent on an ongoing basis. We will book that and have it reflected in the 2015-16 budget. Thank you.

Cleary, this session there’s an interest by Members in terms of vacancies and this HR issue. There’s a report tabled each session in this Legislative Assembly for the Members where we can have that discussion. We’re also in the midst of a total rewrite of the Financial Administration Act, which will fully involve committee. We’re going to be looking at a total rewrite since it’s a very old document, so I believe the concerns of the Member will be able to be addressed as we look at the rewrite of that legislation. Thank you.

The key issue with the Heritage Fund has been the political debates over the amount that goes into the Heritage Fund. We came forward with 5 percent. We’ve had the debate. Clearly, the money is not going to flow into our coffers where we’ll actually have the cash until 2015, but the critical decision as a government was what we are going to put in, as a Legislature, what we are going to agree to earmark to go into that Heritage Fund. If we would have waited until next year, then the 5 percent in the budget would have gone into the fund. So there was a need to have that political debate, even...

The activities that the Member talks about are set out, as he’s pointed out, in Section 31.1 of the Financial Administration Act. Under that act, as well, deputy ministers, under the delegation of authority of regulations, have been delegated authority by the FMB to transfer funds among activities. Departments are required to report to the Department of Finance detailed monthly reports of all budget adjustments and transfers affecting operations, expenditures and capital expenditure appropriations. This includes transfers between expenditure categories, such as compensation and benefits...