Thank you, Mr. Neudorf. Mr. O'Reilly.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I guess this question is for the Minister, if I could get him to respond. Is the Minister prepared to change these terms of reference, to turn this into a representative body with representation from the kind of stakeholders that I just talked about, and actually have the Minister, him or herself, actually make the appointments rather than the deputy minister? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. O'Reilly. Forty seconds, Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. When we rolled this out, this was one of the things -- this is an early step on how we are going to take Yellowknife Airport, if it becomes an authority or something else down the road, then we will look at changing legislation to do that. I believe this is the right step moving forward. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. O'Reilly.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think this is the wrong step. It is not inclusive, it is not representative, and not terribly accountable. I raised all of these issues at committee, and do not like the responses I am getting, and for that reason, I will be voting against the bill itself. I had hoped that the Minister would have responded more positively.
Mr. O'Reilly, your time is up. I will remind the committee that we still have the report of the standing committee to discuss, which discusses many of these topics. Next, I have Mr. Thompson.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just want to go back to leaving from Fort Simpson. If I get on an airline leaving from Fort Simpson, land in Yellowknife, and then get on to another airline going to Edmonton, are there these costs to it? I understand the $7 to $9, but I am trying to understand the $10 and the $20. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I believe the Member said, if they caught a different airline when they got to Yellowknife, going south, there would be that additional fee. The AIF would be added on. If it was First Air, say, from Simpson all the way to Edmonton, there would just be the aeronautical fee. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Thompson.
Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I appreciate the Minister's answer. We don't have those connections. We actually have to land here in Yellowknife, switch airlines, and then get on from there. Sometimes, we can get there on First Air, and then land here, and get on another First Air flight. Sometimes we can't do that, so I just wanted to get that clarified. The second one is regard to charters. If we charter from Fort Simpson to our smaller communities, because of costs to get into these communities, how does that fee get collected? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Mr. Conway.
Mr. Chair, on a charter situation, the charter operator would be collecting the fee. They generally are charging you "X" amount of dollars for however many passengers and your distance, so in that situation, that is who would be collecting the fee.
Thank you, Mr. Conway. Mr. Thompson.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think that clarifies what I was trying to get at in both areas. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Thompson. Mr. McNeely.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. In the spirit of raising revenues, what sort of consultation or feedback, to make you feel comfortable, on the revenue portion that you have heard, from the current vendors and the enterprise or business community gives you confidence that these sales are where they are at? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. McNeely. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. When we looked at the business plan, we looked at all the economic opportunities that come along with this. As I have said, for every $1 million, 3.5 jobs will be created. The offset would create 14 jobs, but if you look at the business plan, there are cargo opportunities that would become available, with consultation with a number of these stakeholders, the 30-something groups that we have met with. That is one area of a particular increase of business opportunities, moving forward. There has probably been a number of people, I believe, already who have talked about, once we implement these changes, changing the structure of the airport, and particularly the building of the retail aspect of it, moving forward.
I think, a year or two from now, you are going to see a totally different airport, and it is going to be a good change for the people of Yellowknife and the Government of the Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Vanthuyne.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. A couple of questions with regard to current revenues being generated: can the Minister or the department let us know, with all the current revenues, let's say, if this fee goes ahead, will all the other revenues that are being generated at the Yellowknife Airport be a part of the revolving fund?
Thank you, Mr. Vanthuyne. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, they will be. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Vanthuyne.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Without the revolving fund aspect right now, all the revenue generated at the Yellowknife Airport, I am assuming it all goes into the general coffers revenue, so there have to be portions of that that get divvied out to our many other airports, to help them with their infrastructure needs. Is that not the case? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Vanthuyne. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. No, none of that revenue goes back to any of the airports. It all goes back into general revenue, and ends up there through the business planning process. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Vanthuyne.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. So it could go into any other government program or initiative of any kind, just for clarification?
Thank you, Mr. Vanthuyne. Minister.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, revenues and expenditures are treated separately. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Vanthuyne.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Will there still be a plan to continue to apply when and where appropriate to feds, for federal support funding, like we currently do for federal support programs? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Vanthuyne. Mr. Neudorf.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Underneath the current model of the revolving fund model, if it goes ahead, we believe that there will be enough revenues at Yellowknife Airport for it to become self-sustaining, that there will be enough revenues generated to both pay for operation expenditures plus our known capital expenditures. That will, in fact, free up other federal government programs so that we can concentrate those on the other 26 airports, and of which there are, of course, many needs out there that we require in order to continue to have those airports in a safe and acceptable operation. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Neudorf. Mr. Vanthuyne.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Therein lies some of the problem, and the concern that I have is that this could be well-meaning, but first of all, we should be identifying an infrastructure gap, which I am going to assume that maybe the Yellowknife Airport already has, to some degree. I see the list of projects that we want to achieve over the five-year plan, but this is probably part of what the people are looking for: show me what needs to be done, and build a plan around how we are going to achieve that.
