Kieron Testart

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I move, seconded by the honourable Member for Hay River North, that Committee Report 21-18(3), Report on the Review of the 2015-2016 and 2016-2017 Annual Reports of the Office of the Languages Commissioner for the Northwest Territories, be received by the Assembly, and Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to waive rule 100(4) and have Committee Report 21-18(3) moved into Committee of the Whole for further consideration today. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Was there any consideration to using these fees as a cost recovery mechanism and keeping them fixed at a rate that is commensurate to the government's costs on administering land title transfers and the other business of land titles, rather than just increasing the fees? Thank you.

I do share the Minister's caution. It is not all that appropriate for governments to reach in to private commercial matters, but there is some precedent when it is useful to government such as MTS. We bought those assets, and now we are using it. If there is a real need for a campus, could this be an opportunity to start fresh? I appreciate what the Minister is saying.

Now, there is some concern, as well, that the public has brought forward around demolition and all that material that as the Minister said, may or may not be hazardous going to the Yellowknife landfill and potentially being an...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today, I rise to commemorate the sacrifices made by Allied soldiers on the shores of Normandy, France, 75 years ago today. Canadian soldiers, along with their Commonwealth and American allies, took part in the largest seaborne invasion in human history. This landing opened a western front on mainland Europe, and over roughly the next year, along with Soviet forces in the east, the Third Reich was besieged from all sides and ultimately surrendered in May 1945.

The task our forces had before them in the early morning hours of June 6, 1944, a task which had never been...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I move the chair rise and report progress.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Environmental liability has been a subject of interest for the committee over the years reviewing the public accounts. Again, the transparency around these liabilities has improved year on year. We have recommended that the GNWT put this information on some sort of website or single portal so it's very clear what the environmental liabilities are, where they're located, and additional information that may be relevant to an interested member of the public. The Treasury Board of Canada has a similar digital repository for the environmental liabilities of the Government of...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. One of the sources that we often look at to understand public sector accounting and how governments report on their own finances is annual reports from the C.D. Howe Institute. That is not our sole authoritative source, but it is a very good one. They have done a lot of work on this, and they grade different provinces and territories in the quality of how they are reporting their public accounts. Unfortunately, the GNWT usually receives around a D. PEI got worse. They have a D-. It is imperative that we find better ways to improve.

A consolidated budget is one of those...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I will just point out that, in our ongoing quest for more plain-language documents when it comes to very complex public-sector accounting such as the public accounts of the Government of the Northwest Territories, we have always pushed for better ways to show how much the government plans to spend, how much they have actually spent, and everything in between. In our conversations this year, the committee noted that a consolidated budget would be a good way to get this around, and the comptroller general at the time indicated that the GNWT believed it was in a position to...

Thank you, Mr. Chair. This marks the final review of public accounts for the Standing Committee on Government Operations in the life of the 18th Assembly. Over the years, the standing committee has gained a great deal of knowledge about the public accounts process and has developed its own best practices for dealing with public accounts. This is a really fascinating area of legislatures in Canada and around the world, and there is a great deal of knowledge to learn. It's our hope that some of our knowledge and experience will be transferred on to future Assemblies, and we will be able to see...

Thank you to the Minister for that clarification. The Minister hasn't looked at this. Has any analysis been done on it, not just on whether it is for a GNWT project, but just on the viability of the building as a commercial development? The GNWT rents space from this development corporation. Is there any reason why they are not renting space in this particular asset?