Debates of June 1, 2005 (day 6)

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the intention is now to have the regulations approved by later on this month, I understand, targeting an implementation date of November 1, 2005. The Minister may have further detail to that. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the Minister is giving the information that I was going to, that the regulations are set to be approved. They haven't been approved prior to now and then November 1st is our implementation date. We are working hard with some of the communities trying to finalize the various proposals and we are more than willing to entertain any proposal from any community when it comes to this particular initiative. Thank you.

Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I should just state here that this might be an example where it makes sense that, for whatever reason, the government couldn’t spend the $933,000 that was allocated for the recovery program and they are asking us to re-approve this and there are good reasons for that, as opposed to the other thing that we are occupied with at this Assembly.

Mr. Chairman, I want to ask for more details about $550,000 allocated for materials and supplies. I wonder if the government is going to buy the equipment necessary for this program. What is that about?

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Minister.

Mr. Chairman, I didn’t quite get the full question on that one. Was it what the money would be used for? Capital equipment to set up the depots and regional processing centres is what it’s identified for. Was there more information the Member was requesting on that?

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. There is $550,000 stated for materials and supplies, which is a huge sum of money. It could mean anything. It could be a pen and pencil to whatever the recycling equipment may be. Perhaps that’s what this is about. I would like to know more details about what the money is going to be spent on. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Minister will provide that information, but I understand, more from my previous experience in setting up these depots, it would be bailers, wrappers, containers and so on. We will have that information provided to the Members.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. He wasn’t referring it to Minister Miltenberger that I heard. Ms. Lee.

Could any of the Ministers indicate whether it’s the plan of the government to buy the equipment necessary for bailing, crushing or whatever you do for recycling products? I thought the plan was to get local groups to bid for it and if they do get it, I thought they would buy the equipment and make these projects work. Can I get that information, please?

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The reason the department was asking for this money initially was to provide the start-up funds. So that is setting up the depots, the equipment that would be needed. At that point, as the recycled materials started arriving and we started sending out the materials for the rebate, then as the money flowed in it would allow them to then become self-sustaining. The goal is to be self-sustaining, but it was realized at that point that start-up costs needed to be identified and attached to this to make it a worthwhile process and to have it come into place.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Ms. Lee.

Could the Minister confirm whether this was supposed to be a non-profit operation? I think that is what has been the plan. We expect that the non-profit community organizations would bid for these projects and run them. Now the Minister is indicating that the government will buy this equipment. I don’t know how long these contracts are. If somebody gets to do this work for two or three years, what happens to the equipment after that? If they are self-sustaining after the program gets off the ground, are they expected to pay towards the equipment and, if not, the equipment should stay as government property? What is the mechanism for running the program? I am assuming, for example, if a community group wins the contract and runs it for three years and they don’t want to do it again and another group takes it over, the equipment would travel with the new group. I wonder if the government is going to be landlord of the equipment or does it go to the groups? How does that work?

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. When a number of RFPs went out to communities, it was open to anybody to put in a proposal to run these centres or depots, the equipment. It’s probably not fair to go to Minister Miltenberger at this point for this information because he’s just taken that on, but Minister Bell may have some information on this that he can share with the Assembly at this point.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Minister Bell.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I believe the approach, as the Minister of Finance has indicated, was to make the capital investment required to get the facilities up and running. The government would make that capital investment and it would be recouped through fees that would be collected. So I am not sure of the length of time in terms of the RFPs and how long contracts would be awarded for. The idea is to be able to operate on a break-even basis. We don’t want to subsidize this on a go-forward basis. So fees would pay for the operation and fees would also be used to recoup our initial capital investment. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Minister Bell. Ms. Lee.

Are we going to recoup the fees and payments to get them started, or is that like operating core funding? I am talking about the $328,000 under fees and payments.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Minister Bell.

Thank you. Just to be clear, the fees that are applied to the containers, once the recycling takes place, only some of that is recouped by the consumer. The rest of it goes to pay for the operation of the program. So there is a deposit and some of it is refundable and some of it is not. The amount that’s not, goes to pay for the program, both for operations and also to recoup the initial capital investment made by government. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Minister Bell. Ms. Lee.

I don’t think I got confirmation as to whether this is supposed to be non-profit. I think Minister Roland indicated that it’s supposed to be self-sustaining. I don’t know what that means. I don’t know if there are too many groups out there without making any money. I am assuming somebody will make some money. They should make some money on this. I am being told that they will be required to pay some of these fees back. We don’t want to see a situation where they would be overburdened by having to make these payments. I guess at this point we don’t have any idea how it’s going to work once it finally gets off the ground. I wonder if Minister Bell could add more into this about how it is envisioned that this money gets used to get these projects off the ground in terms of the financial viability and potential for the groups that might be interested in doing this work. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The reason we initially went back to Minister Bell is when RWED was one department, he was involved with this. Now that’s falling into Minister Miltenberger’s side of the equation. The fees will address cost to collect, process, transport containers, and to administer the program. An unredeemed deposit, when everybody goes forward and buys their pop or their juice packs and pays their deposit, if they don’t return them back to the depot, that money that is unredeemed as they say, will go towards the administration costs of the program and we’ll cover the other costs that are there.

All the revenue and expenses for the program will be managed through a special purpose fund known as the environment fund and the program will pay for itself through the surcharge of each container sold in the NWT, except for the start-up funding. That’s some of the start-up funding that we have identified in earlier discussions. It will not be dependent on funding from the GNWT. So it is meant to be a self-sustaining program. A repayment of start-up funding is expected to occur, as Minister Bell stated, over a five-year period from implementation of this. This was the plan from the start of it to where we are now. Unfortunately, trying to get the regulations in place and how it would work in communities is taking longer than was anticipated initially.

Thank you, Mr. Minister. We are back on page 21, Environment and Natural Resources, operations expenditures, corporate management, not previously authorized, negative $137,000.

Agreed.

Environment, not previously authorized, $933,000.

Agreed.

Total department, $796,000.

Agreed.

Page 22, Executive, capital investment expenditures, not previously authorized, government accounting, $12,000.

Agreed.

Total for Financial Management Board Secretariat, not previously authorized, $12,000.

Agreed.

Total department, not previously authorized, $12,000.

Agreed.

Page 23, Municipal and Community Affairs, capital investment expenditures, community operations, not previously authorized, negative $2.322 million.

Agreed.

Lands administration, not previously authorized, $141,000.

Agreed.

Regional operations, special warrants, $716,000.

Agreed.

Not previously authorized, regional operations, $8.392 million.

Agreed.

Page 24, Municipal and Community Affairs continued, capital investment expenditures, regional operations continued, total department, special warrants, $716,000.