Thank you, committee. Sergeant-at-Arms, if you can please escort our witnesses into the House.
Minister Miltenberger, if you would be kind enough to introduce your witnesses to the House, please.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have with me Deputy Minister Mike Aumond and deputy secretary to the FMB, Mr. Sandy Kalgutkar.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Mr. Aumond, Mr. Kalgutkar, welcome back to the House. With that, we’ll go to general comments. Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Welcome, Minister and staff. I’d like to offer my comments to the Finance department.
Mr. Chair, the comments I want to offer have to do with the points here that look at the resource revenue to Aboriginal governments. Just for clarification, maybe when the Minister responds, are these the Aboriginal governments that have signed on to devolution? I know some haven’t yet come to the point of signing on to devolution. I know the money here, 25 percent is targeted to the Aboriginal governments. So, just more of a clarification.
The $2 million that is established to remediate the contaminated sites, is there a general number the department has as to the amount of contaminated sites and the dollar figure on the remediation of all those sites? Two million dollars is a small amount. Are we receiving support from the federal government on the remediation of the contaminated sites that we as a government have taken on as part of the transfer of lands and resources to the Northwest Territories?
The forced growth of $497,000, the collective bargaining increase, will this be, in the future, an issue for us to pay close attention to when we start collective bargaining with the various unions in the Northwest Territories? Is it something that we can look at?
The government’s support for the NWT Power Corporation to mitigate the impact of power rates, I want to say that the constituents in the Sahtu are happy that they had some relief there due to the natural causes of low water, the hydro that the constituents didn’t have to absorb that additional cost to their pockets as Norman Wells was also hit with switching over to natural gas as another source of energy.
I want to talk about a couple more points before I’m done with my general comments. Investment and implementation of the Mackenzie Valley Fibre Optic Link, it’s a good investment and I see that it’s going to be a strong, long-term and stable investment for the government and the people who are going to use it and I congratulate the department and industry for putting it together. We’re starting to see some of the benefits. This morning I saw a little bit of a hiccup with Ledcor in regards to the criteria, qualification and workers in the Tulita area not working. They’re bringing in workers from outside of the community to work in our area. Working with the Minister of Education, Culture and Employment for the type of proper training, Ledcor, at no fault of their own because they were doing what they had to do, but somewhere there was a glitch and we didn’t get the proper training to hire people. We are now working on it. We are dealing with it. I just wanted to let the Minister know that there are some people in Tulita, and maybe other areas should be aware that they need this type of proper training to get work with the Mackenzie Valley Fibre Optic Link. I just wanted to let the Minister know I’m working on this issue already so we can have this resolved so we have our own people working on the line, other than bringing people from outside into Tulita taking jobs away from our people. That’s what’s happening right now.
I do want to say that I look forward to seeing the stronger implementation of the Decentralization Strategy of this government. Decentralization is one of the key selling points of devolution and moving some of the work, positions, programs and services into our regions and communities. We should continue to support decentralization. There are a number of challenges that the government has to consider. There are always ways to look at how we can overlook some of these barriers.
In closing, I look forward to working with the government on the renewal of the Financial Administration Act. It’s a big document and I look forward to doing some work on that. If there is any way the Minister can provide me, Mr. Chair, with information on the liquor revenue in my region, I would like a breakdown of sales in my region for the year, the type of money we’re spending, the type of money we’re generating in the Sahtu on the liquor warehouse. I would appreciate that.
I want to say to the Minister and staff, I look forward to reviewing this budget and concluding it this afternoon. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Minister Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The resource revenues referred to in the budget is the money that is put aside for all the Aboriginal governments and will be accessed by the signatories, the share they have agreed to. The other money is… I think they have a year to decide if they are going to come on board. We are still in that year and we will have that discussion here in the next couple of weeks as we approach April. So the $2 million referred to for mediation is ongoing.
The Member’s comment about collective bargaining in light of the budget circumstances is going to be important on a go-forward basis. We need to be negotiating affordable but fair agreements that reflect that fiscal reality.
