Thank you. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I was a bit hesitant to commit my colleagues but certainly to when there's a strategy that's underway being developed for electronic health records, it is common practice that we would as the Ministers appear in front of the standing committees with that type of information. So I'm relatively confident that my colleague won't mind me making that commitment on her behalf. Thank you.
Thank you. Department of Health and Social Services, capital investment expenditures, administrative and supportive services, not previously authorized, $10,631,000. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Department of Health and Social Services, capital investment expenditures, health and social programs, not previously authorized 8,853,000. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you. Department of Health and Social Services, capital investment expenditures, total department, not previously authorized, $19,484,000. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Please turn to page 13 and 14.
Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment, capital investment expenditures, economic diversification and business support, not previously authorized, $9,746,000. Does committee agree? Member for Hay River South.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Can the Minister confirm why we have that increase in the plan and what would be the drivers of that increase? Thank you.
Thank you. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, there's a couple of different reasons for it. Approximately $1.8 million is due to increased costs of equipment, and that in itself is in turn due to the changes globally right now. It's a specialized equipment, and it's being impacted by the supply chain delays and being impacted by the costs on some of the basic components that go into the equipment.
There is additional amounts increased as a result of change orders. There were some delays in this project as you might recall, and as time is going on, it does seem like all costs are rising rather quickly these days, so.
And Madam Chair, just to anticipate a further question, I don't know if there's going to be some other impacts as a result of the floods. The fish plant itself was not damaged or in an area that was damaged. But I'm certainly conscious that the community itself is obviously going to be experiencing some significant impacts and will no doubt have some significant impacts on the local construction industry, including those working on the plant. Thank you.
Thank you. Member for Hay River South.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I guess I'm interested to know if the project is on schedule and what is the projected timeline for completion. Thank you.
Thank you. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Madam Chair. It was on schedule to be complete by November of this year. There had been some talk of even being able to go down and to do some sort of formal opening. At this point, Madam Chair, I'm not sure whether that will still be the case, whether that's due to some delays that may arise out of the flood or not, I will when I have an update on that, I will certainly provide it to my colleagues. Thank you.
Thank you. Member for Hay River South.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, and I guess that's my concern is that with the flood, I know the prime on that contractor, on the plant, is doing quite a bit of work with respect to the flood so I'm just wondering, you know, if they're going to have their resources and the forces the workforce there to actually get back and put a hundred percent effort into that plant. So it'd be good to know that, and the Minister can get back to me later on that one.
The second another question is talking about equipment and waiting for it. Will any of the equipment be coming from the old FFMC plant, and if so, will there be any additional costs with that? Thank you.
Thank you. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I don't have the breakdown or the details of the project specifically here. What we have in front of us here, really just information about carryovers or lapses. But, so I don't think so. I will confirm that and let the Member know. But my understanding and recollection of this project is that it was being specially designed. It was specially designed to be CFIA compliant and under the sort of the watchful eyes of Memorial University who had some specialty in this area. So with all that, I know that they were looking largely at new things and new equipment in order to be compliant and in order to meet those specifications. Again, if I'm incorrect, I will certainly update the Member. Thank you.
Thank you. Member for Hay River South.
No further questions. Thank you.
Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment, capital investment expenditures, economic diversification and business support, not previously authorized, $9,746,000. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment, capital investments expenditures, mineral and petroleum resources, not previously authorized, $2,176,000. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment, capital investment expenditures, tourism and parks, not previously authorized, $2,736,000. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment, capital investment expenditures, total department, not previously authorized, $14,658,000. Does committee agree?
Agreed.
Thank you, committee. Please turn now to page 15 and 16 of the tabled document.
Department of Infrastructure, capital investment expenditures, asset management, not previously authorized $20,274,000. Does committee agree? Member for Frame Lake.
Thanks, Madam Chair. So this is, I think, the largest item in the sup, and it seems to be a big area of our spending as well. So I guess the question I want to ask is were there any projects from 20212022 or 20202021 that were carried over but lapsed and taken out of the, say the capital plan? I'm not sure if I'm making any sense.
