Thank you, Madam Chair. I want to ask the Minister on infrastructure and the federal government’s stimulus plan and if the Minister has any type of indication as to any type of further costs, potential federal funding to improve our highways, improve the bridges and the airports, if there’s any type of discussion to improve our infrastructure other than we know the Mackenzie Valley Highway PDRs are completed, or some of them are completed, and if there’s any type of requirements that they’re going to put on our infrastructure to meet or match the federal government’s requirements that may not be known right now. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Madam Chair, and I thank the Member for the question. The issue of infrastructure is an important one as we move along here. We’ve all seen the importance that the federal stimulus money, the Building Canada Plan, has brought to the Northwest Territories. We’ve had an unprecedented amount of capital spending over the past four or five years.
Currently there’s a consultation going on from the federal government to governments across the country on infrastructure planning. This type of consultation should take about a year. After this is concluded, I think you’ll see the federal government make a decision on what should happen next. So talking to our federal Ministers and counterparts in the area of infrastructure I think is going to be really important in the next year to ensure that projects here in the Northwest Territories are given a good billing in Ottawa with the federal government. Thank you.
Can the Minister maybe advise me within the next four years if he has any type of indication that we could be receiving or we are eligible for any type of infrastructure funding other than advising me that there are some discussions going on with the provincial Transportation Ministers and the federal government? If we can receive some infrastructure dollars for our winter roads.
Again, as we continue to move forward, obviously discussions with the federal government are of great importance to us. We thank them for the commitment, the $150 million commitment to the Tuk-Inuvik Highway Project, but we certainly have to come up with what’s next, find a way forward.
We’ve got the next steps with the Mackenzie Valley Highway and I think that’s a project where there’s a great deal of interest in a project like that in Ottawa with the federal government for building the North, this territory, sovereignty and development. There’s a number of issues there that the federal government looks at when looking at potential investment in the area of infrastructure, and certainly the Mackenzie Valley Highway is one of those projects that I think the feds would look favourably on down the road. But we have to continue that discussion. We have to keep knocking on doors. We have to keep promoting the project and the opportunities that are here in the Northwest Territories, and we really will need to work with our counterparts in Ottawa to ensure that the infrastructure dollars that we need here to grow our territory are available to us. So we continue to work towards that and it will be a goal of mine, as the Minister of Transportation, to try to find every available federal dollar that we can for transportation infrastructure here and other infrastructure in the territory. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Any further general comments? Detail. Thank you. Page 9-4, Transportation, activity summary, airports, infrastructure investment summary, total infrastructure investment summary, $1.15 million. Agreed?
Agreed.
Thank you. Page 9-7, Transportation, activity summary, marine, infrastructure investment summary, total infrastructure investment summary, $455,000. Agreed?
Agreed.
Thank you. Page 9-10, Transportation, activity summary, highways, infrastructure investment summary, total infrastructure investment summary, $27.17 million. Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I’d like to ask the Minister at this point my question earlier about the bridge. He kind of sidestepped it neatly. For people who are looking to get some kind of answer on the amount of money that we’re going to end up spending on the bridge, I did ask the Minister if he could give us a bit of a range. I mean, are we talking a minimal amount of money or are we talking a lot of money?
I know in the Minister’s statement he referenced some of the things which will produce the added costs. So I’d like to ask the Minister again, are we talking in the order of $5 million or less, or are we talking in the order of 50 or 100 million dollars or more? Can he give me a bit of an idea about how much money we’re talking about? Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I would say that’s minimal and it’s roughly 5 percent of the total project cost. So it is on the minimal side that the Member has spoken about in her comments to me earlier in the House and here in Committee of the Whole. So that’s where we’re at.
For a project that has been delayed like it has, I think to see a minimal expenditure like 5 percent I think is a testament to the project management team and the department for trying to keep it as in line as we possibly can. This project has been delayed twice now, so we’re looking forward to moving toward the finish line and getting the bridge finished next fall. Thank you.