The NTPC power rate support refers to two major initiatives. The first one referred to in my comments was the roughly $36 million we agreed to put in at the start of this Assembly to cushion the rate increase to 7 percent a year as opposed to what it would have been without that $36 million. In addition to that, we have the $20 million contribution that we made to the Power Corp with the recent low water charges in the Snare system to make sure, as well, that that charge wasn’t passed on to the ratepayers.
I appreciate the Member’s comments about the Mackenzie Valley Fibre Optic Link and his comments about the hiccup, as you referred to it. It’s the first we’ve heard of it, so we’ll be backtracking on that.
We do remain committed to the implementation of the Decentralization Initiative and we’re going to keep working at that. We, as well, look forward to the renewal and conclusion of the Financial Administration Act in the life of this government, hopefully, and we will provide the Member with the liquor revenue for the Sahtu. We do have a big number, $2,581,735.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Mr. Moses.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just a few comments. The money allocated for the Heritage Fund, as the Minister knows, when we were at NWT Days and speaking with Norway about where their Heritage Fund was at, they were just reaching $1 trillion. Even as small a number as this is for our government, we are taking the right steps and moving forward in terms of building on to this Heritage Fund for future generations of NWT, especially with the fiscal situation we see ourselves in. This might be something that might be able to help, like I said, future generations.
I too, like Mr. Yakeleya, would like to commend the work of the Mackenzie Valley Fibre Optic Link. As you heard in my reply to budget address, I think this is going to be something we can see in the future giving us more stable and sustainable revenues for program services or even infrastructure how we use those revenues and distribute those throughout the Northwest Territories. It’s mentioned in here of the contribution to the NWT Housing Corp and all the work the Housing Corp is doing in terms of creating market housing as well as public housing units. Even with the seniors dwellings being developed, I think that’s a good investment as well. It’s going to hopefully cut down on some of the long waiting lists for some of our units.
Then, again, you give all the highlights, but there are still some concerns. One is our debt ceiling, short term and long term. Obviously, with the low water levels at Snare and our dry season and the increased cost of forest fires, the short-term borrowing limit, I understand we are looking at increasing that again. Should any other disasters occur or anything that might happen in any of the communities, my community for one with the Dempster Highway closing during the winter quite a few times and just having LNG as a backup can be a concern, and if there’s ever the need to evacuate or do something with the community, especially Inuvik, that might be of concern for exceeding our short-term borrowing and the need to utilize those dollars for something else. It might not even be Inuvik; it could be anywhere else. Without that guarantee of our debt wall increasing, I think that’s cause for alert for this government, something we should red flag. I think that it is a concern for me.
Within this department, they’ve just taken on the responsibility for the Program Review Office. We did get a list of all the recommendations and programs that were reviewed. This office continues to be expensive, $777,000 in the main estimates. I’m sure they are doing really good work on behalf of government to see where we can be more efficient in government spending, but if we don’t act on those recommendations and put forth some of the recommendations coming out of this Program Review Office, my question is what good is the Program Review Office if we don’t act on the recommendations that they are making.
I want to make one highlight here, just in terms of the office of the comptroller general and public accounts practice in getting those interim public accounts before the standing committee. I think they really did a great job in enhancing that practice and doing it better to get the public accounts to us before we go through this process of getting to main estimates.
So, just a few concerns but also a few good comments and where this department is moving forward in their investments as well as some of the work that’s been going on with public accounts. Just my general comments there, Mr. Chair. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. Mr. Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I was with Mr. Moses when we met with the Norwegian ambassador and it was the first time I’ve had the opportunity to sit across from a representative of the country that does have a trillion dollar offshore Heritage Fund, Sovereign Wealth Fund that has continued to grow and that reflects their extremely prudent fiscal management and it shows you what’s possible. So I share the Member’s comments that, if we look back far enough, at some point they started with a small pot and nurtured it carefully. So, we have a model that we continue to look to.
