Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, earlier, I was speaking to the issues of cost overruns in our contracts procurement -- sorry, project management and budgeting. Mr. Speaker, does the Minister agree that cost overruns are not simply an anecdotal problem, but are part of a wider systemic issue in our government? Thank you.
Thank you, Member from Frame Lake. Minister of Finance.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I've rather made a bit of an effort here since the start of the Members' statements to try to figure out the reference that was made. Mr. Speaker, the best I can discern, if we're going to actually speak about data, that this came from Open NWT's data source; it's a reference that goes back to 2004 listing, 2,000 contract that is go back some 20 years. I will note the last three years have single digits in terms of the count of contracts that have had change orders and would suggest that, perhaps, the situation is not as dire as it used to be in fact.
Moreover, Mr. Speaker, I can certainly speak to the matters that are at hand for this government, and arguably could speak to the last government, but I certainly can't speak to, again, what might have happened in years gone by. So, Mr. Speaker, it's not, in my view, helpful to speak about something that is anecdotal, nor necessarily systemic, because each individual project I certainly can say that I've looked into when there's cost overruns, I've asked questions of individual departments when there's cost overruns, and at every instance there's a number of very specific challenges that often arise. One of the biggest ones of late has been inflation which has been a significant impact across this country in the last few years. Another one has been the price of gas which has been a significant impact over the last few years which impacts upon the supply chain. Last but not least, Mr. Speaker, is the impact of the labour impact which has had a significant impact over the last few years. Beyond that, individually, different contracts, different problems, have arisen. Certainly happy to speak to that. And moreover is simply the fact that the bigger the project, the more likely there is to be some cost overrun but not all the time.
Again, Mr. Speaker, until the wildfires hit, the Taltson overhaul was actually on track, on budget, and then the wildfires hit and here we are. So, again, happy to speak individually but not anecdotically. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Minister for those -- that answer. Mr. Speaker, I think that the Minister is expressing some confidence but I would suggest that we do -- you know, and I've heard that Minister speak to -- and I know that she's committed to continuous improvement so, Mr. Speaker, are we reviewing our project management to look at how we can avoid excessive cost overruns? Are we implementing continuous improvement in our project management, learn from the mistakes that have been made in the past so that we can better manage our projects going forward and try and reduce the number of cost overruns? I do appreciate the Minister noting that reductions have started but let's keep going, Mr. Speaker. Thank you.
Yes, Mr. Speaker. Yes, Mr. Speaker, committed to continuous improvement. And, Mr. Speaker, I want to give a few examples quickly. I know it's question period and the clock is running down, but, Mr. Speaker, Inuvik wind has come up a few times. That is a problem -- project that's had a number of different problems arise over the course of it. I can say that the Northwest Territories Power Corporation intends to do a review of that, intends to do a lessons learned, to ensure that even if we can explain each individual challenge, each and every one of them we should be looking at to try to ensure we avoid it on the next go around.
Similarly, Mr. Speaker, I can also say again we are well aware that when the projects take longer from inception to completion, then you wind up in situations where the initial cost estimate simply doesn't match up the reality 5, 10, 7, 8, years later. Too many things can change. The better we can do to improve our planning processes, the better we will do to ensure that the costs at the end match the budget at the beginning. And I can say that that is ongoing work. That is very much the work that the Department of Finance is committed to, procurement shared services, and the Department of Infrastructure on each of these projects to do those lookbacks. So that's the long answer. The short answer is yes. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, similarly, to project management, are we reviewing how we budget for capital projects and how we might better estimate final costs for these large-scale projects? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, one of the challenges of some projects is on -- when there's federal funding and moving too quickly. That has certainly been a concern. The other problem is not having enough planning time done. So, Mr. Speaker, something folks may have noticed in the last couple of weeks is that there often are planning dollars associated to projects rather than the big dollars associated to the announcement of the project. Mr. Speaker, it doesn't look very exciting in a budget but it means that we're actually putting something out, taking the time to do the design and planning, so that when we do come to the point of saying it's time to go get federal dollars, not going too soon, but going when we know what that project's actually going to cost, because when you get the federal dollars, if a project runs over, they won't cover the extra; it comes down to us. So if we want to keep those 75/25, couldn't agree more, we must plan before we go chasing federal money and before we put our own dollars to it. So that as you will see -- as I said, is a bigger focus in the capital plan now than it was several years ago, and I'm happy to say that we'll continue that focus. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Finance. Final supplementary. Member from Frame Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, finally, has the Minister considered establishing targets for improvements? So a certain percentage of projects not going over budget anymore, have they thought about identifying kind of a plan for addressing this issue, setting targets to shoot for, and working to meet them to ensure that we are budgeting appropriately, managing projects well, ensuring that we are keeping projects within budget? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, happy to take that as a suggestion to establish targets. I mean, really, the target is for no project to go significantly over budget, and there's an obligation on all of our project management teams across departments to work to that goal. But, Mr. Speaker, again, always looking for opportunities to continue to do better. There's been a lot of change in the procurement space and the project planning space in the last few years, and again, very happy to take it away and see what more we can do in that regard. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Finance.
Colleagues, I'd like to recognize a few more honoured guests here today from the Yamoga Land Corp president, Joseph Tobac; Bob Overvold; and the North Slave Metis president, Marc Whitford. Welcome to your Assembly. Thank you very much.
Oral questions. Member from Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
