Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the opportunity to come back to the questions around the official breach of the fiscal responsibility policy, Mr. Speaker. And so I want to start my first question off surrounding about -- sorry, encapsulating the question about when it was realized. So someone will realize, unofficially, there was a breach of the fiscal responsibility and then they'll confirm it through some analysis. So when were both of those areas identified? So in other words, when did they unofficially recognize that they had gone over and breached section 6(5)(c), and when did they officially confirm that it was in breach of the policy? Thank you.
Thank you, Member from Yellowknife Centre. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the Department of Finance does continuous monitoring of the fiscal health of the Government of the Northwest Territories and we do periodic updates to myself, to Cabinet, and to all Members of the House. As part of our capital budget and part of the changes we've made previously, one of those was to do a fiscal update here. And it was in preparations for that that we have identified that, indeed, we would be in a position that we would have to go to Ottawa because we'd be within that $120 million target. That is what led to the letter being sent. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And I appreciate the Minister getting towards the answer which was specifically when, but maybe I didn't use the words specifically and hence that was the opening she used.
Mr. Speaker, once the breach is noted, what does accountability look like or should we expect from a Minister who, as she says, they continuously monitor the situation? So in other words, her fingers must be constantly on the pulse of what the debt looks like. So what type of public accountability should the legislature expect that she's now going to Ottawa over this breach of policy? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this House is responsible for the budget of the Government of the Northwest Territories. If there is -- I mean, this is a bit of a hypothetical, what kind of accountability there is. We have made a number of changes in my time in this role, both in this government and in the last, to improve the availability of information, to improve the transparency of the information, to provide increases in terms of the availability of the fiscal responsibility policy, its clarity. This was the first year, the first government ever, that we actually put the fiscal strategy out in front of the public. These are all parts and parcel of the different types of accountability that are available for someone in my role and on the part of this government. So if there's some form of accountability that the Member wishes to see, I'm certainly happy to hear about it. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I couldn't agree more with the Minister that accountability can be hypothetical some days, at least from this perspective of the House.
Mr. Speaker, ultimately the question now is recognizing section -- I believe it's 6 -- sorry, yeah, section 6(5)(b) about the strategy on doing this, why isn't there a consultation line in there with Members to inform them immediately when such a breach of major policy happens? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we could certainly go back and look at the fiscal responsibility policy again and reconsider if there's some element within that that we want to look at in terms of changes how and when we report on different elements. The last time we did the review, there were some elements that were rejected by the Members at the time through the conversations we were having. There may be a different appetite from this group of Members as to what kind of responsibility they want to see in terms of reporting or engagements. One of the things that we certainly changed there was to have more of a fiscal update in the fall session with capital planning. So, again, certainly happy to take another look at it. We can see if that's a good use -- or a good opportunity and see if there's new appetite within this Assembly to make some of the changes or different changes that perhaps the last Assembly didn't want to make. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Finance. Final supplementary. Member from Yellowknife Centre.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Minister giving me a recap of the 19th Assembly but officially we're in the 20th Assembly, and we're almost a year into it, Mr. Speaker. So that said, I'm hearing conversations but really at the end of the day what would be helpful is the Minister commits to adding a component that Members are included earlier before decisions are made such as taking on generational debt, especially in a case like this when they're now reaching out with an unknown number that could potentially be any number and the Assembly, including the Members on this side of the House, have to take responsibility for. Mr. Speaker, would the Minister, with great urgency and zeal, add a component of communications in the fiscal responsibility policy that respects our duty of this House? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there's a lot of conversations that happen in this House. There's a lot of communications that happen in this House. There are briefings that are done in a consensus government confidentially to Members and through caucus processes which we then don't speak about, really to protect everybody's ability to have those conversations. So I guess if I can look back and discuss with the Members through their -- what maybe was missed, what was maybe not heard, what was maybe not seen, to ensure that firstly the processes that we do have are effective, and that the processes that we have are achieving the targets that we want them to. You know, Mr. Speaker, I'm happy to find a way to make it better. I don't think it's appropriate on the floor without talking to everyone in this House to determine what that should be. So I'm not today going to say, yes, this is the way to do it. I'm more than happy to ensure that we are communicating effectively. We have a lot of protocols between MLAs and Ministers about how we communicate, what that process looks like, what kinds of information, what's marked as confidential versus not. And, Mr. Speaker, it's not for mine to say, here standing today, which of those we want to upend or change. I'm more than happy to ensure that Cabinet -- or to take it up with the Department of Finance, that our financial processes are meeting that target and achieving that and if there's something more we need to do, then there's something more that we can do. I almost want to keep going, Mr. Speaker, but I feel like I've ended so I'm going to stop there. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Infrastructure. Member from Yellowknife North. Oral questions. Member from Yellowknife North.