As well, I appreciate the Member’s comment and support on the fibre link.
The debt ceiling, we are still looking to get that sorted out, hopefully by April, so that we can in fact make some adjustments to short-term debt. We ramped that up during the course of the year. We go in and out. We tend to put it back to zero on April 1st but then the pressures, because of our spending patterns, tend to push us back into the short-term debt and we do need to have, just from a good management sense, a high enough number that it would allow us to adjust to these unanticipated expenses. The long-term borrowing limit at issue will be with the Prime Minister and the Premier and we are looking to a resolution of that, hopefully by April.
The Program Review Office makes the case again that an organization, a corporation, a government that has almost a $2 billion budget needs to have the capacity to do the kind of reviews that we are putting to the Program Review Office to get done. It’s a small office. I think it’s four staff. They do a good amount of work, but the Member hit on the challenge, which is they come up with work and recommendations and it’s up to us as a government, Legislature, to look at those recommendations. For improvements, often those are difficult choices to be made and, as we now know, we’re in a circumstance where we are going to be faced with difficult decisions on an ongoing basis.
Once again, I appreciate the comment on the Comptroller General’s office. We’ve made a commitment to the Auditor General a number of years ago that we were going to apply ourselves and make sure that there was compliance with those dates and get rid of as much of the slippage as possible in terms of having their budgets and accounts available for the public for a review process. They’ve done a lot of hard work with all their respective agencies and departments, so we appreciate those comments and it’s something that we are going to pay attention to. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Next on my list I have Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I would like to welcome the Minister and deputy minister here today. I do want to applaud the work of the department here. As I said in my reply to the budget address the other day, it is a daunting task and a lot of hard work goes into putting together a document of this magnitude. So I do want to commend the department and the Minister for providing the guidance and leadership to make this happen.
As you’ve heard from some of my previous colleagues here, there are some good things on the horizon which we should be very proud of. One of them is the Mackenzie Valley Fibre Optic Link. I was there with the Minister right from the beginning here and I saw the good things that this will actually open up for the North on a business perspective. I do challenge, though, the department to see if we can look at capitalizing that investment over 20 years. I am challenging the department to see if we can capitalize that investment over a shorter period of time. The more satellite dishes we can get, the sooner we’re able to pay that off. I would like to see the revenue streams from that investment affect my generation a little bit. I know the revenue streams will definitely affect future generations, but I think our generation here, hopefully, would be deserving of seeing some of the fruits of that labour sooner than later. So that is a challenge, Mr. Chair.
Of course, currently the committee is working on the Financial Administration Act. This is a fairly large piece of, I guess, a review. We’re right in the midst of doing that, so I’m looking forward to finding ways to see if we can help the department work a bit more efficiently and still maintain the transparency of government, and I’ll definitely be speaking to that in due course.
That said, as you heard from other Members here, there are still some concerns that many of us have, including myself. I’m no stranger to pointing out some of the opportunities in finance and have done so since my term and my tenure here. Again, I agree with the Minister, this is a $2 billion business – and it is a business, Mr. Chair – and with any type of business of this magnitude, sometimes it’s important that some of the smaller things be brought to light. Some of them could be maybe an oversight, maybe not an important one at this point, but I think, again, if we work together in addressing some of these smaller issues, that might take the pressure off some of the larger ones.
Just to talk in a general sense – and I’ll try to deal a little bit more with this in detail as we approach each of the activities – first and foremost, the issue of maximizing tax revenues, especially those involving self-reporting taxes. I have to admit I’ve seen some progress on this file from the infancy stage that I brought this forward to this House, not many years ago, to do a full review and collecting of these self-reporting taxes. Specifically, I started off with tobacco. Lately I’ve added petroleum to that mix, only because I feel that transparency in any self-reporting taxes will definitely help the bottom line, plus overall transparency in general. Are we there yet, Mr. Chair? We’re getting closer, but I think we have opportunity, and I’m hoping the Minister and the deputy ministers see that as well. It’s not just about auditing or more audits or having more auditors, it’s about getting rid of the loopholes and removing those opportunities where this could be misused.
