Thank you, Minister Cochrane. Mr. Testart.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate what the Minister is saying, but, with all due respect to the Minister, I do not think they should have to make that decision when we have identified a $23million gap. I know it is tough economic times, but $23 million injected into local infrastructure projects is going to make an impact on local economies and help spur the economy. That has been the approach of the federal government, and we are looking at historic growth across Canada. I would encourage the Minister to look at ways to achieve equivalent growth through infrastructure spending in local communities where it can be felt directly, and it should start with a $23 million investment. Nothing further, thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Testart. Minister Cochrane.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. It is important to note that not all communities are actually in a deficit position. Some communities are actually in a surplus position. However, any new revenues that we get, we try to focus on the communities that do have the deficit and within the needsbased model that we have developed to assess communities' financial standings. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister Cochrane. Next, we have Mr. O'Reilly.
Thanks, Mr. Chair. I guess I want to follow up on some of the questions that my colleagues have asked. First off, on 911, did I hear the Minister say then that the capital costs associated with that are not going to happen until 20182019? Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. O'Reilly. Minister Cochrane.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. That is correct. At this point, we have not finalized the implementation plan. Before we spend capital money on equipment, et cetera, for 911, like I said, we need to do a lot of work with communities. There are some communities within the Northwest Territories that do not even have street addresses. It is a matter of we cannot send a 911 service and say, "It's the red block behind Charlie's house," you know, so we have work to do before we are ready to develop an NWTwide 911 service.
Some of the communities, like Yellowknife, for example, are more advanced in that way, but we need to get all communities up to speed before we can implement the plan because we want to avoid confusion. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister Cochrane. Mr. O'Reilly.
Thanks, Mr. Chair. Look, I understand the Minister is committed to 911 and I commend her for doing that and making that step. That's a very strong political commitment that was made in this House. I know that the fall started yesterday, so are we looking at before Christmas we're going to get a present with this plan for a 911? Thanks, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. O'Reilly. Just a reminder, all Members it's capital needs, it's not O and M, but I'll bring it over to Minister Cochrane. Thanks.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. You will see a strategy before Christmas. I will not be giving Christmas presents to everybody, though. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister Cochrane. Mr. O'Reilly.
Thanks, Mr. Chair. I'd like to thank Madam Scrooge. She is going to bring the plan forward and it will contain the capital needs for 911, that's great. Is the Minister prepared to look at a supplementary appropriation to get this work started in 2018-2019 rather than wait for 2019-2020? Thanks, Mr. Chair
Thank you, Mr. O'Reilly. Minister Cochrane.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. It's a little bit ahead of the game to actually say that. We will have the plan developed before Christmas; after that, once we've developed the plan and identified exactly what we'll need if we need to go for a supplementary appropriation, then we will look at that. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I hope that satisfies Mrs. Claus' comments. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister Cochrane. Mr. O'Reilly.
Thanks, Mr. Chair. I sort of feel like Prancer now. I'll be prancing more once we get the plan and a supplementary appropriation, but I encourage the Minister to keep working on this really hard and I respect her efforts on that.
I want to turn to municipal funding, capital funding now, and I recall that the NWTAC worked closely with communities and the department to carry out a municipal funding review and that, rather than just a straight formula, it was going to be much more of a needs-based approach. Does this capital spending move us any closer to that new arrangement? Thanks, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. O'Reilly. Minister Cochrane.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. We had made a commitment previously to not change the funding that is given out currently, even though we did do the funding review and found that some communities had surpluses and some communities had deficits. This funding is actually based on the old model. But, like I said, all new monies that come in are based on the newer model where we do address the communities and deficit first before the communities that have a surplus or their needs are met. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister Cochrane. Mr. O'Reilly.
Thanks, Mr. Chair. Thanks to the Minister for that. I understood that there was going to be an action plan developed to move us towards the new model, and of course that new model does not leave any of the small communities behind; they're going to be protected in that, and that's what the municipal funding review concluded and everybody accepted. When are we going to see that action plan move us towards the new model? Thanks, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. O'Reilly. Minister Cochrane.
As stated earlier, the action plan will be developed. We're looking at it now and it will be developed and ready to share with standing committee in the fall, prior to Christmas. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister. Mr. O'Reilly.
Thanks, Mr. Chair. I don't have to bother the Minister anymore then about that one with Christmas analogies. I'm sorry; I didn't really follow the discussion about what level of funding is actually contained in here. There's been no increases whatsoever for the municipal capital funding in this budget over last year; is that what I heard?
Because in last year's budget, as I recall, I think there was a small, maybe it was a 2 per cent increase or something, but there was a gain for municipal governments in the capital budget last year, so this is the exact same funding they got last year or has there been an increase for CPI? Thanks, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. O'Reilly. Minister Cochrane.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. The honourable Member is incorrect. Actually, last year's funding did not have any increase for capital; it was only for operating and maintenance. This year is the same, so we have been trying to leverage the funding through the federal government to address the capital needs at this point.
