Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions will continue to be to the Minister of Transportation regarding the Deh Cho Bridge. For clarity, did our engineers ever order Ruskin to take steps to complete the Deh Cho Bridge by the end of 2012 at Ruskin’s cost and by what authority are they instructing that direction?
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Minister of Transportation, Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. In the contract that exists with Ruskin, again, it is not a fixed price contract. When there are change orders, some of those change orders are the responsibility of the owner, in this case the Government of the Northwest Territories, and we would certainly work with the contractor on a schedule and on costs, and we’ve been doing that all along.
Again, in March of this year it became apparent that the contractor would not be able to complete the project by November. So we had to look at different strategies to allow us to get that accomplished, and the option that we chose was to work with the contractor to make sure that that happened. Thank you.
Thank you. Will the Minister table the 2010 contract signed with Ruskin, along with the 2012 new agreement signed with Ruskin and then finally supply a copy to my office as soon as possible?
Thank you. The Member keeps talking about a contract from 2010. That was a contract signed by a previous government and I would not be in a position to respond to a decision of the previous government, but there were a number of questions asked in this House in 2010 and I don’t believe the Member asked any of those questions at that time. Thank you.
Thank you. In 2010 a particular Member of this House had pointed the Cabinet to stop blaming previous governments for their problems and certainly take decisions and responsibility. Just a moment ago, the Minister referred to the present contract in the present terms, which is the 2010 contract. So it’s still relevant. So the question is: Would the Minister supply the 2010 contract with Ruskin alongside the companion document that I’ve asked for, which is the 2012 document signed with Ruskin? Thank you.
I believe that was the same question I asked the previous government, whether or not I could get a copy of that contract. I believe at the time the answer was no and it would remain no.
Maybe the Minister then could help the public understand why it’s not a reasonable question now when it was a reasonable question before, because the public has no idea on how this contract is being implemented and yet all of a sudden it’s not worthy and we’re scrapping it and putting in a new contract. There are a lot of mysteries out there. In short, explain why we can’t get to the bottom of this contract, find out what the clauses are in there that have us on the hook for more costs. The public wants to know.
I may not be able to supply the contract in its entirety to the Member, but what I would put out there is, perhaps, we can get the details. They don’t have to be exactly specific, but when it comes to costs and who is responsible for what, I believe certainly the Member and the public both deserve to know that. We can’t produce the contract itself but perhaps we can get some of the details on how the contract works so that both the Member and the public would have a better understanding of why we’re in the position we’re in today. I think that may be a worthwhile exercise and I’ll endeavour to get that for the Member.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Final supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to ask the Minister when we will get those particular details. Of course, we are running short of session days and it would be useful for both myself and the public to get these questions out in a timely manner. That’s simply the question. When can we get it? Can we get it before Monday?
It’s taken the Member about six years to start asking questions about the project. I can try to get that information to the Member by early next week.