Mr. Chair, you’re going to hear me talk a little bit later today about third-party recoveries, and I believe that again there are opportunities in there and some of the numbers we’ll see and talk about in the budget will reflect that.
What’s interesting is our medical recoveries, specifically with some of the third parties, are a bit of a question mark. It’s not a big dollar figure with respect to the overall Finance budget, but it’s when a little later on that you’ll see me bring a bit of attention only because I believe, as I said, there are always opportunities in every budget, unless the Minister wants to comment on that right now.
That said, we know that the Minister has talked in the past about a Revenue Stabilization Fund. He’s mentioned that in one of his budget addresses, I believe in 2012-13. This is a fund that actually looks at stabilizing revenues when there are deficit periods. This has been relatively quiet for the last little bit. I’m hoping that this is not falling off the radar. I’m hoping this Revenue Stabilization Fund might be still something of value for even a $2 billion corporation. There is merit in planning for the future, especially in those dry deficit years, which I believe we are facing.
I would also like to talk, just very briefly, about recently when the CFIB rated the GNWT with probably the worst grade that one can get with respect to red tape. Now, I mean, this could be disputed and, by all accounts, I’ve read the rebuttals. I’ve read the testimonials as to possibly where this very daunting grade is coming from, but that said, I’m still feeling that there’s a pushback from government to say that CFIB is picking on the GNWT and that its matrix and analysis is not being fair. I don’t want to dispute the issue of fairness; I want to dispute the issue of merit. I want to dispute the issue of the measurable. Again, without getting into great detail here, this will be something that I will be following up either today in Committee of the Whole or later on, but I believe that we need to pay particular attention. When you have the worst grade in the country, it should beg the question why. Are we making progress? If that’s the issue, and if so, what is the plan of action so that we can get on the right side of red tape?
The other issue that I know has been brought up very briefly here and some other Members have talked about it and I certainly have talked about this in the House many times, is the issue of our debt and the issues behind debt and debt management. I agree. I mean, we are hitting a fiscal cliff, as the Minister has pointed out in his opening address. We’ve been there many times, especially in the last year with our limited capacity to borrow more money for future investment and future infrastructure. I would be remiss if I didn’t remind the department here that debt is really no different than an iceberg. An iceberg, you see debt, it’s visual, you can see the top part of the iceberg, but it’s what’s hidden under water out of sight which really is the bulk of work of your debt. Even though some of that debt is self-liquidating by design, and then even that could be somewhat disputed to a certain degree, it’s all the other aspects of debt and liabilities, contingent liabilities, anything that involves our complete debt line.
I liken it to the fact that we can call it as it is, we can define it as it is, but at the end of the day it’s still debt, and I think some of us are a bit nervous as to how much more debt we can take on. I do challenge the government to, I guess, resolve the issue of that boogeyman out there in terms of can we take on more debt, can we afford more debt. The Minister has come on record saying that this is something we need and we have to do, but still to this day I have yet to see any degree of showmanship explaining that we can take on more debt. What are the matrices? What are the tools convincing every one of us, all 11 Members here, including the House, that we can handle whether it’s $200 million more or a billion dollars more of debt. I think we owe that explanation to ourselves. We owe that explanation to the people we serve, because it’s only through consensus that we’re able to mitigate that debt once the debt borrowing limit is brought before the floor of the House so we can debate that then.
The last thing I want to talk about, and again, as I said, I’ll bring it up in detail, is I applaud the department for maintaining their active workforce to 265 employees, but what I found interesting is that the compensation and benefits increased well beyond collective bargaining, which I found to be problematic. As again, and we’ll get into detail, the increase is 7.7 percent and yet we haven’t changed any bodies in any particular department per se, and so that will definitely raise the question or whether the Minister wants to raise it now, but I will bring it back up in detail.