I think it should be noted, though, at this point the capital for the next two years, the gas tax went up 2 per cent last year, was what he was talking about. With the federal infrastructure money the communities are actually fine for the two years because of the federal infrastructure monies for capital. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister Cochrane. Mr. O'Reilly.
Thanks, Mr. Chair. Just to follow up with one question. There has been no CPI increase in this year's money over last year? I want to confirm that because when I look at the money -- yes, we'll start with that. Thanks, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. O'Reilly. Ms. Young.
The CPI budget has not changed since capital funding was first introduced. In fact, if you look at your year-over-year you'll notice a decrease because we pulled Deline's capital funding out and we now block fund them through their self-government agreement, so that's the change you notice in the capital budget.
Thank you, Ms. Young. Mr. O'Reilly.
Thanks, Mr. Chair. I don't have any further questions. I want to thank the Minister and her witness for answering all my questions really well. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. O'Reilly. Minister Cochrane.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. We try our best to answer the questions very well. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister Cochrane. Anything further, Mr. O'Reilly?
No, thanks, Mr. Chair. My time is up. Thank you.
Thank you. Next we have Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, just along the same line, that has always been a bit of point of contention for me, actually, the capital project money going into the municipalities hasn't changed since the new deal, I think. I think the money has been $28 million, and then now it's decreased for Deline, but that's actually not really a decrease because that's just a transfer.
I think the Minister's answer is trying to live within the economic realities of today, but I personally see it the opposite way. If you increase the money going into the communities, I think that it would save money. Like money being spent, actual money being spent in the communities, has proven to save money in social spending. If we look at one of the things that they've done a model on was the National Guardianship Program and similar programs like that, where leveraging $1 was reducing social spending in Australia, as an example, by $3.70, and the money spent with the Nihat'ni Dene in Lutselk'e was saving $2.50 per dollar spent in the project.
My feeling is that we should not use that reason for not increasing the budget, because when you spend money, you reduce a lot of -- plus there are all kinds of other benefits, too, to GNWT spending money at the community level. I think that the department should take a serious look at increasing that budget at some point down the road. Like I said, no change. There are quite a few departments that have spent quite a few dollars during those 10 years or 12 years since the new deal has been signed. I do not know the exact year, but I know in 2007 when I became an MLA, there was a new deal then. There is no change in that money. I guess I cannot ask the Minister to increase the budget now. As a committee, we did not discuss that, so I am not going to ask the Minister on the floor to contemplate that, but for the future, I think that we should consider moving this money up. This is really good spending at the community level, and I think that it is important.
Also, with the same pot of money, I guess my question is that it is at $27 million some-odd dollars going into the communities. Some have surplus. There is an indication that the reason to have surpluses is they are having some difficulty spending the money. There have been legislation or policies put into effect that will allow the community to use this money to borrow money privately in order to do projects.
I want to ask the Minister if they have any sort of structure that would support the communities who wish to carry out their projects or advance their community projects using this money. I do not know if that is really clear, but that is my question. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Minister Cochrane.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. You look totally different now. It kind of caught me off guard. Yes, the communities actually can use their capital funding to actually borrow money. The Department of Municipal and Community Affairs does have guidelines around how that can be utilized, though. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister Cochrane. Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, is that applicable to Aboriginal community governments as well? I recognize that this would be standard for the hamlets and others elected among the entire population, like the town councils and so on. Would that also be applicable, when you have Aboriginal governments that have an agreement with the department to have this money, for spending this money? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Minister Cochrane.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes. With the Aboriginal governments' designated authorities, they can also use their capital funding to leverage it to borrow monies. Again, they have to agree, and they have to ideally use our guidelines to do that. We have done that with the Yellowknives Dene. We have done that just recently; so it is an option that they can use as well. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister Cochrane. Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have no more questions. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Mr. Blake.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just going to the formula funding, I know I remember when this was called the new deal, and I remember that because it was when I first got into leadership. Comparing that to the way things used to operate before that, this is the 10th year that we are operating like this, and I am always hopeful that it continues because of the opportunities we give the communities.
I have seen the benefits first-hand. If you go to all the communities, now there are projects happening all over the place. It creates a lot of employment, as well. I am just hopeful that we could keep this program continuing the way it does. It puts a lot of power into the community and council as well, because the council is the one that does know what the community needs. They all work together with the community to ensure that they have the capital projects in the communities. We have seen the Hamlet of Fort McPherson build a new building a few years back and possibly looking into an arena and other things that the communities need. It is great to see all the residents really thankful for that as well.
I just want to always remind the government of all of the positive things that this fund does. I would not want to see this structure come to an end. I will always make it a habit of encouraging our government to stay the course on this and make it a long-term project. Hopefully it lasts another 10 years or more. Thank you.