Is there stuff that we're not seeing here that it's been lapsed totally, is not going to come back in the books, and it's not part of the capital plan? Thanks, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, readily we don't have an answer to that question. So we'll certainly make a commitment to go and confirm both with Department of Infrastructure as well as Department of Finance to see if my understanding is if there's projects that had been previously carried over and that now are going to be lapsed and not advanced is what I'm hearing. I will go and double check on that, as I said. And yes, yes. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you for that commitment. Member for Frame Lake.
Yes, thanks, Madam Chair. Yes, and I appreciate the position the Minister's in; this coming as a bit of a surprise. But I think we're trying to figure out to make this more transparent process for everybody.
So one of the issues that I've got with the capital planning, the way that it's been done is, you know, Members sit in the Chamber, they get the capital estimates, they vote on them, most Members vote in favour, even this lowly Member occasionally but not probably in this Assembly. But so Members vote in favour of projects in the capital estimates but then somehow during the course of the year, something doesn't happen and the project doesn't go ahead, and nobody ever finds out about it until maybe it comes back as a zombie project in a sup.
So is there a way in which Members can actually, you know, after they've given approval to capital estimates, there's a capital budget, how do Members find out if projects don't go ahead? Thanks, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Member. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Well, Madam Chair, I suppose there's a few different ways that one might do that. Certainly when there's a particular projects that are being followed along, that's certainly one way, and I certainly answered questions on ITI projects for instance, or some of the finance systems projects. I recognize that's not necessarily the broad brushstroke that's being sought here.
You know, it may well be that we need a different type of tracking system that monitors and tracks the delivery of projects. That's certainly you know, when we're talking about or "we", when I have spoken about recently procurement shared services and the procurement onestop shop meant to be a better repository of information about what is happening with procurement of projects. So we'll certainly look back to see if in fact that type of information is there. That site is only just going live quite recently. So again, maybe some room to ensure that it's achieving that goal of providing that kind of public tracking or that this might be an opportunity to see that it does do that, in fact. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Member for Frame Lake.
Yes, thanks, Madam Chair. Yes, I'd appreciate that from the Minister. I think that's the kind of transparency, accountability, and sharing of what should be publiclyavailable information that I'm looking for. So I'm happy on that one.
The question, though, I want to ask is, you know, and I would have asked it at the beginning, but I'm going to try to sneak it in here. We're getting really close to the reserve for the entire supplementary estimates, and I think some of it is largely due to spending on asset management in particular.
But what happens we've only got I think 11 million maybe the Minister can tell me, how much is left in the reserve, and what happens if we get any closer to it? Thanks, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Madam Chair. So there isn't, as part of the overall fiscal plan or picture, a capital reserve. The supplementary reserve, which we spoke about yesterday, yes, that was sitting at $35 million this year and is definitely seeing a fair bit of pressure on it right now. But when we're funding capital projects, you have to fund the capital projects 50 percent out of surplus dollars and then the other 50 percent would typically come from some form of borrowing.
So to the extent that we are eating in to or increasing our capital spend, we are drawing that down from the projected surpluses that we were holding on to in compliance with the fiscal responsibility policy. That, or going in for borrowing. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Member for Frame Lake.
Yes, thanks, Madam Chair, and thanks to the Minister for that. I guess maybe I might suggest, then, that in the review of the Fiscal Responsibility Policy that this idea of a reserve on the infrastructure side is something that the department might look at. Yes, is that something that they could consider? Thanks, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Madam Chair. And as I mentioned earlier, Madam Chair, there is an existing commitment to look at the Fiscal Responsibility Policy so this certainly may well be that opportunity. And similarly, as I had said, there's ongoing work happening with respect to the reporting on contracting and procurement more generally. So this may also be that opportunity to again to look there. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you. Department of Infrastructure, capital investment expenditures, asset management, not previously authorized, $20,274,000. Does committee agree? Oh, Member for Hay River South.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I just wanted to go to these culverts in highway reconstruction.
This spring we had a number of washouts on Highway 1 and which required some you know, a lot of labour and equipment. And I see with the culverts there, will some of that work take into account, you know, some of the issues that we did experience this spring, or is that going to be additional funds we'll be looking for? Thank you.
Thank you. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, this spring's culvert work would come out of what would have been appropriated as part of the usual appropriation. So this is for work that was underway or not completed but underway or begun last year. The annual amount that is budgeted for culvert work I gather is $7.5 million, and that remains unchanged. Thank you.