If you are going to use this fee to apply to it, then fine. Then, when it is done, it is done, and the fee gets dropped. In the meantime, what we are going to do is put the weight of these infrastructure priorities on to Northerners and visitors, and we are going to divert federal funding into the communities, to help them with their high-priority needs. We could still be applying for federal funding. Use that and a user fee to fast-track getting the Yellowknife infrastructure down much faster, so that we can just get it off the books, and then start prioritizing other federal funds into the other 26 airports. I don't know if that is a comment, Mr. Chair, that the Minister cares to reply to.
Thank you. Minister Schumann.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I know it was a comment, but I have to respond to it. As being the Minister of Transportation, I am now going to be the Minister in charge of infrastructure. Our infrastructure deficit in this territory is more than we could ever tackle. I've said many times, even at the federal FTP tables, the money that they had allocated for transportation nationally across this country, if they all gave it all just to the Northwest Territories, would never, ever even meet the needs of the Government of the Northwest Territories and the citizens of our territory. These are ongoing challenges. They are always going to be there no matter how we address this; even if we took the Member's approach to what he is saying. It would just continue escalating. This is what we see as a way to move forward to address the capital needs and to change the Yellowknife Airport and, at the same time, make it into an economic driver for citizens in the Northwest Territories. That does free up other federal pots of money that we can put into all the other communities across the Northwest Territories for transportation and, particularly, airports. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. Vanthuyne, was there anything further?
Thank you, Mr. Chair. To that point, the problem is that when you look at the list that's being proposed for the Yellowknife Airport, yes, there are aspects with regard to better improved service, but most importantly, improving safety. That's a priority. That's probably a priority for most of the other airports. It ought to be, but when you're being asked to take $10 million out of the economy to put into a lot of these other projects that we're identifying as being part of the infrastructure gap but really are actually just nice, shiny, nice-to-have projects at our airports, that's where I have a problem with this.
The other thing is that I argue that the business plan is not a business plan, quite frankly. A business plan builds a case that does a cost-benefit analysis project by project. We have a list of things that we want.
Mr. Chair, the business plan suggests two things. The business plan suggests that the current rental rate of leases and vendor leases and vendor agreements of that sort may be considered for increases. Can the department explain? Is that also being considered right now, that the current existing lease holders there might be seeing a rent increase? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Vanthuyne. Mr. Neudorf.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. All of our lease rates are at market rate. Our Public Airports Act dictates that we need to charge market rates for the lease rates for land. If the market increases and the price increases, then we would adjust the rates as appropriate, but otherwise we will continue to follow market rates on there.
We do also charge some concession fees to some of the vendors that are in the terminal building, for example. Like any business, we will look at those concession rates that we're charging and there's opportunities to improve the relationship that we have with the vendors, then we'll take those opportunities to negotiate different agreements with them. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. Mr. Vanthuyne.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. The business plan also indicates that the user fee and I believe the air nautical fee will be subject to annual increases under influence by the CIP. Is that what's anticipated? Is that what can be expected that we're actually going to see an annual increase in these fees based on the CIP adjustment? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Vanthuyne. Mr. Neudorf.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. All of the fees that the Department of Transportation charges -- any department, in fact, charges are -- we've been directed by the Department of Finance that they are to increase annually with inflation. Our air nautical fees would follow underneath that. We would expect that they would increase annually with CIP. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you. Mr. Vanthuyne.
Just for the record, currently, right now, the CIP is at 2.1 per cent. Just so folks know, that's the kind of increase we might potentially be looking at on an annual basis. I don't mind increasing a fee when it's for the purposes of trying to keep up with the costs of inflationary factors, but when this is just trying to take more money out of people's pockets, that's a troublesome thing to swallow.
Mr. Chair, my last 20 seconds, as I've said in my opening comments, this is not a time to apply a new tax of any kind especially when it's as steep as such. For those reasons, I will not be supporting the bill for what the bill allows us to enable. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
