Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My question is for Minister McLeod, Minister Michael McLeod. I just wanted to follow up on my Member’s statement and ask the Minister of Transportation with regard to some of the contracting opportunities that can be missed when they’re out in our regions and communities. These are huge opportunities. They’re big contracts. There’s the Blackwater Bridge contract near the community of Wrigley. Residents have been advising myself, and probably the Minister’s office as well, that they’re missing opportunities. Some of it can be unfair practice, I believe. I would just like to know if some of our contracts that we let out, is there any policy or guidelines attached to that saying that they must use as much resources from proximity communities -- in this case, the community of Wrigley -- to employ their people, use their equipment? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. The honourable Minister of Transportation, Mr. Michael McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. First of all, I’d like to thank the Member for recognizing the benefits that come from large projects, such as Blackwater, to the communities and to companies in the North. Yes, we do follow a policy. It’s the Business Incentive Policy that requires us to have certain content that is listed in the contract that has to be adhered to, and we do monitor the situations and the projects very closely. Thank you.
So the Minister is then aware of some of the complaints from the community of Wrigley, especially in the case...Like in the joint venture contract there right now offered the community of Wrigley I think it was $200 to rent a water truck for the whole day. Mr. Speaker, that just covers wages only. That’s very unfair to ask the community to provide almost free services for the water and, as well, they use that very same excuse, Mr. Speaker, because they use a lowball figure, they use that very same excuse to bring in their own water truck and not use the community of Wrigley’s. Our government is all about developing capacity and giving them opportunities. Like I said, in the spring contract, they purchased equipment and that’s not even being used as well, Mr. Speaker.
Once again, is the Minister aware of the lack of working with the community of Wrigley to use their equipment and employ their people? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I am very familiar with this project. We went far above what was required to ensure that the community was involved. We gave a lot of flexibility to the community to become a partner and negotiate a contract. Six million dollars worth of work went to the partnership. We extended time frames. We facilitated discussions with subcontractors. So I think there’s been a lot of work in this area and certainly our department has been involved every step of the way. We are well aware that there are some companies, some sub-trades are not able to negotiate good arrangements.
Mr. Speaker, we as a government cannot get involved with the discussions with every company that needs to work with a general contractor. We look at the bottom line. Right now the community has benefited close to $7 million from this project and that’s over 20 percent, Mr. Speaker. I think that the community should be very proud of their ability to take part in this project and generate revenue for their community. Thank you.
Indeed. Like I mentioned in my Member’s statement, it was quite an achievement, the work that they’d done in the springtime, but to complete the bridge, they’ve got some new contractors, Stan Dean and I believe it’s Ruskin had joint ventured. But these are the people that the community are having difficulty with. They’re giving the opportunities to meet and sit and negotiate for their equipment, but I don’t believe that the rates they’re using are fair and they’re using that excuse to get their own equipment, employ their own people and, as a result, leaving out the community of Wrigley. They did have some opportunities, but they just cannot seem to be using their equipment. They’ve used that previous contract, they developed the capacity and we’ve got to continue to support it. So I’d like to ask the Minister, Mr. Speaker, what can be done in this instance to help continue to build the capacity of the community of Wrigley? Thank you.
As in every project with every community, there has to be a demonstrated capacity to take on some of the work. The equipment has to be in good shape, whether it’s a CAT or a grader or a truck, and the price has to be fair and the people that are going to operate it have to be experienced enough to ensure their safety. Our department has facilitated, we’ve worked with the community at every step and we’ll continue to do so. If there is a situation here, I’m not sure what the water truck number is referring to, whether it’s a municipal water truck or if they have one of their own, I wasn’t aware of that. But we certainly can look into it. We encourage the company, we have inspections, we have discussions with the contractors to ensure that they’re involved and they involve the community and we’ll follow that up.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final supplementary, Mr. Menicoche.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I guess, overall, the biggest contract here is Ruskin and it can almost be viewed like they’re an outside contractor. What I’d like to see is to ensure that there is proper follow-up, proper documentation that they use as much local content as possible. Can the Minister ensure a mechanism like that when they do their post-mortem at the completion of this project, to show how much local content that they have used on this $50 million contract? Thank you.
We certainly can do that. Mr. Speaker, I have to point out I don’t share the Member’s concerns. The community, the job contract from the community requested to do the site preparation and they did the contract, they had that contract, they requested to do the earth works, they got the contract, they did that work, they wanted to do the gravel pit development, they requested that, they got that, and they did it, and they wanted to provide camp services, Mr. Speaker, and they are providing camp services. I wasn’t aware there was water truck involvement in here. I only know that the Municipality of Wrigley has a water truck. If that’s what we’re talking about, then we’ll follow that up. The post-mortem is going to be done, in any event. Our indication is that this project has exceeded all local and northern requirements and it’s only going to improve as the time goes on. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. The honourable Member for Kam Lake, Mr. Ramsay.