Last but not least is the fact that the overall expenditure category for this budget has changed significantly since we talked about this in October. Now, I can’t talk about a number that was never before the House, but I can assure the House that we are seeing, in terms of the expenditure category in this department, a much larger number than what was presented to committee. I’m concerned that growth was well over $4 million. This is something to which I would probably need some explanation as to why. What was it that we didn’t foresee a few months ago when we were doing the pre-work coming into today’s deliberations or what was tabled before the House?
I’ll leave it at that. As I said, I do have more specifics as we get into the various activities. By and large, it’s a pretty tight budget and for certain aspects I’m pleased. Other aspects, I believe we do have some work before us.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Minister Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the Member’s comments on the overall applauding of the work of the government and his continued support, which has been there right from the start, in terms of the Mackenzie Valley Fibre Optic Link. We are of a like mind that if our very conservative estimates prove to be wrong and that we’re going to generate more revenue and it’s going to be much more fruitful than what we anticipated, then what we would fully intend to stay on the track that the Member has recommended and that we get on, which is pay it down sooner so that it is paid for sooner.
The FAA is work that we are very committed to as well.
The maximizing tax revenues through tobacco and fuel the Member has raised over the years. Good points, and we still have, while there has been some improvement, as he has noted, there is still work to do. One of the reasons that we’re redoing the Petroleum Product Tax Act is to give us better tools and legislative framework to monitor the petroleum product side of the operation, which is a big number.
Third-party medical recoveries are an issue that the Minister of Health will be in a position to discuss in more detail.
While we have done work on a Revenue Stabilization Fund, the big challenge, very basic challenge, is where do we get the money to put into such a fund at this juncture?
In regard to the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, they tend to pick one or two things that we get graded on. One of the ones that sticks in my mind is that if we didn’t have a legislation that spoke to red tape, then you immediately got a low grade, and I would say I would easily hold up the improvements we’ve made here in the Northwest Territories both with devolution and the cutting off of 5,000 kilometres of red tape, the timeliness of how we are doing our business, the investments we’ve made to make our online services available to cut down the time it takes people to do business, the work we’re doing on raising the population, the taking advantage of the Nominee Program to make sure that we have staff for those hard-to-fill jobs, the placing of government service officers in the communities to perform a one-window service function. All those are totally disregarded by the CFIB.
The Member may consider this a very significant issue. I mean, we look at it, but I’m very, very comfortable and pleased with the amount of work we’ve done and we continue to do in terms of making our government more accessible, more efficient, more tied into the 21st century, and we can demonstrate it all over, there is no recognition. For example, the Mackenzie Valley Fibre Link is going to put fibre optic connections into all the communities. It’s going to incredibly improve our efficiencies. It’s going to allow everybody that has that tie-in to be able to do all the online work that now is only available in the larger centres. For example, the business opportunities, the time it’s going to eradicate from tying up businesses trying to do business right now that don’t have those kinds of connections. That issue, their grade, it’s there, but I must confess, it’s not what I go to sleep worrying about and it’s not what I wake up wondering what we’re going to do about because I know we have an amazingly progressive and ambitious plan with this budget.
As I speak about this budget, if I could use the Member’s analogy about the iceberg, well, this iceberg is sitting on the table here. Tip, base, everything in between is here. It lays out all the work we’re doing as a government. There’s nothing that’s hidden. There’s nothing that’s not visible. We’ve taken it out of the murky water of day-to-day business and we’re here, as we are every year, to get approval of it. Debt is part of the business that we’re in and we manage our debt, we make strategic investments, and how much more debt can we afford?
We’ve laid it out. It’s very clear in our fiscal sustainability policy that we can’t go more than 5 percent of revenues go towards paying interest. We’re capped at 5 percent. That figure is now 1 percent. So, do we have capacity? Yes, we do.
