Caroline Wawzonek

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, that would only be in a short-term sense. Again, I expect this is going to come up here today. So not as a way of running their operations. I think perhaps the original question was whether they're expected to have a balanced operating budget. And, yes, they're expected to have a balanced operating budget, but they can use debt to take on infrastructure costs. Again, Mr. Chair, I don't necessarily have all this in front of me, and I'm more than happy to follow up with Members if I -- if -- with NTPC, they may well be quite happy to come and speak to Members...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So these eight items were budgeted originally under the operations budget. This is where seeing going from Fund 1 to Fund 2 is part of just moving that they were -- the amount that we're putting in to the infrastructure operations part -- or the infrastructure budget here is coming off of the operations budget to reflect that. So they're just -- they're moving in terms of the accounting, how they're being accounted -- considered in the accounting. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I could certainly run that number for the House and for the Member. I don't have that here. It would -- it may, again, bit of me having to sort of tea leaf what the PUB's final rate increase would necessarily be. I don't know that. I can certainly -- once that's done, we could certainly consider coming back. Obviously, that's the rule of the House. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, this is a 75/25 or 75 percent/25 percent cost share project, so $1.913 million is offset by revenues from the Government of Canada. Thank you.

Mr. Chair, I think the new rate application will reflect a subsidy of $12 million over four years, and I -- again, I don't -- I believe it will say that it's then going from 24.8 down to 15. It's from the perspective of the public is where I want to add again that that's only their energy side of their bill, not the total bill, and it doesn't necessarily yet take into account that there was the increase in July. So the GRA reflects that total rate increase but from the perspective of the public, they've already seen a small increase in July, and it is not the whole bill that goes up 25 percent...

Yes, please, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, the Members of the accountability and oversight committee schedule the timing of the supplementary estimates reviews, and this one was scheduled for today. The PUB is already reviewing this. The $12 million was landed on, 12 over four as a number that was deemed reasonable to bring the costs down to a rate level that would, while still impactful, obviously would be one that could be managed. There was numerical consideration given to what those potential outcomes would be. You know, again, Mr. Chair, had I anticipated that that would be the questioning today or...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So, Mr. Chair -- and it is -- it's ratepayers. I often get it wrong, but -- so the ratepayers who often are the same taxpayers -- and I mentioned this yesterday in saying that you are taking tax dollars then essentially turning it back over so that people are keeping their costs lower.

The $12 million that we are proposing will be -- would go towards the cost of power. Now, the final amount that it's going to be depends upon what the public utilities board decides to do. They're the ones that actually set the rates, and the requirement for a GRA was issued somewhat earlier...

Mr. Speaker, I wish to table the following two documents: Supplementary Estimates (Infrastructure Expenditures), No. 3, 2024-2025; Supplementary Estimates (Operations Expenditures) No. 2, 2024-2025. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Chair, I just don't have that in front of me here. There are -- there was considerations that were put in to different options that could be put forward, you know, and certainly the range could be anything from a complete subsidy to no subsidy. Again, I didn't bring that level of detail. You happen to have the Minister responsible for the Northwest Territories Power Corporation here, but even -- and so that's where I know there was some fairly detailed considerations done of what different numbers might do to impact different potential rate increases. I just don't have that math in front...