Mr. Speaker, going back to my Member’s statement on the materials supply tender, the local and regional suppliers proved that they are capable of submitting competitive prices. I’m not here to tell N.W.T. Housing Corporation how to do their job. I am here to tell them that we want a fair and competitive process for all businesses, regardless of what they do.
I’d like to direct my question today to the Minister Responsible for the N.W.T. Housing Corp. I’d like to ask him what the rationale was that the Housing Corp used for coming up with this process.
Mr. Speaker, the rationale for the Housing Corporation was based on trying to obtain efficiencies, economies of scale, logistical and quality control, returns to maximize transportation corridors. Mainly, in their view, it was better support of Northern suppliers. But the key one was economies of scale.
Better support of Northern economies was a good statement to make, because that’s where I’m coming from. Some of the regional suppliers have basically been left out of the mix, because they’re capable of supplying the regions; wider-scale is a little harder on them because they’re regionally based. I’m sure they could make the effort. But that’s not my point.
I’d like to ask the Minister if the regional suppliers have been proven incapable of supplying this tender.
Mr. Speaker, I don’t think this is a reflection so much of the inability of regional suppliers, but on the attempt of the Housing Corporation to try to maximize the dollars they do have via the Affordable Housing Initiative. At this time, they are trying to do the repairs and improvements on the units they do have. So it was an issue of economies of scale, as opposed to a lack of capable Northern suppliers, when they were looking at supplying within their region.
I do know for a fact that a lot of the regional suppliers have proved competitive in the past, and they have been able to submit quality bids for the supply in their region. So I’d like to ask the Minister if it’s proven that there’s a significant cost savings to the way the Housing Corp is proposing to do business.
Mr. Speaker, the Housing Corporation is always interested in trying to be as efficient and effective and fair as possible. We’d be happy to discuss this issue with committees, to look at the numbers to make sure this is the best way possible. Are there other options? Right now it’s based on 11 commodities Territory-wide. If there’s a regional application base developed that is competitive, I’d certainly be prepared to look at that. I’d be more than happy to sit down with the appropriate committee to look at this.
Final supplementary, Mr. McLeod.
I thank the Minister for that. I’ve seen cases where too many terms and conditions have been put on tenders that go out there, effectively eliminating a lot of people from being able to bid on this work.
I’d like to ask the Minister — and I think he made that commitment…. I’d like a commitment to have the Housing Corp put out regional tenders for all regions in the N.W.T., so that they can bid on their region. If they choose to bid on the whole of the N.W.T., they have the option also. It’s worked before, I believe, and I think it’ll work again.
Mr. Speaker, what I will commit to, as a first step, is to share the rationale and the math, in terms of economies of scale, that allowed the Housing Corporation to come to the decision to adopt this particular policy. I’ll share that with committee, and we’ll see what those numbers add up to in terms of how a regional application compares Territory-wide, based on commodities. Together we can see what that information tells us and discuss the best way to move forward.