When you look at our numbers, $2 billion, almost, of a budget, half of our current debt of about $700 million is self-financing through rates, through tolls. So the actual money we borrow as a government for a $2 billion corporation, the actual borrowing room we have is $400 million.
So we don’t have a lot of debt, and our job as legislators is not only to mind the money on a daily basis but to have a vision for the future about how we build a territory, especially post-devolution. We’ve been on a track to build the economic conditions that are going to promote economic development. We need to invest in economic infrastructure to do that. We are in the risk management business. That’s what we do, all of us.
I would suggest, for example, if we put the Deh Cho Bridge out for tender or RFP today, it would come in way over $200 million. Even the Fibre Optic Link, when it flicks on and we go live, if you put that project back out for tender, you would never get it for the same price. I’ve learned that over the years, things we put off today because they are too expensive that we know we have to deal with down the road, always come back to cost us more. That means more money that we have to spend.
One of the good things coming forward, as I mentioned in my budget address under the new FAA, we are going to come forward with a debt plan every year to the House. Once that bill is approved, it’s going to put that whole piece of the budget on the table, short term and long term, all the borrowing we are considering for the year. So we are going to address that. We know it’s an issue and we think that’s going to be a step in a direction I know the Member has been an advocate for, which is transparency, accountability and visibility. So we’re going to look at that.
I would ask the deputy to speak to the issue of the collective bargaining and the balancing of the numbers that the Member mentioned, the discrepancies. Mr. Chair, with your indulgence, I would ask Mr. Aumond to respond.
Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. Deputy Minister Aumond.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. With respect to compensation and benefits for the department, the increase is almost $3.2 million of which collective bargaining is about $950,000. Due to some budget true-up exercise and accounting for some collective bargaining and benefits for those positions that came over from various transfers from last year, there’s another $984,000 increase in those benefits from 17.5 percent to 23 percent to capture the total burden cost. Then there were some internal reallocations for some unfunded positions. We just moved the money from other parts of the budget and put it in compensation and benefits to show the true costs of those unfunded positions. So while the position count hasn’t increased, the salary dollars to do that have been increased to match that count.
So, while the Member is correct, it has gone up, but the only real forced growth that we did get incremental money is about $943,000 in total for collective bargaining. Thank you.
Thank you, deputy minister. Committee, we are on general comments, Department of Finance. Does committee agree to move on to detail?
Agreed.
We’ll defer the department summary. The review of activities beginning on page 148, Department of Finance, revenue summary. Questions?
Agreed.
Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I want to thank the Minister for replying to the majority of my opening comments. On page 148, it does list in the taxation column both for tobacco and fuel tax, we see a very modest and actually very insignificant I call it decrease in the revised estimates to the main estimates. In fact, it’s almost statistically insignificant when you factor in an audit component.
That being said, if we look at the statistics we are getting from the Department of Health which clearly indicates that the smoking rate is going down, the number of smokers is going down, so just by virtue of math, we should be collecting less tax. Those variables should go hand in hand. Yet when we look at the main estimates, we are only seeing a very slight decrease in tobacco tax being collected.
Can the department offer some validation as to knowing some of the variables are decreasing by significant factors, both in the Territories and nationally? What are the assumptions in only seeing a slight decrease in tobacco tax revenues for the upcoming fiscal year? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Minister Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The numbers tell us that yes, we’ve bent the curve a bit on the number of smokers, so we haven’t raised the price of tobacco recently. The one assumption I would make, and I would ask the deputy or Mr. Kalgutkar if they want to add anything further, is that people who are smoking are probably smoking more. I will ask the deputy if he wants to add anything further.
Thank you, Minister. Deputy minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Why we’re expecting a minor decrease is due to a combination, as the Member mentioned, of lower smoking rates but also the decline in population as well. So we are expecting only a minor decrease at this time. We don’t think the consumption is going to decrease on an aggregate level all that much at this point in time. Thank you.
