Mahsi, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my questions are for the Minister of Finance on maximizing public revenue. I have mentioned the expert report that highlights weaknesses of our royalty collection regime. Are the Minister and his staff familiar with these reports, and what action have they taken to evaluate and consider the content of them with respect to tax policy formulation? Mahsi.
Masi. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We are familiar with the reports and we are just going through them and looking at their contents and doing analysis. Thank you.
I am pleased to hear the Minister is familiar with the reports. What action does he plan to take on their contents?
That depends on the content. I mean, the way we do business in the Northwest Territories, of course, we listen to and we follow all comments out there, but at the end of the day we will evaluate their contents and see if it's one that would apply or work for the benefit of the people of the Northwest Territories whom we 19 Members were all elected to represent.
I want to emphasize again, this report was not written by my Mom. These people are world-wide experts in revenue generation through resource royalties. So I am very interested to know how the Minister is going to evaluate the contents of these reports and bring the results to bear for discussion in the House?
We have experts of our own within the government system who are well versed in these types of correspondence so we will review it. I commit to the Member we will review the contents of the reports that were done and see how it fits into how we do business in the Northwest Territories.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife Centre.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the Minister for that commitment. As I said in my statement, I am not asking the Minister to raise taxes. What I am asking for is for him to work with the Standing Committee on Government Operations to set the terms of referenced for an evaluation of NWT tax policy and to provide the public with an opportunity to comment on that so that we can generate some discussion about revenue prior to the end of the Assembly. Can the Minister make that commitment? Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, absolutely. I mean, I would be more than happy to sit down with the committee. We've had some discussions with committee on own-source revenue in the Northwest Territories. We've had some feedback on committee on own-source revenue in the Northwest Territories, and I would be more than happy to sit down with committee, as I always am, to get their feedback as to how we can move forward. Because at the end of the day all the decisions that are made should be decisions that are made by this Assembly, and we should have some common ground and see what we can do to mitigate any impact it might have on people in the Northwest Territories. So I have made that commitment in kind of a long way, but I just had to add something in there. I did not want to just say yes.
---Laughter
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Sahtu.