Thanks to the Minister. Yes, I think we’re all looking forward to the completion of the bridge. I can accept that this may be a minimal cost. Unfortunately to some of our constituents they may think that $10 million or $20 million or these numbers that we talk about here, they’re definitely not minimal, but I thank the Minister for his statement; roughly 5 percent of the total project cost. That gives people a reasonably good idea about what we’re talking about.
I do want to say to the Minister that I appreciate his commitment to providing Members with information and I would hope that that would also go to providing as much information as possible to the public. I wish the Minister well in getting to November 2012 on time and with no further additions to the budget. I have no question, Madam Chair, just a comment. Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Transportation, activity summary, highways, infrastructure investment summary, total infrastructure investment summary, $27.17 million.
Agreed.
Agreed, thank you. Page 9-13, Transportation, activity summary, road licensing and safety, infrastructure investment summary, total infrastructure investment summary, $850,000.
Agreed.
Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I wanted to ask the Minister for the improvements to the road licensing operations, the infrastructure type of support systems, they could help in our small communities where sometimes the contracts are interrupted because of a lack of financial appetite to operate these important services. However, I wanted to ask the Minister if that is something that could be looked at in this infrastructure budget. How do we set up something that the communities can take more advantage of? Because sometimes these operations are costly and their offices actually shut down until somebody comes into the office to say yes, we’ll do this as a service, not because they want to make money. Actually, the money is not that great. So what can the department do to help utilize some of the infrastructure to improve the services in the communities like Colville Lake or Good Hope? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Mr. Neudorf.
Thank you, Madam Chair. We have a project here to work on replacing our existing motor vehicle information system. We have been upgrading this for a few years now as we’ve been adding additional requirements, one of which being the Deh Cho Bridge and the toll collection. Toll permits will be issued through the motor vehicle information system, so we’ve been doing some upgrades. In fact, we have rebuilt the interface that all the client service managers in the communities and in our own-force operations use and that’s been underway this week, actually. We do need a bit more money. This is a total of $1.7 million over the next two years that will allow us to completely rebuild the motor vehicle information system. This is responsible for $5 million worth of revenue right now; and once the tolls come in, it will be about $9 million of GNWT revenue that would go through the system.
One of the big benefits that we hope to achieve in this project is to introduce on-line services related to vehicle registrations and perhaps some other services. Of course, if that’s on line it would be available to anybody in any community. We would see that as an improvement to the service that we’re delivering to the public right now. That will also mean some changes in some of our smaller communities where there is a relatively minimal amount of business related to motor vehicle information services. We’ll have to determine that impact, and we will work with communities and our clients as we do that.
We have developed, in recent years, a mobile issuing station. It’s basically an issuing office in a suitcase that we can go into smaller communities and provide driver’s licensing testing services, and we’ve done that on a few occasions when there’s enough to warrant or enough need in a community. They will make a request to us and we’ll go in and send somebody in with this mobile office and provide the services required.
Thank you, Mr. Neudorf. Mr. Yakeleya.
I look forward to going into the communities that have somewhat struggled with these services and see how these services are going to be improved to the people in the communities. I look forward to that and will get back to the Minister once I visit the communities.
I want to ask the Minister on just what the deputy minister has said. I asked how many dollars are spent with the southern contractor in this activity.
This work required to reprogram and reconstruct this service is not generally available in the North and we would expect that the majority of this funding would actually require the use of southern contractors to undertake.
Could I be so polite as to ask how many dollars? He said the majority. Can he answer that question?
We have not determined the final approach to the project. We do have a consultant engaged right now to help us with the existing upgrading that’s underway. We would expect that some of this would go to that consultant. I don’t have the details going forward how much that would be. I would think that as we implement the project that we’ll have a more clear idea about how we’re going to spend the dollars.
At this juncture of our budget approval, it’s very hard to accept Mr. Neudorf’s answers on my question. Surely he must know the numbers that they estimated. He’s got a lot of smart people in the department; they have consultants. They surely must know what they’re paying or what they estimate for anything like this to go forward.