Thank you, deputy minister. Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. So, what I’m getting from the response today is we’re not quite sure. Again, it is maybe a very difficult question but when I see the fact that some of the health determinants are showing certain trends, it’s just interesting that our trends on the revenue taxation line aren’t reflecting those two trends. Whether or not I’m predicting a price increase or taxation increase, it sounds like there’s not. I will leave it at that. I will probably be coming back to that sometime in the future.
With that same page, Mr. Chair, I want to move my question down to the bottom of that page under program insured and third-party recoveries and medical transportation recoveries. It’s interesting that this number is decreasing, especially in medical transportation recoveries. This number is decreasing almost by half compared to the revised estimates of last year. It’s a very substantial decrease in both categories. When I say substantial, it’s significant factoring from 2013-2014.
Knowing full well that the costs for medical travel are paid by the GNWT and we know that some of those expenses are claimed through Sun Life insurance to the Public Service Health Care Plan. I know there have been issues on collection. I know there have been issues on having the proper paperwork in place and I know that Sun Life had its challenges on adjudicating some of these claims. My question is very simple. It appears that we are actually collecting less for these programs and I need to know why. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Mr. Aumond.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The previous year’s budget number reflected a backlog of claims that we hadn’t submitted with Sun Life, so we made some progress on there. At the same time, previous years’ estimates had anticipated us being reimbursed for a greater range in services. So at this point in time, we do have some issues to work out with Sun Life and we do have some work to do in that area.
In terms of medical travel for those covered under the Public Service Health Care Plan, we do consistently invoice Sun Life, and our backlog is, for the most part, being cleared up, which is why you are seeing a drop in recoveries in that area. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Aumond. Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just so I can get some clarity, again, we know that Sun Life has had some issues with adjudication. Can the department give us some indication for the last two years, let’s say, how many adjudication audits have been done on the Sun Life submissions?
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Minister Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We don’t have that level of detail with us but we can commit to provide it to committee.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I’ll challenge the department to see if they can provide that to the Member here. I’m looking for that type of level of auditing and the backlog. It sounds like that backlog was very significant, so it does tell me that there’s potentially an issue here on the way we deal with these recovery allocations into our general revenues. With that, I will challenge the department if they can provide that level of detail at their earliest.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. I’ll take that as a comment. I think the Minister committed to getting that information. Next I have my on my list Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just have one question here. I presume it should be on this page with the revenue summary, but I’d like to know where the net fiscal benefit for the resource revenue amounts that we receive is shown in the revenue summary.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It’s ITI that would have that reflected in their revenues.
Yes, that’s right. Thank you for the reminder, Minister. I’m done.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Committee, we’re on page 148, Department of Finance, revenue summary. Questions?
Agreed.
Page 149, Department of Finance, active position summary. Questions? Mr. Yakeleya.
Mr. Chair, I want to ask the Minister in regard to the active positions. I see in here we have seven for the Sahtu, and I just want to ask about the type of active positions in the Sahtu. Is this like they have their own authority or jurisdictions? Do they have to report to the Inuvik region or the Minister of Finance? Are there some independent? Is there a superintendent? I want to see if these active positions are similar to other regions that have their own region.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Deputy Minister Aumond.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. In the Sahtu we have seven positions all in Norman Wells and they work in either financial shared services or employee services. Financial shared services, the staff there report to the assistant director in Inuvik, and for employee services they report to headquarters here in Yellowknife. The context in Sahtu is similar to what we would find in the Deh Cho, is that the level of activity doesn’t warrant the number of staff or the required program and service delivery that you would in a much larger region where we have a much larger contingent of employees to serve and have our financial shared services in place, internal services to government. Depending on the number of employees in that region that would determine the amount of effort that we would need to have in that region.
Thank you, deputy minister. Mr. Yakeleya.
That’s okay. I’ve got to think this over here and I’ve got to read the Hansard tomorrow and I’ll have to come back to this maybe through another forum.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Next on my list I have Mr. Dolynny.
