Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister of Infrastructure. Can the Minister tell us how the department is ensuring their RFPs are advised early enough in the new fiscal year to get work done during the upcoming short building season. How is industry being engaged in this conversation. Thank you.
Thank you, Member for Great Slave. Minister responsible for Infrastructure.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the department are doing we're doing infrastructure in different ways to be able to help reduce some of the carryovers working with the contractors to ensure that we get our tenders and our information out so that we can have timely projects happen. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It's always really frustrating to ask how things are being done to then just get an answer that they're being done. So I'm just going to leave it at that. But that's quite an odd answer. Can the Minister explain if projects are looked at as a whole both within her department and across the entire GNWT to see if there are savings to be had by planning these projects together. These could include maximizing their buying power by ordering bulk materials or sharing labour and transportation costs. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, yes, we are looking at different ways of doing this. For example, enhancing some of our project tracking tools, enhancing some of our project management with best practices. We are staggering out some of our projects in future years where possible, working with our Department of Finance as well to look at our procurement, find historical data. Mr. Speaker, I could go on. I will not other than to say, yes, we are doing that. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I'm glad to hear that the myths's department is doing something. Can the Minister advise if her department is examining the cost benefit of prepurchasing and shipping materials in ahead of time for future projects. So not only looking to maximize benefits by sharing between projects, but also being foreplanning, or preplanning proactive to see whether or not materials could be brought in at a time that the winter roads are in place or the barging is happening so that they're ready to go once the grounds thaws and work can be done. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, throughout the fiscal process, we do our capital plans in the fall so that contracts can be in place in time for summer barging as well as our ice road seasons. Before we can lose a half a year on any projects is at a minimum. We cannot enter into negotiations, RPFs, contracts until our infrastructure acquisition plan is approved every fall. We face capacity issues as well, Mr. Speaker. A number of our contractors that are available to do the work as well, they have same issues on trying to source material and finding workers as well. So thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Great Slave.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, can the Minister explain how often she consults with stakeholders who enter the RFP process? I want to make sure that we're actually giving our contractors time to meet the needs of the contract. If that contract doesn't come out until April, they have missed the window for winter roads and, you know, knowing how the barging goes, I doubt private industry wants to rely on that. So can the Minister explain how often is she actually meeting with industry stakeholders about RFPs. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, it all depends. I mean, we meet with contractors if and where possible. We have staff that continue to have dialogue with we as leaders in this government have meetings with Indigenous leaders, and we talk about some of the projects that advancing into the regions. So we do have discussions. And, you know, if the contractors have issues, they contact the department, and if they need to, they will we will have those discussions. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.