I can’t believe the government’s going to operate their operations on this type of answer to my question; a simple question. He said this is about $1.7 million to complete rebuilding the whole system. He’s saying that southern institutions, southern people have the technology for this and they’re going to be bringing this up into the Northwest Territories. So much for working with northern people on this. I wonder if this request even went to the northern firms to see if they could develop something like this in the North, rather than, say, something in the South there. I think the responses I’m getting back from the deputy are not sitting well with me on this southern contract going to the South on this piece of infrastructure.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate the Member’s concern over the $850,000 for the MVIS replacement. It is a very specialized piece of computer system that you just don’t buy off the shelf. Members will recall other programs, the FIS replacement, other larger-scale government software fixes, and IT infrastructure is very expensive. We’re trying to accomplish the MVIS replacement over two years. It’s $850,000 a year. What I can do today is make a commitment to the Member to get a thorough breakdown of that $1.7 million, and we’ll get the projected contract cost and that information that the Member is looking for as soon as we can.
I appreciate that from Mr. Ramsay, to get the details to me on this piece. I still have a hard time accepting that this piece of work is contracted to a southern firm. Even though it could be right on the button here on the computer system, they have their reasons for their madness. I will accept that.
I guess, in short point form, we have a bridge in Norman Wells called Oscar Creek and it’s been sitting there for a couple of years; maybe four or five or six years. Nothing has been done about it. This southern engineer that put it in there didn’t listen to the elder in terms of location and we’re still talking about it. I just want to make a point. The department knows pretty well what I’m talking about. I’m asking again how sometimes the local northern people need also be recognized in some of this work that needs to get done in the North here. This is $800,000-some-odd going to a southern firm. I just want to make a comment to make a point.
Again I thank the Member for the concerns that he’s raised this afternoon. As far as Oscar Creek – and I spoke about this a little bit earlier – we are going to try to find a remedy for Oscar Creek. We are engaging engineers to find the best way forward on Oscar Creek. Hopefully it’s not another four or five years that it’s there not being utilized.
We also need to understand that, again, this is a system that is highly specialized. We’re also getting with that the opportunity to work with a potential contractor on how it works and we’ll have the ability for some hands-on training with this new system. I will get that information together for the Member and again make that commitment to him to get the breakdown on costs for him on the MVIS replacement.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Transportation, activity summary, road licensing and safety, infrastructure investment summary, total infrastructure investment summary, $850,000. Agreed?
Agreed.
Thank you. Page 9-2, Transportation, department summary, infrastructure investment summary, total infrastructure investment summary, $29.625 million. Agreed?
Agreed.
Does the committee agree that that concludes our consideration of the Department of Transportation capital budget?
Agreed.
I would like to thank Mr. Ramsay and Mr. Neudorf for their help with getting through this today. Thank you. I’d like to ask our Sergeant-at-Arms to escort our witness from the Chamber. At this time is the committee agreed that we will look to proceeding with the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment?
Agreed.
Thank you. I’d like to recognize in the visitors gallery Rene Watts. She is the chaperone to our two Pages from the Thebacha riding: Jenni Watts and Katelyn Holtorf. Welcome.
We’re going to move on to ITI. I’d like to ask Mr. Dolynny to take the chair.
Welcome back, committee. I’d like to ask the Minister of ITI, Mr. Ramsay, if he would like to call witnesses to the table.
Yes, please, Mr. Chairman.
Is committee agreed?
Agreed.
I’ll ask the Sergeant-at-Arms if he would like to escort the witnesses into the Chamber. I’ll ask Members to start thinking of moving forward with Industry, Tourism and Investment.
Mr. Ramsay, I’d like to at this time ask if you would like to introduce your witnesses at the table.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. To my left is Peter Vician, deputy minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment. To my right is Mr. Richard Zieba, director of tourism and parks with Industry, Tourism and Investment.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. General comments on the Department of ITI.
Detail.
Mr. Yakeleya.
