Caroline Wawzonek

Thank you, Madam Chair. Again, the only reason that the Department of Finance has received in terms of when we evaluate a submission like this coming forward, certainly, is that there wasn't a lot of flexibility at this stage of the fiscal year remaining for MACA and that, at this stage of the fiscal year, they had already used up a lot of their available room in terms of their support for community governments and grants-in-lieu, et cetera, so, while certainly in their total budget, there might have been some flexibility. Being where we are now here in the fall, late fall, there was limited...

That kind of a consideration is not currently within the department's purview of projects underway right now. That said, there are a number of things that the department is doing to try to improve the speed of which small northern businesses are being paid. There are a number of things that can be done and a number of steps that can be taken to improve that process, not the least of which would be to just encourage the vendors themselves to be using e-mail, to be directing things, fulsome information, as well, Mr. Speaker, to ensure that our departments know that those vendors invoices go...

Thank you, Madam Chair. Even at present, this is probably a few days old. The current forecast of the department is to be in a slight decrease in overall cash flow by the end of the fiscal. What we are able to have repaid will depend very much on what revenues we are able to get back in.

I can assure the Member that the request to make this part of the short-term borrowing limit would stand only until the end of the fiscal year. To the extent that there would be a total increase in the short-term borrowing limit, that may well be changed significantly in time for the next fiscal strategy so...

Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, I am hesitant always to put other departments on the spot, but I would certainly expect that we likely have that information within Finance, and so, to the extent that I can provide some further chronology on when that taxation information was received, the Department of Finance will certainly endeavour to see what information we have .

Madam Chair, that's correct. The number that we settled on in terms of coming forward to the Assembly is one that we thought was certainly as low as possible, but while retaining sufficient flexibility, looking at the projected cash flows from now to the end of just this fiscal year, again.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Department of Finance does attempt to pay all vendors within 30 days, which I would suggest is really an industry standard. It allows an opportunity to due diligence on the materials that are presented in support of an invoice, in addition to which the goal in fact is to pay BIP members or BIP businesses within 20 days, a standard that we are working towards. So that is the rationale, Mr. Speaker. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. There are a number of contributing factors that are impacting on the cash flow, as we have identified them quite recently. For one, simply put, there was a much lower starting point from what had been projected; outstanding receivables from the Northwest Territories Health and Social Services Authority for repayment of their payroll, $117 million; the collective agreement resulted in increases to overall GNWT payroll, and that has impacted on the cash flow estimates; the delay in terms of federal funding that is received and that will be coming in as revenue but that...

I just want to clarify, Madam Chair, when the city bill was received generally.

In the interest of time, Madam Chair, I'll just turn it over to Mr. Koe.

Thank you, Madam Chair. There is an increase in the Norman Wells mill rates. With respect to the opening of the Norman Wells Health Centre, that does include some of the additional increase, $52,000. As well, there are some other assets within the Yellowknife region where, again owing to the change in rate, the assessment values also rose. That accounts, I believe, for the remainder of the full amount being sought on the supplementary appropriation. Thank you, Madam Chair.